This bulletin presents two articles, one from Australia and the other from the UK. We forward them to you because both countries have immigration problems similar to those in Canada.
The Australian article presents the view of Professor Tim Flannery, Australian Of The Year in 2007, and author of “The Weather Makers : The History and Future Impact Of Climate Change”. Flannery says that decisions about immigration levels have to be removed from the hands of politicians and placed in the control of an independent group. This body should make decisions about Australia’s future immigration intake by considering immigration’s potential environmental, economic and social impact on the country.
The UK article presents the revelations of Andrew Neather, Labour Party adviser and speech-writer for former Prime Minister Tony Blair. Neather has stated that in 2000, Labour initiated a high immigration policy to re-engineer the cultural make-up of the UK and “to rub the opposition’s nose in diversity”.
However, in doing so, the Labour Party shamelessly betrayed its base, the UK working class, and has probably committed suicide.
These two stories are clearly very relevant. Prime Minister Harper has recently visited India. He is scheduled to go to China in December. One of the main purposes of his trips is to get votes from the Sikhs and Chinese in Canada. This continual search for the immigrant vote undermines and ignores Canada’s larger interests.
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TWO VIEWS: (1) FROM AUSTRALIA : INDEPENDENT ARBITER SHOULD DECIDE IMMIGRATION LEVELS ; (2) FROM UK : LABOUR PARTY ABANDONED WORKERS TO CREATE DIVERSITY
Let independent arbiter decide immigration levels, says Flannery
Jason Dowling
The Sydney Morning Herald
November 11, 2009
AUSTRALIA’S immigration intake should be reviewed and an independent board, similar to the Reserve Bank, should be established to set immigration policy, says a former Australian of the Year, Tim Flannery.
”Immigration has always been a tool of economic policy, economic development, or else it has been set as a result of scare campaigns by people who don’t like foreigners,” he said.
There had been no estimation of the rate of immigration that allows for the protection of the environment, he said, but immigration was ”far too important to be left to government”.
”Government will always want more taxpayers, and business will always want more customers – so put them together and you’ll get a recipe for endless population growth.”
Mr Flannery said a body completely independent of government, one that could not be bullied, should be in charge of immigration.
”Just like the Reserve Bank, it would set [the level of immigration] in the interest of the nation.”
He said the independent committee should have a proper charter ”just like the Reserve Bank or just like the electoral commission”. ”A full justification would have to go with each annual intake, exactly why from an environmental perspective, social and economic – done transparently,” he said.
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Labour wanted mass immigration to make UK more multicultural, says former adviser
Labour threw open Britain’s borders to mass immigration to help socially engineer a “truly multicultural” country, a former Government adviser has revealed.
By Tom Whitehead, Home Affairs Editor
The Telegraph
Published: 6:42PM BST 23 Oct 2009
The huge increases in migrants over the last decade were partly due to a politically motivated attempt by ministers to radically change the country and “rub the Right’s nose in diversity”, according to Andrew Neather, a former adviser to Tony Blair, Jack Straw and David Blunkett.
He said Labour’s relaxation of controls was a deliberate plan to “open up the UK to mass migration” but that ministers were nervous and reluctant to discuss such a move publicly for fear it would alienate its “core working class vote”.
As a result, the public argument for immigration concentrated instead on the economic benefits and need for more migrants.
Critics said the revelations showed a “conspiracy” within Government to impose mass immigration for “cynical” political reasons.
Mr Neather was a speech writer who worked in Downing Street for Tony Blair and in the Home Office for Jack Straw and David Blunkett, in the early 2000s.
Writing in the Evening Standard, he revealed the “major shift” in immigration policy came after the publication of a policy paper from the Performance and Innovation Unit, a Downing Street think tank based in the Cabinet Office, in 2001.
He wrote a major speech for Barbara Roche, the then immigration minister, in 2000, which was largely based on drafts of the report.
He said the final published version of the report promoted the labour market case for immigration but unpublished versions contained additional reasons, he said.
He wrote: “Earlier drafts I saw also included a driving political purpose: that mass immigration was the way that the Government was going to make the UK truly multicultural.
“I remember coming away from some discussions with the clear sense that the policy was intended even if this wasn’t its main purpose to rub the Right’s nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date.”
The “deliberate policy”, from late 2000 until “at least February last year”, when the new points based system was introduced, was to open up the UK to mass migration, he said.
Some 2.3 million migrants have been added to the population since then, according to Whitehall estimates quietly slipped out last month.
On Question Time on Thursday, Mr Straw was repeatedly quizzed about whether Labour’s immigration policies had left the door open for the BNP.
In his column, Mr Neather said that as well as bringing in hundreds of thousands more migrants to plug labour market gaps, there was also a “driving political purpose” behind immigration policy.
He defended the policy, saying mass immigration has “enriched” Britain, and made London a more attractive and cosmopolitan place.
But he acknowledged that “nervous” ministers made no mention of the policy at the time for fear of alienating Labour voters.
“Part by accident, part by design, the Government had created its longed-for immigration boom.
“But ministers wouldn’t talk about it. In part they probably realised the conservatism of their core voters: while ministers might have been passionately in favour of a more diverse society, it wasn’t necessarily a debate they wanted to have in working men’s clubs in Sheffield or Sunderland.”
Sir Andrew Green, chairman of the Migrationwatch think tank, said: “Now at least the truth is out, and it’s dynamite.
“Many have long suspected that mass immigration under Labour was not just a *bleep* up but also a conspiracy. They were right.
“This Government has admitted three million immigrants for cynical political reasons concealed by dodgy economic camouflage.”
The chairmen of the cross-party Group for Balanced Migration, MPs Frank Field and Nicholas Soames, said: “We welcome this statement by an ex-adviser, which the whole country knows to be true.
“It is the first beam of truth that has officially been shone on the immigration issue in Britain.”
A Home Office spokesman said: Our new flexible points based system gives us greater control on those coming to work or study from outside Europe, ensuring that only those that Britain need can come.
Britain’s borders are stronger than ever before and we are rolling out ID cards to foreign nationals, we have introduced civil penalties for those employing illegal workers and from the end of next year our electronic border system will monitor 95 per cent of journeys in and out of the UK.
The British people can be confident that immigration is under control.
