Why Does This Country Depend So Much On Immigration?

[anotheoldgit]

We are constantly being told that this country could not carry on without immigration, fruit would lie rotting on the ground, crops not gathered, companies closed etc,etc.

What I ask is how did this once great country manage to make this country the country it once was without depending on people from foreign shores, taking into account that we had more industries to run mainly by male workers only since most ladies did not work away from home as they were classed as house wives, looking after the home and any children they had.

[cassa333]

Well with the nurses it could be argued that their own rise from nurse to nurse practitioner, needing a degree for entry level, real nursing is hard work and not a vocation any more (merely a career job) could be their numbers downfall.

As for seasonal farm work. The benefits system isn’t conducive to seasonal work. If you jump off benefits for three months it’s a hell of an uphill struggle to get back on an even keel only to do the whole thing again in six to nine months time. And again it’s hard work and if your benefits are in any way comparable with wages then why bother with the hard work and hassle?

However with seasonal farm work there was always an itinerant workforce moving from season to season.

Overall I would say, other than there has always been a need for itinerant workers, it is a combination of the benefits system and education system whereby everyone is told they can achieve ‘greatness’ to one degree or another and that manual work is beneath them.

[NellieMay]

Cassa //Overall I would say, other than there has always been a need for itinerant workers, it is a combination of the benefits system and education system whereby everyone is told they can achieve ‘greatness’ to one degree or another and that manual work is beneath them.//

Totally agree

[Old_Geezer]

We only depend because we've encouraged that dependence. There are plenty of working age here to fill job positions. But one might need to cope with not exploiting cheap foreign seasonal labour but pay a decent UK standard wage. We'd probably also need to have import taxes on lower pay countries to create an even playing field between their producers and ours. Maybe need changes to Welfare too, to prevent folk choosing not to find employment.

[davebro]

"because we never grew our own food

or else the submarine blockade of both wars
would not have caused Churchill to have sleepless nights...."

It wasn't food so much as armaments that worried Churchill.

[Khandro]

Rockrose; //There was an apple grower on the news the other day - normally gets 60 workers from abroad for harvest - only 10 this year and he has had to leave fruit rotting.//

Two questions; Where have that 50 previously employed workers gone? have they now latched on to the UK benefit system?

Secondly; What kind of apples is he growing & are they a match for the types which are now being imported from outside the UK & EU such as Pink Lady (Cripp's Pink) ?

Perhaps he needs a rethink.

[CrapAtCryptics]

Maybe those suitably fit members of the 2.5 million of our own people could get off their collective bottoms and do it.

[anotheoldgit]

danny13
Rubbish we had many more industries than we have today.
Also we do not have the agriculture that we once had, rather than the growing of crops the land is used mainly for livestock.

[emmie]

according to the latest figures it isn't 2.5 million, but closer to 1.5 million.

[emmie]

70 percent of the land in this country is for agriculture.
we must be doing something right.

[CrapAtCryptics]

3.8% of 66.44 million is around 2.5 million although not all those are fit enough for field work.

[emmie]

Is England an agricultural country?
In the UK an estimated 17.2 million hectares is used for agricultural practices which accounts for 70% of the country's land area. An estimated 36% of the agricultural land is arable, or in other words, 25% of the total land area in the UK is arable.25 Apr 2017

[emmie]

What are the main crops grown in the UK?
Principal crops:

wheat, (the most widely grown arable crop in the UK)
barley,
oats,
potatoes,
sugar beet, (The UK is the fifth largest producer of sugar beet)
vegetables,
oil seed rape,
fruits.

[NellieMay]

Re gsngmsdters, I was talking about agriculture AuntyPolly and associated industries like packing veg. Incidentally the Polish and other eastern europeans in the few factories here in our small town are driving the locals away through bullying. Not because they are more hard working, but because they want to rule the roost. They seem to be increasing in number not diminishing.

[emmie]

so we are a agricultural nation,
but one that does import a lot of food, because people have a notion that they like the idea of all year round produce.

[NellieMay]

And we hae got used to such a wide variety of fruit and veg now. My grandparents were greengrocers, I doubt they would even have heard about what we hsve in shops now.

[Zacs-Master]

'Also we do not have the agriculture that we once had, rather than the growing of crops the land is used mainly for livestock.'

Erm.................

[emmie]

no they wouldn;t..

[emmie]

zacs that is why i posted about 70 percent of the land being used for agriculture.

[AuntPollyGrey]

farmers will give cash in hand for people to pick fruit -its not up to the farmers to find out if these folks are still on benefits its up to the workers to declare it. Trouble is they don't want work and I have first hand experience. Its no good harking back to after the war where everyone mucked in - in those days there were very few hand outs and yes people had to work -now they don't. Laziness and too many benefits has taken over the UK making a fat lazy society that think they have just got to ask to get. Those that do work get shafted by high taxes and child care costs while the spongers get their homes paid for and hundreds of pounds a week towards their preferred lifestyle. This does not happen in any other country other than the UK. Our benefits system is too generous that's why we get all the immigration ! They get a job then realise they can get more money on benefits!!

[Ryzen]

Simple...because benefits pay more than most unskilled work and migrant workers can earn more here than back home.