The new Tory immigration system won’t work – except at the ballot box Martin Kettle
over 4 years in The guardian
Shutting out low-skilled workers from entering the country is all about politics, not the economy
There was a solitary question on the ballot paper in the 2016 referendum. It asked: “Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?” The result – the majority vote to leave – was clear but close. Boris Johnson’s government has now begun to implement it and would like to pretend that the issue is done and dusted.
This is patently not the case. For one thing, most of the terms on which Brexit Britain will coexist alongside the EU remain to be decided. For another, it was common ground among leavers and remainers that a lot of umbilically linked questions clustered around the core EU argument. Among them were such things as austerity, business confidence, inequality, regional decline, hostility to London, nationalist narratives, resentment of elites – and immigration. Ever since 2016, these other Brexit-powered questions have helped to reshape British politics at least as much as Brexit itself has done. Continue reading...
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