Our Tradition of Common Sense against Utopian Idealism                                                      

We are led to believe that mass immigration is a blessing to us and that only Enoch Powell and a few narrow-minded and prejudiced people have ever seen danger in it.  All decent folk of good will, we are told, have embraced this break in our national continuity as a sign of enlightenment with people progressing into a higher state of civilisation, that of a one-world utopia made up of coffee coloured persons.  But if those who seek this are so benevolent and moral, why have their plans been underhand and why public infamy for those who foresaw danger in just allowing it to happen without making any practical arrangements to accommodate the newcomers? This has been presented as an Ideological battle between left and right but is really between people of common sense and utopian idealists. Most ordinary people relate to the world by common sense so the impracticable dream of a multi-racial utopia had to be socially engineered which requires totalitarian methods.   The Utopians see immigrants as essentially good and if are nice to them they will be nice to us.  

Multi-Racialism follows on from the French Enlightenment in trying to create a society on rationalist principles by treating people as abstractions without human nature. Those who wished to preserve our traditional way of life knew how human nature works from experience of  how people treat each other and what they are capable of doing to each other. They learn from history how different ethnic groups have vied with each other for power and territory and looking at the world around them see that in practice immigration is not assimilation, but the colonisation of our territory.  Conversely, Multi-Racialists never describe reality but appeal to a vague future utopia.  If we have been cruel to other races in the past then these newcomers are capable of being cruel to us in the future.  

Two days after the Empire Windrush docked on the 22 July 1948 with 790 West Indians, J.D. Murray and ten other Labour MP’s wrote to Labour Prime Minister Clement Atlee, asking for legislation to prevent an influx.  Atlee replied, that he thought they would “make a genuine contribution to our labour difficulties at the present.”(2) There had been racial battles 1948 between 31 July and 2 August in Liverpool in Deptford on the 18th July; and Birmingham between the 6th and 8th of August 1949. around the time but the idealists ignored them as they had in 1919 when after the racial battles in Liverpool and Cardiff Lord Milner wrote a Memorandum of June 23rd “On the Repatriation of Coloured Men.” ”I have every reason to fear, that when we get these men back to their own colonies they might be tempted to revenge themselves on the white minorities there…” ( Panikos Paranyi (ed) “Racial Violence in Britain in the Nineteenth Century.” (Leicester University.1996)

The first actual debate on immigration was in the House of Commons on the 5th of November 1954 in a 30 minute adjournment debate called by John Hynd Labour mp for Sheffield (Attercliffe). “One day recently 700 embarked from Jamaica without any prospect of work,

housing or anything else.” He also said the colour bar in Sheffield dance halls because of knife fights was justified. Both Hynd and another Labour mp James Johnson called for a committee of enquiry to be set up and speakers repeatedly called for the Government to take action but Henry Hopkinson, Minister of State at the Colonial Office fobbed them off by

telling them “the matter is receiving urgent attention.”  He did admit that he had received many letters from worried mp’s on both sides. (3)  In March 1955 Frank Burden (L) in the

debate on National Service asked the Parliamentary Secretary at the Ministry of Labour why immigrants did not have to serve in the armed forces as native-born youngsters did.

Winston Churchill battled in cabinet against appeasers of commonwealth leaders but was old and ailing.  Ian Gilmour then owner and editor of the Spectator related that just before he stood down because of his health in 1955, Mr. Churchill told him “It (immigration) is the most important subject facing this country, but I can not get any of my ministers to take any notice.” (Inside Right. Quartet.1977)  Two did agree with him. Oliver Lyttleton (later Lord Chandos) wanted a £500 deposit paid by immigrants to prevent them coming for welfare benefits. The fifth Marquess of Salisbury believed that immigration was a threat to the fabric of society and the flow was attracted by our welfare state would increase even if employment dropped.  On the 20th of March 1954 he wrote to opponent Lord Swinton, “Though only just beginning to push its ugly head above the surface of politics. It may eventually “fill the whole political horizon” (5) 

