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And their numbers have dropped due to Irelands economic boom so we needed another source. My old man was a builder and he told me working on large projects where the majority of the workforce was Irish or Jamaicans. Lets not even get started on the motorways and roadbuilding.
No offense to you but I used to work at a place which trained would be builders and plumbers and their work ethic was almost non-existant.
There are issues when it comes to training (something UK businesses have never been great at compared to say Germany) but its also that a lot of the kids just dont want to work hard enough.
And even if we could magic training programmes out of thin air its really not enough, we need 10's of thousands of trained staff for the olympics on top of everything else.
The Italians came 2,000 years ago and built highways hundreds of miles long. The ammount of wealth generated by that was massive. Leather and metal workers ...farriers farmers brewers stone cutters hoteliers timber merchants fishermen ferrymen rope makers sandwhich bars hot dog vans ...the list is almost endless.
Throughout the history of these islands ...people have been coming from afar to inhabit and exploit it.
You can get yourself trained, lots of people do.
My two cents is as follows.
Britain is overcrowded. That is a fact. Public services are straining as it is and more people, British or otherwise, are not going to help matters. And the planned concreting of the south of England in order to accomodate these new arrivals as well as the projected population growth from British citizens is testament to this. Around London, even outside of the main touristy centres, I hear more foreign languages than I do English. I no longer feel English in my own country. Maybe that's a bad reflection on me as an less-than-100%-tolerant person but that is how I feel.
The immigration policies of this country are grossly out of step. The open-door policies of the 60s and 70s are not applicable today. Back then, we had more people leaving the country than were coming in so immigration back then was necessary but the same is not true today. We need modern policies to reflect the modern needs of this country.
I guess I'm fortunate in that I have a good education, good qualifications and as such I have a good job where I don't feel 'threatened' that someone from overseas is going to come in and 'take my job'. So perhaps it's my prerogative to feel a little bit more lax about it but the BBC's White series has shown that I seem to be in the minority here.
Essentially, be you pro- or anti- immigration or somewhere in the middle, you have to face facts that we do not have the resources to cope with the massive influx of people. The system is at breaking point, the country is dangerously overcrowded and something, soon, is going to have to give and I'd rather it were the flimsly immigration policies rather than a surge in BNP-style sentiments.
Not to mention the Romans, Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Frisians, Franks, Danes, Norwegians, Normans... oop we're only up to 1066 here...
English people are snapping up properties all over the former soviet bits of eastern Europe. Guess what ...English and Polish workers are flocking there to renovate rebuild and invest in these properties so it's swings and roundabouts.
Poland is benefiting from the investment of British individuals who are going out there to live and do up these plac es.
There are a lot of English people pushing up the price of property and raw materials ...making housing more expensive for the natives ...swings and roundabouts?
oops should have read the 2,000 year bit
Yeh, especially since Italy wasn't a country until 150 odd years ago.
precisley and in those days there were no public services that ad to cope and people were fewer so the land could take it, to compare 1-2000 years ago to today is childish and un-educated
yea and now look where they are.... they still have a fascist style press telling them how great they are and a major player in europe pft I don't think europe gives a hang about them and their economy is in such a state that they had to buy their way into the euro and frankly that didn't help the common people just uped their living costs
What makes you think there were no public serices?
Looking back at yesterday ...gives most thinking people ...a good idea of why they are where they are today.
Who's good enough and ok enough for you ...what is it you want in this 21st century?
Wow thanks, nice to know I'm childish and uneducated. I know what Tacitus had to say about immigration and why propaganda around Xerxes invasion was so important to Herodotus - and why it's relevant to the way civilisation continues to work. Do you?
I'm unclear why the fact that immigration used to involve mass-rape, forced repossession of land, violent conflict, religious persecution compared to today where what it involves today is you feeling you can't get a job breaking rocks and shugging bags of potatoes shouldn't be relevant...
And why is the opening up of the EU always portrayed as a bunch of foreigners coming over here and stealing our jobs? Where are the hordes of hungry young Brits heading over to Germany like Auf Wiedersehen Pet? Oh, hang on. Anyone who wants a job in this country can get one, so they don't need to.
I didn't mean to in my previous post. I'm pro EU. And pro globalisation. I want a world where international borders don't mean anything really - where everyone is your neighbour.
But I'm well aware that different economies with lots of different things going on need time to acclimatise to each other otherwise you do get negative 'fallout' such as a spike in unemployment etc. if you just say 'yesterday there were loads of boundaries, today there are none'.
It's why we're not in monetary union with the EU yet, it would be good for us but we have such a strong trading history compared to the EU and various other factors that doing so would basically devalue all our wealth and increase the value of everyone elses in Europe at the minute. I can't remember the specifics now, you'll just have to trust me
To put it in simple terms, change, culture change, getting workers from abroad - that's inevitable. BUT, because of the systems already in place, the way the economy ticks over vs. other economies, when putting them together you can't just throw caution to the wind like many free marketeers would love to and let it sort itself out - it will - but it is far less damaging and more beneficial to everyone if the whole process is slowed down to allow gentle integration.
That's my only gripe, the fact that some very different economies were suddenly exposed to each other and has caused some turbulence.
Or they know that there are no jobs over there so they don't go?
Taxes in themselves seldom seem to cover the cost of running a country - which is why governments, like ours, get embroiled in debt.
The problem isnt with space, its with the fact that a lot of people want to live in London or the South East.
All of it's genius IMHO. Watch it all.
Are you kidding? in Germany in the 80s the Brits were like the Poles now, I suggest you track down DVDs of Auf Wiedersen Pet. Mates of mine were working on building sites in Oz in the 90s, living in overcrowded accomodation, absconding when they ran up huge bills and the only integrating they did was fighting the local blokes over women.
But their English so I guess thats alright.
Keep it civil, dude. I am happy to have my views influenced. This is a 'discussion' board after all.
Anyway, the 80's is now? And Australia actually had a campaign to get more workers over there.
The Auf Wiedersen show was the 80s. The Austalians still have campaigns to get more workers over there.
yes they send people over to recruit nurses and our own NHS is short of nurses and guess what nationality many nurses are (not poles in particular)
British? Sorry was that rhetorical
Unfortunately, the government's position is closer to the latter, which is the why these bastards need to be kicked out of power asap. Hobbes was right - once a government no longer puts the needs of the people it is supposed to represent first, the government no longer has rightful authority.