This day is the 75th anniversary of over 800 migrants arriving in Britain at Tilbury Docks in south Essex on HMT Empire Windrush on 22 June 1948. On board were more than 800 passengers from the Caribbean.
Today we also look back with shame at the hostile environment our politicians created from around 2013 as they sought to deport legal residents from the Windrush generation.
And we remind ourselves of the reasons why immigration is good ....
1) Migrants fought and died for our country to defend the liberty we still have
2) Compared with locals, a higher % or migrants pay tax, a lower % take benefits or use services like the NHS, a lower % burden society by committing crime
3) Migrants enrich our culture with their arts, entertainment, sport, music and retaurants
4) Migrants support their country or origin by passing wealth back to family there
5) Educational migrants in the UK as students pay higher fees than local students, thus subsidising our universities
6) Educational migrant in the UK as students create jobs in our universities and in the local economy around universities and in businesses that serve universities
7) Migration enables people to flee persecution and poverty and broaden their life opportunities
8) Migration significantly staffs our NHS
9) Migration eases a tight labour market
10) Migrants do jobs locals don't want to do
11) Migrants increase the weath of our nation
12) Migration is key to staffing the increasing social care economy as the average age of our native population gets older
13) Migrants slow or halt population shrinkage
14) Migration isn't to blame for fewer job opportunities or stagnant wages or overcrowded services, but lazy incompetent politcians are, (particularly those who cynically and wrongly blame migrants for any issue they think voters don't like).
15) Many migrants at universities spark new ideas that lead to patents
16) Migrants are twice as likely as locals to start a business
17) In citizenship ceremonies migrants swear their loyalty to the Crown and the UK and that they'll respect the UK's rights and freedoms, uphold its democratic values, observe its laws and fulfil their duties and obligations as a British citizen
18) Migrants make our cities more cosmopolitan and so more attractive to business
And some final thoughts ...
Religious courts and laws not recognised in British laws should not be allowed to enforce their viewspoint on others
Politicians do need to use facts and analysis to determine what level of net immigration we can sustaiably support.
In areas where migrant populations are a significant % of the population, politicians need to support locals as they adjust to the migrants
If low skilled migrants are in demand, we should create legal ways of them entering the UK, rather than making their only option to use illegal routes
Migrants should learn the English language