From this point we look back to the time of his illustrious ancestor Lord Burleigh advisor to “Good Queen Bess and see coming alive our tradition of practical wisdom and how idealists are trying to destroy it, for it was Elizabeth1 herself who in 1601 had the “Blackamoors” expelled from her realm.  As we move forward we find the David Hume, the great Scottish philosopher,  write in “Of National Characters”, “There are moral causes that tend to transform whites from a barbarous nation to a civilised one, whereas nature does not allow this to happen to blacks.” His near contemporary Edward Gibbon, the great historian of the Collapse of Rome, warned of a time hence when minarets would sprout amongst the spires of

Oxford. Farther on, we come to G. K. Chesterton who predicted a war with Muslims in England in his novel The Flying Inn (1912).   Nearer still Enoch Powell refined his views in a speech to the Southall Chamber of Commerce on 4th November 1971, “Yet it is more truly when he looks into the eyes of Asia that the Englishman comes face to face with those who will dispute with him possession of his native land.”   

On 20th January 1955 when immigration from Jamaica was 11,000 a year, Conservative Cyril Osborne had written to the London Times,” But the present West Indian and West African invasion is a mere trickle of what we must expect because, as the law now stands, everyone born in the Commonwealth is entitled to come to this country. What shall we do when the millions living in the bigger areas decide to emigrate?           

At the second reading of the Commonwealth Immigration bill (1961) Mr. Osborne stated “that the world’s poor would swarm to Britain’s welfare honey pot.  We have neither the room nor the resources to take all who would like to come.”  Both sides of the House laughed at him and called him Fascist.” We are seeing this now with boats leaving Africa for Europe.

Churchill was replaced as P.M. by Internationalist Anthony Eden who answered Cyril Osborne (C) in the House of Commons “There is no question of any action being taken to control immigration and in any case most were from Eire.” (5) In May 1958, 3 months before the racial battles of Notting Hill and Nottingham, Mr. Osborne had written to Labour leader Hugh Gaitskill who contemptuously handed it to his secretary to reply, “The Labour Party is opposed to restriction of immigration as every Commonwealth citizen has the right as a British subject to enter this country.” 

He instigated a Commons debate on the 5th of December 1958 3 months after the racial battles when Labour spokesman Arthur Bottomley replied, “We are categorically against it (restrictions).” Seconding the motion Martin Lindsay© )said, “We must ask ourselves to what extent do we want Britain to become a multi-racial community. If that is our desire and we decide to make it a matter of deliberate policy, well and good, but let us at least consider where we are going and make up our minds that is what we want, and not simply drift.” Simon Heffer relates in his biography of Enoch Powell “Like the Roman” that in 1958 Osborne pleaded with the Conservatives 1922 backbench committee to consider the future consequences of mass immigration.  When they refused to listen, this genuine and sincere man broke down and wept.  In March 1965 he told the House ”Our children and grandchildren will curse us for our moral cowardice.”  

Supporting Osborne in December 1958 Labour’s Frank Tomney, remarked on elected representatives ignoring their constituents. “We have been sent here by the electorate to give expression to issues which concern them.” Fellow Notting Hill mp George Rogers (L) told the Daily Sketch of 2/9/58,” Overcrowding has fostered vice, drugs, prostitution and the use of knives.” James Harrison (L) from Nottingham also supported controls.  Mr. Tomney was a practical man of humble origins and understood his people, "I have come directly from the benches of a factory to the benches of the Commons".  (6)In the Guardian of 20/3/01 Andrew Roth slotted him into a standard stereotype, “the crusty old far-right Labour MP.”  In the early 70’s Militant, the ideological group in the Labour party, tried to de-select him. 

Norman Pannell Conservative member for Liverpool (Kirkdale), had served in the Nigerian Legislature and lived in Africa for over 10 years.  He proposed a motion at the 1958 Tory conference for reciprocal rights of entry with other Commonwealth countries, for the U.K. had an open door policy and let anyone in.  “When I visited Nigeria two years ago as a member of Parliament without ultimate responsibility for the affairs of that country, I was given an entry permit valid for 14 days and renewable subject to good behaviour.”  He also addressed the 1961 conference on the perils of admitting criminals and the sick. The debate was stage-managed to stop Cyril Osborne speaking who stood outside in the rain handing out off-prints of a letter of his from the morning’s Telegraph.   

