Following on from last week and Gordon Brown’s proposal for ‘managed UK immigration,’ we have seen a plethora of commentators on the issue take what Gordon Brown has said and throw disregard to Labours past policies.

It has been claimed by some that Tony Blair and Gordon Brown got together and conspired to create a United Kingdom that was an open door to immigrants, this they philosophise would create a country so full of immigrants and thankful to the Labour party that the Tories would never again win a general election.

This theory is being touted by many as a genuine incidence, and although interesting I feel it to be another fabricated bit of spin by those seeking to displace the current Government.

In this blog entry I would like to address the issue that I see as the main instigator for many people’s negative views on UK immigration.

The UK’s policy on asylum has to date been that of a tolerate nation to problems and plights that have been encountered by immigrants in their home country. The UK has not nor has it ever had an ‘open door policy to immigration.’ The bill for human refugee status is quite clear on the subject of asylum seekers, and I am confident that if a person has been granted such status in the UK it has been warranted.

It is clear to me that feelings about this small part of UK immigration, although important, are clouding the average persons’ idea of what ‘immigration’ is in this country. UK immigration is much larger than asylum seekers.

Certain areas of society feel they are being shifted along in order to make room for new arrivals to the UK, although not felt by other areas, this can no-longer remain unaddressed by the Government. Specific areas that have housed new arrivals have been ill-equipped to do so; they need injections into their public services such as schools and doctor surgeries, that have under the current system, had to bear the weight of more people without any increases in funding. The feelings around this issue have reached such a point that we have had two BNP MEP’s elected, this should have been dealt with a long time ago, however the Government now seems to understand that it can no-longer simply dump immigrants in areas and needs to ‘manage’ these arrivals.

For to long this country’s immigration policy has been susceptible to the over-burdening that this has resulted in. It is not just the area of asylum that it is being felt, since 2004 when nations such as Poland and The Czech Republic were granted into the EU state of nations we have seen an influx of immigrants but no measures taken to increase spending on the necessary infrastructure.

I understand the reasons behind the policy for workers, and am happy that the approach we have towards asylum seekers is fair and right. The gaps however have been widening for some time and they are the real reasons people are unhappy. Gordon Brown must now address the needs of the areas that are feeling the burden of new arrivals most heavily and regain peoples belief that they, as others, have access and rights equally to all aspects of their communities.