Thursday, January 08, 2009

Obsessed with the immigrants

According to the Express, an immigrant who's lost her job should just go home.

Are you, by any chance, starting to think of real problems? Were the X-Factor and the rivers of booze over the festivities not enough to distract you? Not even the brand new Celeb Big Brother? Have you started to realise that losing your job may lead to defaulting on council tax bill payments? Maxed out the plastic? Have you got bailiffs knocking at your door?

Here's where the tabloids come in handy. Today it's the Express' turn to throw sand into people's eyes with fear and paranoia that has F.A. to do with reality. Let's start with the misleading headline. "SOFT TOUCH BRITAIN: MIGRANTS CLAIMING £200M A YEAR IN UK BENEFITS". That is made to sound like typical tabloid fodder about freeloading Afghan families allocated Balmoral Palace or similar. No. The point is about something totally different.

The piece by Nick Fagge is a rant against those hundreds of thousands of migrants who actually work in Britain (mostly doing jobs the pure breed wouldn't even touch), but are falling victim of the economic crisis.

"[U]p to 200,000 migrant workers are set to lose their jobs this year as firms lay off staff in the construction, manufacturing and retail industries", the article goes. But here we are, look: "But while some young single workers are expected to return home, many others are likely to stay in the UK and ask their relatives to join them. They are keen to take advantage of Government handouts which are four times higher than in other EU states". Cue token immigrant saying "I would never move back home, benefits here are so much better".

Four times higher? Seriously? Which EU states? Has the Express got any comparative figures to show? No, because they obviously know that they wouldn't stand to scrutiny, with benefits in Britain paling against those of France, Spain and Germany, for instance. Which is why Spain alone has attracted over 5 million immigrants in the years since 2000, a number that would have given the editors of The Sun, Express and Daily Mail severe apoplexy. It simply wouldn't serve the tabloids' agenda to stop saying that "they all want to come here".

But aside from figures, Nick Fagge and the Express obviously think that no matter how many years of work and how many thousands of pounds you've contributed in tax, if you lose your job in Britain without being British, then you simply turn into a disposable piece of shit. No matter if you have a family or any other ties. You should just fuck off and not enjoy any benefits that can help you weather the storm in between jobs.
Lovely paper, the Express. Lovely chaps.

4 comments:

eric the fish said...

Tonight's BBC North West Tonight carried a piece about a former homeless man visiting people sleeping rough in sub-zero temperatures. One of the grateful recipients of soup etc was a Polish guy who had lost his job and had no money for accommodation.

I just wonder what kind of mindset reads the Mail/Express stories on this then watches the TV and doesn't start to question the veracity of their stories and agenda being pursued.

A couple of months back, of course, they were all deserting us because of the Zloty/Sterling rate.

[Apropos of something, I spent a night in arctic Brum walking up and down Hagley Road after losing the address of where we were supposed to be staying.]

claude said...

Great comment, eric.

And, about Hagley Road, like Richard Hawley would say: "it's a long dark road"...so I hope you did find the address eventually!

Ceri said...

Got to love the made up benefits figure as well.£715 per week- if you have 8 kids and live in London, possibly, otheriwse start scaling down a bit.
Basically, its just racism- if immigrants work, they steal 'our' jobs, if they don't they are scroungers. They shouldn't come here in the first place, but if they leave they are deserting us.
Poisonous.

Anonymous said...

So Ceri, eric the fish, and claude.

Do you deny that limits to the amounts of people we take are needed?
Or are you of the opinion a free-for-all is perfectly alright?