The Anti- Migrant Hysteria Continues

WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE

Jobless migrants from within the European Union will be denied access to housing benefit from April this year, senior government ministers have said. They will also only be able to claim jobseeker's cash for six months, unless they have a "genuine" chance of work.  A three-month ban on claims for out-of-work benefits is already in force. It is not a  co-incidence that the proposals were publicised by Smith and May in the right-wing Daily Mail.

Among the other measures announced were plans to deport those caught begging or sleeping rough, with no return within a year. The Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said immigrants who cannot speak English have no way of being a “full member” of British society and may lose benefits if they do not learn. Landlords will be fined up to £3,000 if they rent a property to an illegal immigrant, while non-EU migrants will be expected to pay a levy of £200 a year to access the NHS if they do not have private healthcare.

If unable to find work and deprived of jobseekers allowance, how else to survive but by begging. If denied housing benefit to pay rent for shelter or if a landlord decides that a foreign accent of a prospective tenant may risk breaking the law, what other choice is there but to sleep rough for the homeless.

An estimated 4.7 million UK-born people live abroad with  the largest numbers in Australia, the USA, Canada, Spain and Ireland. The UK ranks eighth highest in the world in terms of the number of its nationals living abroad (World Bank, 2011) More British live abroad than any other nationality The Daily Telegraph said. There are 41 countries with more than 10,000 British living there and another 71 countries with more than 1,000. A 2006 study by the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) suggested that one in 12 UK nationals may now be living abroad. There has been continuous net-emigration among British citizens since at least 1991. In 2011, 70000 more British citizens moved abroad than came to live in the UK. The Daily Telegraph described the situation of 1.3 million Britons with university degrees living abroad. Nick de Bois, secretary of the 1922 committee of backbench MPs, said: "We live in a very mobile, global market people can look around and they can judge where they want to go. My concern is that people are putting their own interests first and looking to beyond the European Union.” There are 865,000 highly-skilled German citizens living abroad, and almost 400,000 highly skilled US citizens who have chosen to emigrate.

Stirring up hatred towards a particular group of people, particularly from ordinary working people, is a shameful political tactic to gain votes. Divide and conquer so that the poor squabble amongst themselves and not notice what the scum that floats to the top are doing? The UK is awash with low paid jobs and most employers rely on their workers getting benefits such as Tax Credits in order to survive . As such It is in the employers interest that migrants get no help so that they are more desperate than the indigenous wretches and as they are based twenty to a shed they can step in and fill the jobs where local workers refuse to accept as viable. Social affairs commissioner for the EU Laszlo Andor, however, said of migrant labour “They tend not to take jobs away from host country workers.”

Blaming foreigners for taking British jobs is a smoke screen for the failings of capitalism to offer prosperity or security.