Mr. Pannell stated that though Home Secretary Butler had disagreed with limiting numbers he had agreed with his suggestion of deporting immigrants who commit crimes but nothing had been done. In a letter to the Times of 13th December 1960, Harold Gurden wrote, “On the health question we find the middle ring of the city (Birmingham), where immigrants are mainly concentrated, heavily peppered with dots of tuberculosis incidence.  It is the opinion of medical officers that at least some immigrants are suffering with this disease before entering the country. We have a duty to our constituents.”  In the winter of 1961-62, a young Pakistani girl entered the country with smallpox and caused an epidemic. In January 1962 two Pakistanis were in hospital in Birmingham with smallpox Mr. Gurden wrote to the Minister of Health urging medical checks on immigrants. In 2005 we were told that we now have a record number of TB cases and that London has more cases than the usual breeding grounds of the disease. 

A series in the Times in January 1965 “The Dark Million” showed what the official attitude was. The author wrote: “Back in June (1964) a senior civil servant talked to me about a particular aspect of the problem that has since taken some people by surprise.  I had asked why figures were not available to give a nation-wide picture of the problem. I was told:

“We haven’t tried to find out.  It may be as things get more critical, and they are getting more critical, it will be decided that we should do so.  It will be a political decision. One of the things about statistics is that people asked what they are, then again in three months time what they are, and then you have a problem on your hands.  People start to keep the score, and you have a crisis.  If, as a result, they know that such-and-such is happening in Wolverhampton, they say ‘what is the Government doing about Wolverhampton?’  It is a matter of judgement as to when you start taking that line and say something should be done.  It is a matter for central Government.”  

 In 1964 there was uproar over the general election at Smethwick.  The victor was a local man Peter Griffiths who as a local councillor had led the take over of the council by the Conservatives; the loser was shadow Foreign Secretary Patrick Gordon-Walker who lived at leafy Hampstead Garden Suburb. Mr. Griffiths lost this seat in 1966 to Andrew Faulds who lived in Stratford upon Avon! Several well publicised events made this West Midlands industrial town world famous.  A slogan used during his election campaign was  “If you want a N***** for a neighbour vote Labour.” The town council wanted to buy the remaining houses in Marshall Street to stop it becoming “a coloured ghetto”. Prime Minister Harold Wilson described Griffiths as a “Parliamentary Leper” on television and the BBC took black power leader Malcolm X to Smethwick to cause trouble.  He told the world’s media, “I have come here because I am disturbed by reports that coloured people in Smethwick are being badly treated.  I have heard they are being treated as the Jews under Hitler.  I would not wait for the Fascist element in Smethwick to erect gas ovens.”  I wonder from whom he heard that?  He later told the Times that the BBC had taken him there for a television programme on race. This was just nine days before he was assassinated back in the States. Peter Griffiths had a bomb planted outside his home on 26th October 1965. This was a result of the way he was de-humanised by press and politicians.  

Some think the oppression and social engineering began with Political Correctness or the advent of NuLabour but it is part of the Multi-Racialists mentality. Some examples: The first act of positive discrimination was in 1950 when Minister of Food John Strachey announced that no Government contracts would go to caterers who did not employ coloured people.  In 1955 Smethwick council candidate Harold Jackson had his election addresses printed in Urdu as well as English and General election candidate John Wells did too. They were both Conservatives. In 1964 Enid Blyton was being pilloried for her book "The Little Black Doll", in 1964 the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination sent out pledge forms for election candidates to pledge they would not mention “race” and at three campaigns candidates agreed among themselves not to mention it. Meanwhile, back at the narrative -

On the 5th of March 1965 Patrick Wall (later knighted) spoke against the multi-racial ideal, “We must for the moment reject the multi-racial state not because we are superior to our Commonwealth partners, but because we want to maintain the kind ob Britain we know and love.”  

In the debate on the 1968 Race Relations Bill Ronald Bell (later knighted) argued that the bill was “very deep and damaging encroachments into the proper sphere of persons’ decisions.” (Hansard,  23/3/1968).  In a speech “This Sceptred Isle” to W.I.S.E. at the National Liberal Club in 1981 he spoke of evolution, eugenics and equality and “The very word discrimination itself has been grossly abused.  It used to be a good word: a discriminating person was someone to be admired.  People have been brainwashed into thinking that it is a bad word except when native inhabitants are being handicapped.  That is now called positive discrimination, and is deemed a good thing. We are well on the road back to “presentment of Englishry”, when in the days after the Norman Conquest that it was a defence to show that the injured person was only an Englishman.”  Sir Ronald had constant difficulties with his constituency party chairman who argued with him and wanted him de-selected. 

