IMMIGRATION as the number one issue in Europe and the US

For 35 years, I’ve been a foreigner living in a country in which I wasn’t born. “Ex-pat” is the name we tend to call ourselves – but that is a bit high-falutin compared with the “immigrants” that we actually are. Sam Freedman puts it well with this comment

Migration has rocketed worldwide, driven by warfare, climate change, rapid population growth in lower-income countries and the relative ease of travel. Since 1990, the number of people living outside the country of their birth has doubled to 300 million. But as well as greater supply, there has been rising demand. The birth rate in all rich countries, apart from Israel, has fallen well below the replacement rate at which population levels are stable. This is the first time in history that there has been a sustained drop in populations without war, famine or disease as a trigger. As a result, more and more countries are becoming dependent on migrant labour to sustain shrinking and ageing workforces.

And continues with this article

Compared to the years immediately after World War Two, with much of the country in rubble and a ruined economy, or the mid-1970s with runaway inflation, blackouts and a three day week our troubles are small scale. But spend a little while scrolling through X, or reading a right-wing paper, and one would think Britain was on the brink of civil war, with endless warnings of imminent ethnic conflict and a tidal wave of violent crime. Last week one of the Telegraph’s resident apocalypse correspondents Alison Pearson took to wondering when there would be a military coup to save us from the hell in which we live. Nigel Farage made a speech warning about “societal collapse” and “civil disobedience on a vast scale” in protest at immigration and crime. The Government are not being quite so hyperbolic but have been briefing about society “fraying at the edges” and the risk of more riots. Last month, culture minister Lisa Nandy talked about her concerns that the North would “go up in flames”.

It's true that there’s plenty of anger around and it is likely that we’ll see further protests 

this summer along the lines of those in Epping over the past few weeks. Some of these could 

turn violent. But summer riots, even if they happen, are hardly a new phenomenon. 

We saw them in 2001 in various northern cities following racial tensions, and in 2011 after 

the police shot Mark Duggan. The 2011 riots led to 3.5 times as many arrests as last year’s. 

In each case the damage has been done by fairly small groups catching the police by surprise 

and violence has been contained within a few days. The vast majority of Brits, regardless of 

political views, wouldn’t go anywhere near a violent riot. 72% of people thought the sentences 

for those convicted of rioting last year were either fair or not harsh enough and an even 

larger percentage said the rioters don’t speak for them. 87% said the people who cleaned up 

after the riots represent “the real Britain” compared to the rioters, one of the highest 

percentages I’ve seen on any poll.
Britain isn’t on the verge of civil war but the relentless doomerism is damaging nonetheless. 

For a start some of it, particularly from the radical right, is clearly designed to encourage 

violence and disorder. But it also stops us focusing on the real, more boring, problems of debt 

and governance. And it can be self-fulfilling even for those who wouldn’t dream of rioting. 

People’s perceptions of crime, migration, social cohesion and the economy can be warped by 

unending negativity, which then makes things worse. Public confidence really matters. 

Ben Ansell puts it best with this analysis -

OK throat-clearing over. What I want to argue today is that there are three important 

stylised facts about British public opinion over immigration.

• Stylised Fact One: National Public Support for Immigration is Thermostatic

• Stylised Fact Two: People in More Diverse Areas Like Immigration More

• Stylised Fact Three: Local Public Support is Thermostatic but only Sort Of

A lot of our public confusion comes from mixing these things up. Facts One and 

Two feel contradictory. Fact One implies that national changes matter: when 

immigration increases nationally, support for immigration goes down. 

But Fact Two implies that in places with higher levels of immigration, support for 

immigration is also higher.
In other words, the dynamics and statics of immigration public opinion work in 

opposite directions. This helps explain why the people who are most upset by 

rising immigration are in places that don’t have many migrants.
Facts One and Three by contrast, seem to go together. If local areas that see 

higher immigration become more opposed to immigration that helps explain the 

national thermostatic effect.
Facts Two and Three, on the face of it, also clash. Local areas with high levels of 

immigrant population have higher support. But local areas with higher changes in 

immigration become less supportive. It is perhaps less surprising when you 

consider that places with very proportions of non-UK residents back in 2011 

tended to have lower rates of increase, or indeed declines, compared to places 

that began as less diverse.
This split between levels and changes helps explain why our political debates 

over immigration produce so much talking past one another.
Anti-immigration commentators see rising national discontent when net migration 

rises nationally - and indeed in some localities; and they chat to fellow travellers 

who left that there London for whiter destinations.
Pro-immigration commentators point to the disconnect with on the ground experience, 

noting that their friends who live in diverse places love diversity and it’s in places 

without immigration that people seem angriest.

And all the time, the forces of sorting and selection produce geographic communities 

that don’t understand one another. Immigration can lead to balkanisation where a 

group of ethnically homogenous residents don’t talk to outsiders and become 

increasingly detached from their fellow citizens elsewhere. 

But enough about white British residents of Essex.

Recommended Reading
Select and Respect Ben Ansell (2025) article
Immigration and Freedom Chandran Kukathas (2021) rather too philosophical a book for my taste 
Exodus – immigration and multiculturalism in the 21st Century Paul Collier (2013) Collier comes 

from a richly migrant background and has produced a profoundly interesting and challenging book