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Authors: Richard T. Kelly
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trends. Numbers of foreign students are down again.’
Bloody Malahide will be all over that , thought Blaylock.
‘That said, some concerns in the other direction are a nine per cent rise in asylum applications, and a notable fall in the numbers of illegal migrants forcibly removed or leaving of their own accord. Also fewer Britons have gone off to live abroad, but we have rising numbers coming in from Spain, Italy, France – the wine belt, oddly.’
‘I’m all for southerners heading north,’ Blaylock murmured. Someone chuckled – Ben? But he was disconsolate. He yearned to see this issue afresh, not so wearied by the years, but it appeared intractable. And he had come to understand how it told on longer servers than himself – why staff who could hardly be considereddepartmental veterans nonetheless looked suddenly aged and helpless.
The immigration system creaked. No available resources could be thought adequate, no figures truly accurate. And no truly talented staffers wanted anything to do with it, while those who were politely forced into it just served their time counting beans down in Croydon. Blaylock could all too easily imagine some of them, overwhelmed by the workload, afflicted by paralysis, pushing obstinate figures into a drawer and turning a key. He could picture secret lock-ups – warehouses, even – jammed with cabinets full of abandoned immigration case files. It was one of his second-order stay-awakes at night.
Indisputably of the first order, though, was the fact of party conference in a fortnight when he would be required to say that immigration was falling, which would, on present evidence, be to say that black was white. It was a party political problem, thus not one shared by the permanent civil service round the table, yet he was compelled to make everyone feel the urgency.
‘This is not good,’ said Blaylock, finally.
Eric cleared his throat. ‘It’s not ideal . But there is, if you like, an upbeat story to tell here, about people wanting to come to this country – hard-working people, contributing to our economy.’
‘Eric, I’d love to have that view, it’s obviously a sweet deal for coffee-shops to get their baristas from Bucharest. But the public think immigration’s too high and that it makes problems, and we said we’d lower it, so that is our mission and anything shy of that is a failure.’
‘That people believe it doesn’t make it so, not statistically. And it overlooks the wider benefits.’
‘In my constituency, in all the old industrial areas, people seem to feel it can reduce their opportunities in life. They’re not bothered by how cheap it is for Londoners to get a nanny or a cleaner or a loft conversion.’
‘Minister, we should be wary of broad-brush caricatures—’
Blaylock felt the reproof – dimly aware, as of a backache or toothache, that the picture he bore in mind of the hypocrisy of Londoners was near enough a picture of his ex-wife. Still, he rallied.
‘We also have to be wary of discounting what people say is their experience. They’re not to be damned as bigots or belittled as fools just for objecting to the rate of change in a place they thought they knew.’
He pulled up, judging from the looks round the table that he had begun to beat on a drum in a manner his audience found strident.
‘Look, if we all want to be relaxed about immigration we just have to show we have control of the numbers. Over a decade we’ve had several million more guests in this country than the public were bargaining for, and the levels keep ticking up. So, we need to ensure our guests are good guests. Right? And that we manage those levels, in a way that speaks well of diversity – not adversely. We have a sensible target of what the levels ought to be. Right now, we’re missing it. By a mile.’
Guy Walters, frowning, elbows on desk, raised a hand. ‘Eric says forcible removals are in decline. Then isn’t it time to get the troops
Bloody Malahide will be all over that , thought Blaylock.
‘That said, some concerns in the other direction are a nine per cent rise in asylum applications, and a notable fall in the numbers of illegal migrants forcibly removed or leaving of their own accord. Also fewer Britons have gone off to live abroad, but we have rising numbers coming in from Spain, Italy, France – the wine belt, oddly.’
‘I’m all for southerners heading north,’ Blaylock murmured. Someone chuckled – Ben? But he was disconsolate. He yearned to see this issue afresh, not so wearied by the years, but it appeared intractable. And he had come to understand how it told on longer servers than himself – why staff who could hardly be considereddepartmental veterans nonetheless looked suddenly aged and helpless.
The immigration system creaked. No available resources could be thought adequate, no figures truly accurate. And no truly talented staffers wanted anything to do with it, while those who were politely forced into it just served their time counting beans down in Croydon. Blaylock could all too easily imagine some of them, overwhelmed by the workload, afflicted by paralysis, pushing obstinate figures into a drawer and turning a key. He could picture secret lock-ups – warehouses, even – jammed with cabinets full of abandoned immigration case files. It was one of his second-order stay-awakes at night.
Indisputably of the first order, though, was the fact of party conference in a fortnight when he would be required to say that immigration was falling, which would, on present evidence, be to say that black was white. It was a party political problem, thus not one shared by the permanent civil service round the table, yet he was compelled to make everyone feel the urgency.
‘This is not good,’ said Blaylock, finally.
Eric cleared his throat. ‘It’s not ideal . But there is, if you like, an upbeat story to tell here, about people wanting to come to this country – hard-working people, contributing to our economy.’
‘Eric, I’d love to have that view, it’s obviously a sweet deal for coffee-shops to get their baristas from Bucharest. But the public think immigration’s too high and that it makes problems, and we said we’d lower it, so that is our mission and anything shy of that is a failure.’
‘That people believe it doesn’t make it so, not statistically. And it overlooks the wider benefits.’
‘In my constituency, in all the old industrial areas, people seem to feel it can reduce their opportunities in life. They’re not bothered by how cheap it is for Londoners to get a nanny or a cleaner or a loft conversion.’
‘Minister, we should be wary of broad-brush caricatures—’
Blaylock felt the reproof – dimly aware, as of a backache or toothache, that the picture he bore in mind of the hypocrisy of Londoners was near enough a picture of his ex-wife. Still, he rallied.
‘We also have to be wary of discounting what people say is their experience. They’re not to be damned as bigots or belittled as fools just for objecting to the rate of change in a place they thought they knew.’
He pulled up, judging from the looks round the table that he had begun to beat on a drum in a manner his audience found strident.
‘Look, if we all want to be relaxed about immigration we just have to show we have control of the numbers. Over a decade we’ve had several million more guests in this country than the public were bargaining for, and the levels keep ticking up. So, we need to ensure our guests are good guests. Right? And that we manage those levels, in a way that speaks well of diversity – not adversely. We have a sensible target of what the levels ought to be. Right now, we’re missing it. By a mile.’
Guy Walters, frowning, elbows on desk, raised a hand. ‘Eric says forcible removals are in decline. Then isn’t it time to get the troops
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