Enoch’s greatest speech is his  “Uniform of Colour” speech to Stretford young conservatives in Manchester in 1977. He described how the Law of Extremism works and introduced the alarming concept of the “Uniform of Colour.” and said we face “racial civil war.”  With the bombings in London we now see how accurate he was. 

“In understanding this matter, the beginning of wisdom is to grasp the law that in human societies power is never left unclaimed and unused.  It does not blow about, like wastepaper on the streets, ownerless and inert.  Men’s nature is not only, as Thucydides long ago asserted, to exert power where they have it: men cannot help themselves from exerting power where they have it, whether they want to or not.  The coloured population of over 2 millions in England, a population which grows at the rate of nearly 100,000 a year while the remainder diminishes, a population which is predominantly concentrated in the central areas of the metropolis and other key urban and industrial centres of England, does possess – simply by reason of segregation and differentiation – a power which would not accrue to a mere random sample of two million persons similarly located but not perceived or perceiving themselves as distinct from the rest. “The potential power derived from this basic and, as it were, physical cause is enhanced by the special circumstances attending upon the New Commonwealth immigration which brought it about.  The publicly expressed attitude of the indigenous population toward the coloured population is one of apology and self-accusation, denoted, amongst other things, by the passing of ever severer laws for the protection of the minority in circumstances where protection is not intended to be available, and would in practice not be available, for members of the majority who were similarly disadvantaged.  The plain effect is, and is understood by both minority and majority to be, to endow the members of a distinctive and growing minority with privilege, and to communicate to tem the dangerous conviction that the guilty and apologetic behaviour of the majority derives at least in part from fear.  This effect is enormously heightened when seen as part of the contemporary world-wide and systematic movement to use colour to exploit and foment internal and international conflicts.  The result is that the indigenous population perceives its own predicament as that of part of a world minority which is under verbal and sometimes physical pressure and attack. 

Once the position of strength and privilege, natural and psychological, which I have described, is created it is bound to be used as a means to extend that strength and privilege further.  In this situation of a minority which possesses full political rights but yet regards itself and its interests as distinct from, and possibly antagonistic to, those of the host society, is especially favourable.  In the narrowly balanced politics of Britain, political support can be auctioned to the highest bidder in return for further privileges and concessions; for the requisite precedents and grievances will always be available and this context – uniquely – privilege enjoys vocal public approval.  I think I cannot be the only one to have noticed that if four per cent of the population had four per cent representation in the House of Commons it would already contain 25 coloured MPs, or to have wondered how  soon measures will be proposed to ensure that the present disproportion is rectified.  It is the business of the leaders of distinct and separate populations to se that the power which they possess is used to benefit those for whom they speak.  Leaders who fail to do so, or to do so fast enough, find themselves outflanked and superseded by those who are less squeamish.  The Gresham’s law of extremism, that the more extreme drives out the less extreme, is one of the basic rules of political mechanics which operate in this field: it is a corollary of the general principle that no political power exists without being used.  Both the general law and its Gresham’s corollary point, in contemporary circumstances, towards the resort to physical violence, in the forms of firearms or high explosive, as being so probable as to be predicted with virtual certainty.”  Warren Hawksley Conservative (Wrekin), ”You may have read in the National Newspapers of the 12 or so back-bench Conservative M.P’s who had a meeting, during the summer, with the prime minister o put our fears that Mr. Whitelaw was letting us down by not implementing our election pledges with speed and enthusiasm.” 

