Think this illustrates a huge problem with even starting to have a serious debate on the subject. Whenever there are surveys on this they consistently show that peoples perception of the numbers is way out. You could stop every single boat tomorrow and it wouldn't even scratch the surface of the immigration 'problem'.
Then you hit the problem that we've seen on here in the past, when you show the correct numbers they're just dismissed as 'fake news'. Immigration is coming down, action is being taken on hotel use (which is a problem entirely manufactured by the last government stopping processing new asylum seeker applications), visa restrictions are being tightened.
The one thing it seems hard to get any clarity on is what people actually want. You will get a handful who will say zero immigration or even remove immigrants already here but the economy couldn't cope with that. Just saying lower the number doesn't really help when there's many different types of migration.
Yeah, unfortunately most don’t even understand or try to understand the actual numbers involved. I think that’s the same on both sides of the debate though.
What has been needed and hasn’t ever been delivered, is some kind of industrial/ employment plan* as to what’s needed short term and longer term. Tying in with unis, public sector and large private employers. This then also tied back into welfare state as we can’t have such a large proportion of the working population not working….theres no point importing labour when there could be the labour available here with the right training/support
Once that’s done an adult conversation been the political parties and the public about all the trade offs. I just can’t see this happening though
*I think the government are preparing one. I personally think one should’ve been done prior to Brexit and formed part of the debate.