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For political veterans, recent arguments about immigration have a very familiar feel: dire warnings of crisis as official statistics show the number of people coming to Britain to work, study and join their family, as a dysfunctional Home Office struggles to cope with a new wave of refugees; a troubled government committed to repression, but lacking the means or will to do so. All are familiar plot lines from past political dramas on immigration 10 or even 20 years ago. The political responses were also predictable – social conservatives thundered about the failure, once again, to deliver the swingeing cuts they claimed voters demanded. Liberals dominate and change the subject, fearing that their arguments will surely fail with a skeptical electorate. All players are locked into the same old roles. None of them seemed to know that the script had changed.
One of the most striking, yet least noticed, political changes of the past decade has been the dramatic liberal shift in public opinion on immigration. The decades-long tendency to see immigration as a problem to be controlled is now rapidly waning. A growing view is that immigration is a resource that can deliver benefits for all. Most now see immigration as economically and culturally beneficial, as a driver of economic recovery and an important source of support for public services. The share of voters who say transfer levels should remain the same or the increase has never been higher, even as migration hits record highs.
The public now favors increased recruitment of migrants across a wide range of economic sectors, from the NHS and social care to fruit pickers and pint pullers. Some of the biggest positive changes have come in low-wage sectors struggling with shortages, such as food service and construction. Voters see the case for more migration in almost every sector of the economy in question. Only migrant bankers don’t like it.
Like all great changes, this liberal change has many sources. Demographic change is slowly moving Britain in a liberal direction on many fronts – naturally more migration-sceptical groups are shrinking a little each year, while pro-migration groups are growing. But the change of the past decade is too vast and rapid for population change alone to explain. Brexit may be another part of the story – voters approved a post-Brexit points-based system, which applies equally to all migrant labour, and post-Brexit labor shortages underline the economic importance of migrant labor . The Covid and post-Covid era may also have generated wider direct experience of the essential and often high-risk work migrants do, from the NHS and social care, to transport and home delivery services.
The more moderate and pragmatic will of the public is not reflected in the government’s rhetoric. The Conservatives are hampered by their heavy reliance on migration skeptics lured into the party since Brexit by promising to “take back control”. Fears of an anti-immigrant backlash have locked the party into hardline language and proposals, but fears of an anti-austerity backlash have ensured these remain empty gestures. The government needs migrant workers but cannot speak. Also, Rwanda’s plan for asylum seekers is clearly unworkable but no one in the government can admit it.
This approach has now failed on many fronts. Voters noticed a yawning chasm between Conservative words and deeds. Eight in 10 disapprove of the government’s record, an all-time low. Even those who agree with the Rwanda scheme see it as a political gesture, expensive and bound to fail. Nigel Farage remains the more attractive option for migration hardliners, while years of draconian rhetoric have alienated swing voters who now favor a more moderate approach. The Conservatives’ reputation on immigration has been trashed across the board – for decades they have led Labor by large margins as the party that has best handled the issue. Now Labor is favored in most polls, the only Tory consolation is that most voters don’t trust both parties equally.
A tumultuous government and a heated public should present opportunities for progressive politicians to make the case for open migration. So far, Labour’s response has been cautious – balancing recognition of migrants’ economic contributions with calls for business to do more to raise the skills, productivity and wages of British workers. But caution carries its own risks. Tough language and vague policies can be cautious on the campaign trail, but risk storing up problems for the government sometime.
A Labor government, like the current Conservative one, will rely on migrant contributions to grow the economy and staff public services. The party needs to make the case to the opposition for the reforms it will need in the government. It has already begun, promising to make the current points-based selection system more responsive to changing economic and social needs and to scrap the expensive, operational cruelty of Rwanda’s scheme. Labor could go further, for example, by committing to root-and-branch reform of the toxic “hostile environment” and by offering a new deal to migrants who make their lives here with a liberalized citizenship policies, implemented a faster, cheaper and more transparent. immigration bureaucracy.
Labour’s instinct to tread carefully is understandable – the party has been battered by immigration before, the public is still wary and migration liberalism remains more prevalent in big city seats already held by the opposition than in rural or small town seats it needs to win. However, such risks can be exaggerated – the Tory voters most open to Labor are pragmatic moderates who see immigration as beneficial. The Conservatives, mistrusted by voters, and fearing a Farageist uprising on their right, will not be able to contend with the new center ground. Labor has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to change the conversation on immigration. It may be a risk worth taking.
Robert Ford co-authored with Marley Morris a new report, A New Consensus? How Public Opinion has Changed on Immigration, published by the Institute for Public Policy Research
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