In the same year Tony Marlow Conservative mp in Northampton told the Oxford University Conservative Association, “Hordes of exotic invaders have flooded the continent (Europe) wishing to help themselves to the luxuries of Western living.    Nowhere has the pressure been greater than in the United Kingdom.  No country has been less prepared to stem the flow than our own.  In this land which proclaims free speech free discussion has been stifled by humbug and by the censorship of an establishment unwilling to contemplate the radical cures which alone can reverse the tide.” “What would be unacceptable and should not under any circumstances be tolerated is a policy of suppression and inaction for no policy can be more calculated to bring about the racial holocaust which we should all so earnestly strive to avoid.” At the 1983 Conservative party conference K. Harvey Proctor and no senior party member sat on the platform apart from a glum looking John Biffin who only clapped sparsely.  Mrs. Thatcher was not present.  Just two years previously Proctor Had revealed a plan by the Monday club immigration and repatriation committee to repatriate 50,000 ethnics a year. The forward to the document was by Sir Ronald Bell. Mrs. Thatcher rushed to assure Asian leaders that they have a right to be here. Just two years previous to that she had won power by stating on TV that the British people feared “being swamped.” At a Monday Club dinner in early 1984 guest of honour Enoch Powell revealed that the Conservative party had threatened to not speak to Proctor for the first time in their history. 

In 1993 the grandson of Sir Winston Churchill, also called Winston, warned that in the north of England half the population was now Muslim and If our prime minister (Major) believes that 50 years hence. 'spinsters will still be cycling to Communion on Sunday morning:' he had best think again. Rather, "the muezzin will be calling Allah's faithful to the High Street mosque" for Friday prayers.  

The Times (London) attacked him for a 'tasteless outburst' and a leading Labour Party politician described his remarks as 'putrid and racist.' Michael Howard, the Conservative  Home Secretary,  denounced “any intervention which could have the effect of damaging race relations” Downing Street stated Conservative Prime Minister John Major agreed with Mr. Howard,." Mr. Churchill was viciously shouted down on BBC Radio Four’s Today programme by presenter John Humphrey’s in what was a despicable attack on an elected politician. Another mp to be bullied by his party leader (William Hague) was John Townend (C ) who wrote in 1991, that Government “ministers wanted to turn the British into a "mongrel" race and the Commission for Racial Equality  should be abolished.” In 1989, he suggested deportation of Muslims who opposed Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses, "England must be reconquered for the English".  

In 2005 Lord Tebbit former chairman of the Conservative party told e-politix website , “Islam is so unreformed there have been no real advances in art, literature, science or technology in the Muslim world in 500 years, and multiculturalism was in danger of undermining UK society. In the 1980s he disputed the loyalty of immigrants who backed cricket teams from their countries of origin. He claimed if he had been heeded it might have stopped the London bombings. A leading Muslim group said he was "misguided". After the Muslim bomb attacks in London he declared that Enoch’s prophecies of racial civil war were right.  

Professor Bob Rowbotham in the London Sunday Telegraph of 2 July 2006, referring to the motives of the elites, quoted Marx on them wanting, “A reserve army of labour.”   Charles Moore, former editor of the Daily Telegraph, produced Salisbury Paper 9, “The Old People of Lambeth”. It was an empirical research into the real living conditions of “whites” rather than another abstract academic study.  One elderly man told him, “…it’s our Queen and our country, why should we be afraid to go out?”  Another former Sunday Telegraph editor Sir Peregrine Worsthorne has written “even Hitler would not have treated ordinary people with such cruelty.”  In 1991 the Conservative party tried to impose a black candidate on its party in Cheltenham.  A local party member Galbraith expressed his indignation in crude language and was pilloried by the media and hounded by the Race Police and this persecution led to his death. 

There were eminent legal minds concerned about one-sided laws.  Viscount Radcliffe, former Lord of Appeal in Ordinary was concerned about the preferential treatment being accorded to immigrants above that given to the natives, “I cannot for myself, imagine how judicial notions can be founded on such vague conceptions.  The conduct of human life consists of choices, and it is a very large undertaking indeed to outlaw some particular grounds of choice, unless you can confine yourself to such blatant combinations of circumstances as are unlikely to have any typical embodiment in this country.  I try to distinguish in my mind between an act of discrimination and an act of preference, and each time the attempt breaks down.”  (Immigration and Settlement: some general considerations”, Race, vol.11, no.1, pp 35-51.) 

 In a case against squatters, Judge Harold Brown commented,” It seems curious that if a landlord closes the door on a coloured applicant merely because of his colour he might well get into serious trouble.  But if he closes his door on white people with children merely because they have children, he is under no penalty at all.” (Guardian, 2August 1969.)

