Saturday, February 24, 2024

Michael Lambert: Desperate Tories Target Foreign Workers to Save 'Red Wall' Votes

Feb 24, 2024 | The British government seems determined to do everything possible to stop foreigners from coming to the UK. Presumably this is in an attempt to pander to the Daily Express and Daily Mail readers who backed Brexit and who favour tougher restrictions on foreigners coming to the UK.

The latest immigration regulations make it all but impossible for any unskilled worker to come to work in the UK. For skilled workers there are considerable hurdles to overcome. In response to higher than expected and record immigration from non-EU countries following Brexit, the government has now announced that, in future, those wishing to work in the UK will not be allowed to bring their dependants. This will almost certainly result in a significant reduction in those coming and will further add to the UK's woes.

There are no longer any legal routes for asylum seekers to come to the UK or to apply for asylum. There are tens of thousands waiting for their applications to be processed. They are being paid around £6 per day for subsistence whilst just one of the firms providing accommodation made a profit of £62 million last year.

Preventing workers from coming to the UK and failing to process asylum applications from those who have arrived from across the Channel, having no other route to the UK, is stupid and inefficient and will only damage the UK economy more.