Monday, February 07, 2005

Migration matters

Dead Men Left is rightly angry about the familiar way in which pre-election debate on migration in Britain is shaping up. The main parties have legitimated the notion that the public has lost faith with the current legal framework and are in a competition as to who would be 'tougher' or more efficient at controlling immigration. Some of the evidence DML cites to rebut the assumptions underpinning this moral panic will be familiar to readers of Importance. Two new nuggets are worth checking: firstly a 2004 Citizens Advice Bureau Report on exploitation of migrant workers and secondly this from The Guardian highlighting mistreatment of foreign nurses in the UK.

Why does it appear that only left-leaning blogs are concerned about the situation of migrant workers? Surely for the libertarians this should be a struggle for personal liberty and free markets against the overbearing state? Why don't the liberals see that this as being about the rights of others to share in the benefits of Western democracy? I suspect Dead Men Left would say I was naive to even ask these questions.

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