In1995 retired judge, James Pickles, told a literary luncheon in Leeds,, "Black and Asian people are like a spreading cancer... There are no-go areas in Halifax, where I have lived all my life, where white people daren't go even with their cars... All immigration must stop... The country is full up. We don't want people like that here. They have a different attitude to life. They are not wanting to adopt our ways of life" (India Mail 02.03.95). Bradford MP, Max Madden, described Judge Pickles as a "repulsive old buffer" who had "plumbed the depths by his remarks which will cause widespread offence to people of all races and nationalities", Liaqat Hussain of the Bradford Council for Mosques called for Judge Pickles to be prosecuted under the Race Relations Act. 

In 1976 Rock guitarist Eric Clapton advised his audience that Enoch was right and that Britain was overcrowded. This raised a profoundly important point about culture and Multi-Racialism which got lost in oppressive hysteria.   Those of us who were brought up on Black music as I was, have a great respect and admiration for those blues and soul singers who developed a deep and expressive music. Clapton had black musicians in his band but understood a profound human truth - that enjoying different cultures and having friends from other ethnic groups is good: but that does not mean that we should try to force them together and destroy both. 

There have also been scholars. Dr. John Casey who read a paper to the Conservative Philosophy Group which was also printed in the first issue of The Salisbury Review in Autumn 1982. “There is no way of understanding  British and English history that does not take seriously the sentiments of patriotism that go with a continuity of institutions, shared experience, language, customs, kinship.  There is no way of understanding English patriotism that averts its eyes from the fact that it has at its centre a feeling for persons  of ones own kind.” Dr. Casey was persecuted for this and recanted. Marxist professor Terry Eagleton held rival English lectures, the usual campus rent-a-mobs demonstrated as well as refusing to go to his lectures and the Sunday times of 1st December1991 printed a photograph that made Dr. Casey look like a wizened crow! 

Conservative philosopher Roger Scruton was quoted in “The Opinion Journal” of December 10th 2002, “It is a tautology to say a Conservative wants to conserve things; the question is what things?  To this I think we can give a simple one-word answer, namely: us.  At the heart of every conservative endeavour is the effort to conserve a historically given community.”

Eminent economist Professor Ezra Mishan wrote of how from the beginning immigration has been about cheap labour the Salibury Review in 1988, “Frequent claims that the new immigrants have in fact reduced the labour shortage in particular sectors of the economy – in particular, the apparent shortages of labour in transport, in nursing, and in what are popularly to be the more menial and less attractive occupations- are naïve.  Managers of public services in Britain who, along with some private firms, sent agents to the West Indies in the 1950’s in order to recruit labour were only acting as good capitalists would in such circumstances – attracting lower-paid labour from outside their area in order to prevent wages from rising within it. If it was not for that wages would have risen.” 

In a book review for the Salisbury Review of Spring 2003 Sir Alfred Sherman explained that a friend in race relations had asked him to take a look at the reception areas of Deptford and Southall in the mid 60’s, “ I was horrified.  My natural vague sympathies for the immigrants, strangers in a foreign land, was replaced by strong but hopeless sympathy for the British victims of mass immigration, whose home areas were being occupied.  I was made aware of a disquieting evolution in “Establishment” attitudes towards what they called immigration or race relations and I dubbed “colonialisation.”  The well-being and rights of immigrants and ethnic minorities had become paramount. The British working classes, hitherto the object of demonstrative solicitude by particularly the New Establishment on the left, but the working classes had acquired new status as the enemy, damned by the all-purpose pejorative “racists.” Since New Labour took office in 1997 there has been such a massive increase in immigration that even middle-class Liberals are now worried.  The preferential treatment given to immigrants over that to our own elderly caused Sir Patrick Moore, the world renowned astronomer to remark “The more asylum seekers get the less there is for us.”

The veteran Liberal broadcaster Ludovic Kennedy wrote in a book review for “The Oldie”, in January 2004, that there ”are too many black faces on TV, political correctness has got completely out of hand.”  

Early in 2005, Welsh film star John Rhys-Davies who played Gimli in Lord of the rings told “World magazine”, that the Muslim birth-rate is a demographic catastrophe, I think that Tolkein says that some generations will be challenged.  And if they do not rise to meet that challenge, they will lose their civilisation.”  The same month in the Radio Times film star John Hurt praised Enoch, “I think he was just saying: We can’t afford to have any more.”

