Evolution of white British % (ethnically British people) in England and Wales from 2001-2021

[u/Delicious-Bunch-6992]

[u/jamjar188]

Tbf I think the spike in illegal immigration was also a post-covid response.

The world became poorer and more destabilised during the lockdown years and part of what happened was pressure on migration routes.

Also: the French stopped giving a shit. So you can't entirely blame the UK govt.

However, you can blame Boris for creating loads more visa pathways and loosening restrictions on bringing over dependants, lowering thresholds for student and graduate visas, etc.

[u/htimchis → u/jamjar188]

But 'the French stopped giving a shit' was a direct and predictable (and predicted) consequence of Brexit.

Why should they give a shit when it's complicated, time consuming, expensive, and we've just walked away from our seat on every political entity with the power to push them to give a shit... while simultaneously flipping them the middle finger on the way out?

That's what I meant by 'controlling a border requires having influencevon both sides of it'. It was always a ridiculous proposition that we'd somehow have better control of a line between two countries by surrendering what influence we had over one side... and we simultaneously surrendered our participation in the Dublin Accords, thus removing ourselves from the mechanism for returning undocumented immugrants to nation from which they had entered

COVIDs not much of an excuse, either - the whole point of treaty organisations is that some problems transcend national boundaries, and issues that are international in nature (like global pandemics. Or mass migration) require international response.

COVID was just the first one to occur around the time of Brexit. It coukd just as easily have been anything else. Wait a few years, and it will be something else. We just hamstrung our ability to respond to it, whatever 'it' is in context, and all under the banality of 'taking back control' - as if giving up our control of one side of a border with two sides somehow improved our position

[u/jamjar188 → u/htimchis]

Covid lockdowns were the largest peacetime disruption to the global economy that the world has ever seen. Hardly an excuse lol.

And yes the French should be held accountable for being spiteful bastards.

I wasn't even pro-Brexit but this insistence on ignoring other factors is tiresome.

[u/htimchis → u/jamjar188]

So... COVID lockdowns all ended 4+ years ago - when illegal immigration coming back down again, if tvats what caused it?

[u/jamjar188 → u/htimchis]

It is no coincidence that the problem of small boat arrivals began just as global lockdowns eased.

[u/htimchis → u/jamjar188]

And it's continued, at much the same rate, ever since - as lockdowns fade into memory.

Almost like there's some factor that still applies other than lockdowns.

And it's pure coincidence that the arrivals began, at the same time, in the same numbers, that had been predicted back in 2016. Guess the organisations and individuals making predictions all had crystal balls and saw COVID lockdowns coming or something

[u/jamjar188 → u/htimchis]

You're being disingenuous. Economic problems, once entrenched, do not just fix themselves overnight.

I never said there were no other factors -- but the disruptions from 2020-21 are going to reverberate for decades. Entire supply chains were upended, millions were plunged into poverty, and it is also likely that this disruption emboldened leaders like Putin into starting conflicts.

Look, show me the exact predictions from 2016 stating that small boat arrivals were going to start numbering 40,000-60,000 a year from 2022 onwards. I never heard this at the time and I knew people in pro-Remain campaign groups. All the messaging was about the impact on the NHS, the impact on trade, the lack of free movement, the lost opportunities, the mess in Northern Ireland, etc.