I live in southern england (high density), not the UK (medium density). House prices have risen beyond the reach of anybody without rich parents on an average salary. An utter failing of the Labour government. And yes, some of this upward pressure on prices is due to net migration.

Jersey and Guernsey are not green and pleasant. They are highly developed with intensive agriculture on what is left.

The so-called cap on immigratin is nothing of the kind membership of the EU means ere is no possibility of regulaing the number of immigrants. Capping non-EU immigrants, as the ConDems pretend they will, is simply a sop to those who want to control, or reduce the number of immigrants with Black or Brown faces.

This is pernicious as it is unworkable. No government can accurately foreast the level of employment in the ecoomy 3 months ahead, let alone a year- and by sector.

Instead, the mobility of labour is tid to the maobility of capital. And both increase our productive forces here whether doestically generated or imported. The whole of the outperformance of the US economy verus the European economy since WWII can be accounted for by demographic trends, most especially the far higher levels of net migration to the US. This is becasue it is people who create wealth, especially those youthful, hardworking and adaptable people that make up the bulk of all immigrant populations.

That new wealth-creating capacity should be lveraged by policymakers so that the benefits are shared by all- increasing spending on schools, health care and above all new social housing in areas where immigrants come to live, for the befit of the existng population and the newly arrived.

Norbert, you are therefore entirely wrong. Immigration creates wealth and policy can be used to increase it. And if its your green and pleasant land you’re worried about, you might be surpised to learn that Jersey and Guernsey have population densities more than 3 times greater than the UK

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_population_density

without much despoilation of the countryside.

i think you have to define ‘migrant’ and ‘true migrant’ if anyone is going to have a hope of understanding what the hell you are talking about.

Also, not all non EU migrants are true migrants. The banks for instance currently outsource a lot of their work to India (and not we’re not talking call centre staff). No problem in that, except that a lot of the Indian staff work here in the UK and aren’t counted in the figures.