The Socialist intellectual David Goodheart wrote in intellectual socialist journal prospects (march 1998), Conservative politician David Willetts said of the "progressive dilemma."  "The basis on which you can extract large sums of money in tax and pay it out in benefits is that most people think the recipients are people like themselves, facing difficulties which they themselves could face. If values become more diverse, if lifestyles become more differentiated, then it becomes more difficult to sustain the legitimacy of a universal risk-pooling welfare state. People ask, 'Why should I pay for them when they are doing things I wouldn't do?' This is America versus Sweden. You can have a Swedish welfare state provided that you are a homogeneous society with intensely shared values. In the US you have a very diverse, individualistic society where people feel fewer obligations to fellow citizens. Progressives want diversity but they thereby undermine part  the moral consensus on which a large welfare state rests." Goodheart reflected, “Thinking about the conflict between solidarity and diversity is another way of asking a question as old as human society itself: who is my brother? With whom do I share mutual obligations? The traditional conservative Burkean view is that our affinities ripple out from our families and localities, to the nation and not very far beyond. That view is pitted against a liberal universalist one which sees us in some sense equally obligated to all human beings from Bolton to Burundi - an idea associated with the universalist aspects of Christianity and Islam, with Kantian universalism and with left-wing internationalism.”   

In an echo of Enoch’s warnings on “racial civil war” The  Sunday Times (London) June 11, 2006 reported that Rear Admiral Chris Parry, one of Britain’s most senior military strategists has warned that western civilisation faces a threat on a par with the barbarian invasions that destroyed the Roman empire. He said future migrations would be comparable to the Goths and Vandals while north African “Barbary” pirates could be attacking yachts and beaches in the Mediterranean within 10 years.

Europe, including Britain, could be undermined by large immigrant groups with little allegiance to their host countries—a “reverse colonisation” as Parry described it. These groups would stay connected to their homelands by the internet and cheap flights. The idea of assimilation was becoming redundant, he said. The warnings by Parry, of what could threaten Britain over the next 30 years, were delivered to senior officers and industry experts at a conference. The result for Britain and Europe, could be “like the 5th century Roman empire facing the Goths and the Vandals”.  “Globalisation makes assimilation seem redundant and old-fashioned … the process acts as a sort of reverse colonisation, where groups of people are self-contained, going back and forth between their countries, exploiting sophisticated networks and using instant communication on phones and the internet.” Lord Boyce, the former chief of the defence staff, welcomed Parry’s analysis. “Bringing it together in this way shows we have some very serious challenges ahead,” he said. “The real problem is getting them taken seriously at the top of the government.” 

Frank Field (L) has also spoken out about cheap labour. In August 2006 was questioned by the panel on the Moral Maze and asked why he has only raised the issue now and was it because the mass of current immigrants are white (from Eastern Europe).  His answer was “The sheer numbers and the attempt to close down the issue.  He took the side of the poor natives and talked about this influx pushing down wages and people having to compete for homes.  He commented that the panel are well- heeled and the ones who are getting cheap labour.  

Former Conservative mp George Walden has just published a book, Time to Emigrate (Gibson square Books). Writing in the Times of 5th November 2006  he wrote how he had been attacked by historian Tristram Hunt. The previous day the Office for National Statistics (ONS) had announced some startling new figures: Britain was taking in 1,500 immigrants a day, while 1,000 Brits left. “Which rather confirmed the central premise of my book: that more people were moving out as well as in, and that a growing number of emigrants — by no means necessarily racists — were quitting because of the numbers coming in.  Earlier in the week Mervyn King, the governor of the Bank of England, had complained to a committee of MPs that it was hard to manage the economy when nobody knew how many people were in the country. Unmoved by any of this, Hunt denied there was a problem, real or potential. In one sense he was right: for the well-born, expensively educated liberal elite he represents, there isn’t. I doubt that the Hunt dynasty (he is the son of Lord Hunt of Chesterton) will be inconvenienced too much by immigration and its social, economic and educational consequences. Less privileged folk of his generation, for whose fears about the future he clearly has a patrician contempt, will pay a heavy price if our unprecedented experiment of mass immigration goes wrong.” 

David Hamilton (Jan 2007)