IT’S a cold blustery November day and shoppers hurry briskly through the Bridge Shopping Centre in Fratton, lugging Asda bags brimming full of ready meals and roll-back offers.
Just another day in the life of a busy city. But something is different on the shopping streets of Portsmouth these days compared to ten or 20 years ago: The jumble of faces that rush pas today, wrapped up in hoods and scarves, are more multi-coloured and multi-national and belong to peoples of a wider variety of ethic groups than they ever used to be.
These people provide the city with one of its hardest working sources of labour. They work in the hospitals and the opticians, lecture and study at the university, wait in the restaurants and work in the convenience stores which we would be lost without.
If the current government has its way though,, a new immigration cap will drastically reduce the numbers of workers who can enter the UK from outside Europe and could deprive the city of this crucial pool of labour, not to mention damaging its new-found cosmopolitan character.
And on the streets of Portsmouth today, it’s abundantly clear that residents have strongly contrasting views about the scheme.
Sue Pickford, a mum in her 50s rushing home after a hard day at work, looks concerned about the impact of the cap: “We have an ageing population and often British people are unwilling to do the more mundane jobs,” she says. “The health service would probably collapse as well if it wasn’t for migrant workers.”
A stocky Portsmouth born man in his forties who doesn’t wish to be named looks intimidating staring incredulously as if the question was too obvious to answer: “We’re in an economic crisis as it is, the last thing we need is these foreigners coming over and taking our jobs,” he says with a broad Pompey twang.
Interestingly views are equally divided amongst those whose origins lie outside of the EEU. Randy Wei, 21, a bespectacled Chinese student at Portsmouth University stops to answer questions with a characteristically keen and polite manner. He is unsurprisingly hopeful that Chinese immigrants will continue to be allowed to come to the UK: “China is doing well economically so Chinese people bring valuable investment.” he says. Interestingly he is studying for a degree in Business and International trade but says he plans top return to China to work when he graduates as the job prospects are better there.
Sitting casually at a promotional stand for the Solutions for Health campaign, are Ashrat Ali and Abdul Kalil. Both have lived in the UK all their lives but both their families originate from Bangladesh. Ashrat tells me proudly that they see themselves as British citizens and have always been treated fairly by the British government. The two of them are happy working for the Solutions for Health programme, helping their fellow Pompey residents to quit smoking.
But when asked about the immigration cap, their answer surprises me: “We believe that whoever is in the United Kingdom should be able to stay,” Ashrat says, gesturing animatedly, “but the government should say ‘no more.’ The British economy needs stability and too many migrant workers are coming and taking the jobs when British people can’t find them.”
This clearly matters to Ashrat and he is intent on making his point. “It’s also not fair that students from other countries are allowed in to British universities,” he says, “whilst British people cannot find places themselves.” Their answers show just how complex the immigration issue really and how difficult it will be for the coalition to solve.
The recently unveiled cap will reduce the number of skilled migrants from outside the EEU entering the UK each year to 21,700 and many feel that the policy, which will take effect from April 2011 will have a negative impact on the economy, in particular the health professions of which 30% of the workforce were born overseas, and there are concerns that the policy could soon be extended to reduce the numbers of overseas students placing greater financial burden on UK undergraduates.
If this sample of views is anything to go by, the Cameron-Clegg team may not find that the immigration cap has the positive effect on the opinion polls that they had hoped for. On this evidence it could be the biggest challenge facing the coalition yet.
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