Politics

Immigration: familiarity breeds content

Voters are angry about the general phenomenon of immigration, but the more they come to know immigrants, the more they like them

November 07, 2014
Each wave of immigration to Britain brings concerns, but over time natives grow to appreciate them. © Al Cane
Each wave of immigration to Britain brings concerns, but over time natives grow to appreciate them. © Al Cane

Whoever leads Labour into next year’s election, the party must grapple with the vexed issue of immigration. And whether David Cameron wants to or not—he doesn’t—he must also address the subject, as he tries to fend off the challenge from Ukip. Fresh YouGov research for Sky News does not offer simple solutions; but it does suggest that attitudes are more nuanced than many politicians think. For there are immigrants and there are “immigrants”—families who settle in Britain on the one hand, and a shorthand label for an awkward controversy on the other.

We listed seventeen countries and asked people in each case whether they thought immigrants from there made a positive or negative contribution to today’s Britain. Few people will be surprised that Australians have the best reputation, with 56 per cent saying positive and only 6 per cent negative—a net score of plus 50. Americans who settle here come a close second, with plus 46, with Germany third, plus 42.

People from other western European countries also enjoy positive scores: France and Italy, both plus 28, Spain plus 25 and Portugal plus 20.

It is when we look to the former communist countries that we find the first surprise. On balance, we rather like the Poles who have settled in Britain. Their net score is plus 25. It’s as if we regard today’s Poland as an honorary member of the western European community rather than a source of unwelcome immigrants from behind the old iron curtain.

Immigrants from other eastern eastern Europe score less well: Russia minus 5, Bulgaria minus 18, Romania and Albania minus 25. The figure for Albania is curious. Hardly anyone living in Britain comes from there—just 13,000 according to the 2011 census—and as it’s outside the European Union, the EU’s freedom of movement rules don’t apply. The fact that our reaction is much the same as to Bulgaria and Romania suggests that public attitudes are shaped more by generalised fears than by personal experience. (Indeed, the fact that the figures for Poland are so different supports this interpretation. Around 600,000 Poles live here. Millions of us have had direct contact with one or more of them. Few of us seem to have cause for complaint.)

YouGov’s figures for immigrants from non-white countries will also surprise some people. Two of the four we tested produced clearly positive responses: India (plus 25) and the West Indies (plus 17). Pakistan is narrowly negative on minus 6; only Nigeria, minus 17, provokes anything like the hostility we accord to people from Bulgaria and Romania. Compared with the 1960s and 1970s, when Enoch Powell was exploiting dislike of Caribbean immigrants in particular, the passage of time and the accumulation of personal contacts have changed our attitudes.

Overall, these figures seem to suggest a different, far less hostile, attitude than results to questions about the overall level of immigration. Most of us want far less of it; but when people think less about the general phenomenon and more about the men and women from particular parts of the world that we have come to know, our hostility starts to fade. My guess is that, in time, our opposition to people from Bulgaria and Romania will also fade. With immigration, it seems that, over time, familiarity usually breeds content, not contempt.