Immigration: locking the stable door?

Enoch was right.

 

All those years ago he predicted that by the turn of the century immigrants in the UK would make up 8% of the population. Forty years on, it’s 8.5%.

 

And at this time there is a rough estimate that there are 600,000+ illegals, but the figure could be 800,000. These are people who have crept through the rat-holes left by our notoriously ineffective ‘Border Agency’, those who have overstayed their visas, and failed asylum seekers. Try finding and deporting that lot! Last year, the BA managed to get rid of 15,000. At that rate it will take 40 years to clear the backlog.

 

Immigration, which has been a political taboo since Enoch’s time, is back on the agenda with a new Immigration Bill.

 

It  will do away with the never-ending scandal of years-long appeals funded by the taxpayer ending in a ludicrous judgment in favour of the immigrant because he has a cat or some other totally spurious claim to ‘privacy and a family life’. There are 70,000 appeals a year. The only winners are criminals and lawyers.

 

Grounds for appeal will be reduced from 17 to 4; most of the ECHR loopholes will be blocked.

 

There will also be a power to deport criminals first and deal with their appeals later.

 

There will be a crack-down on abuse of public services (some action has already been taken under existing legislation to tighten benefit controls over immigrants who have no right to work in the UK). It is estimated that illegals cost the NHS £330 million  a year. In future, immigrants with temporary visas will have to make a contribution.

 

The regulations about EU immigrants will be toughened so that the right to reside as a job seeker will cease after 6 months if still unemployed  with no realistic prospect otherwise. That should take care of Romanian gypsies.

 

It will be easier to identify illegals through checks at the point of embarkation, fingerprinting and cracking down on phony marriages. And there will be new powers to make it more difficult for illegals to live here, by bank account checks, making landlords check the immigration status of their tenants, and revoking driving licences on visa expiry.

 

Too little, too late, perhaps, but it’s a start.

 

There should be no problems with the passage of the Bill; the Labour Party supports it. It even wants to strengthen it.

 

I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth………………..