I see the Home Secretary, currently in the wars over sacking the drugs advisor, has opened up another controversial front...Immigration. Successive governments have got it wrong etc etc says he, but we know that dont we. But how do we know?...its like trying to square the circle, immigration is.
However let me tell you a little story. We went to London last week for a couple of days to see the daughter at university. We stayed in a nice Hotel, I dont get up there too often so I thought I might treat myself to the Hotel Russell in Russell Square, its right next to the university life of Bloomsbury.
The Hotel has just had a refit costing £20million , marbled halls marbled walls and so on, and although much of the country might be suffering with a deep recession, London is it seems bullet proof. There is so much money there that nothing short of biblical catastrophe would slow it down. Not like that for the rest of the country of course...as we know.
But...the staff!? The Hotel was entirely manned by foreign workers. Some indian I think, but mostly east europeans. Poles, Czechs etc etc....they talk in broken english as they deliver your sandwich with a smile. if you say something too fast they look at you with bewilderment.
However they are in my book very very welcome. These workers keep London running. They keep the hotels open, they keep the transport running, they keep the hospitals running, the keep the restaurants thriving..people in London actually go out to restaurants, the whole thing is thriving and its all held together by Foreign workers because the English themselves wont take the jobs.
We might view immigration differently from this sleepy backwater
but where life is hubbing along at breakneck pace, immigration is the oil in the machine.