Where did you get your figure of 1.8m Brits in Spain from, Finglas? All the authorities I've seen including Wikipedia have it at less than half that, at just over 700,000?
Sorry Goldy. The figure is just over a million Brits living in Spain and 1.8 million living in the whole EU. Apologies.
You're getting as bad as David Cameron, Fingy! And I don't think it's as much as a million in Spain. This per Migration Watch website: "There are around 1.2 million British born people living in another EU country, according to figures provided by the UN. Around 800,000 will be workers and their dependants. This is much less than the estimated 3.3 million people born in another EU country who now live in the UK, of which 2.1 million are working."
Just to provide a little background info. on the actual numbers involved here, the respective figures for the UK. and Germany are: Migrants from Poland: Germany 674,152 UK. 646,000 Migrants from Rumania Germany 355,343 UK. 101,000 Migrants from Bulgaria Germany 183,263 UK. 57,000 Yet despite these figures Britain, apparently, can't cope with this influx. Interesting also that the German figures are exact whereas the British ones are estimates. The British figure may not include some of your seasonal fruit pickers of course. Apparently 21,000 entered the UK. last year under the seasonal agricultural workers scheme, which apparently allowed them work on a specific farm for 6 months. Mostly they lived on camps holding up to a thousand workers, whereby half of their minimum wage of 5 pounds 74 pence was deducted for squalid, overcrowded accomodation. In contradiction to promises made about hours per week, they often work only half of that, but are not free to look for other work. I guess that many would opt to go home after finding out what conditions are like - but I would suggest they cannot afford the fare. My problem is that apparently the average Ukip voter believes that the numbers of eg. Rumanians in Britain is about 8 times larger than the reality - and on the basis of this misinformation is about to take a step which could cause years of uncertainty ahead.
From the Financial Times website - EU migrants moving to UK balanced by Britons living abroad. By Elizabeth Rigby Deputy Political Editor. February 10th 2014. "The number of EU migrants living in the UK is almost exactly balanced by the number of Britons living elsewhere in the EU, according to official figures. About 1.8m Britons live in Europe with Spain boasting an expat population of just over 1m UK citizens, according to government estimates. Of the Britons living in Europe, 400,000 are claiming a state pension from the UK. That compares with an estimate of 2.34m EU citizens living in the UK according to the latest official figures from Nomis - the National Online Manpower Information System a service provided by the Office of National Statistics - based on passport records".
One of those expat citizens living in Spain is my little brother, who has been there for about 25 years. With a Spanish wife, and 3 half Spanish (but in reality much more Spanish than English) kids. I'll ask him if he's worried about being kicked out, and tell him that he can't live at our house if he is. Actually I probably won't, the naive fool trusts his big brother and would genuinely start to worry. He's never gone for Spanish citizenship, but as a Spanish- English translator I think he would do ok in the language section. He's definitely more Spanish than he likes to think, spends a lot of time moaning about South American accented Spanish in Madrid. Got to nip out, I'll pick up the baton with Goldie a bit later Fingy. Tag team!
Germany has had a waning population so presumably is happy with numbers. I can't speak for the average UKIP voter or indeed any UKIP voter, but my guess is they're not focusing so much on how many Romanians are coming in, as the 1 million immigrants (net) coming and staying in the UK every 3 years. It's not sustainable.
As far as I know nobody can be kicked out of anywhere where they have a legal residency - it is not as if people can become illegal citizens overnight. I have lived in Germany for 26 years, and paid taxes to both the government here and the health insurances for the entire period. The only negative thing which could happen here is the loss of voting rights at local and european elections - even that may be illegal (I am not sure if you can disenfranchise people in that way) - possible is, that in Germany it may be difficult for future Britons coming here to get dual nationality (Germany only recognizes this with other EU. nations).
The majority of these are non-EU though Goldie - subject to the much trumpeted points system. If it's not sustainable why aren't we cutting those we can control first?
I think it's close to 50/50 on current figures, Tooting. The immigrants from non-EU countries tend to be skilled, and non-skilled are rejected. It is essentially the opposite from EU where we have no control.
I think a lot of the EU ones go home as well, true migrants rather than immigrants. To be fair a lot of the non EU ones are students. I would be much more confident in this 'control our borders' stuff if we actually did it now with non EU people. We can't even get them into the 'tens of thousands'.
Looking at immigration as a whole (and forgetting the EU. for a moment) - there are 7.5 million people living in the UK. who were born somewhere else. The figure for UK. citizens living abroad is 5.5 million (this figure may be more if you include those who left as Brits but became naturalized somewhere else). A difference of 2 million spread over a lifetime. If you take London as an example since the 1950's - how many have left the place, and how many have come to it ? I think that you will find that many English towns (particularly in the north after their industries were closed) have been able to repopulate themselves only through immigration - places like Oldham, Bradford, Burnley etc. would have become ghost towns without it.
Since these are net figures, I think it takes account of those going home, since emigrants are deducted from gross figures. I agree with you about the non-EU figures, but there just hasn't been a will by government to address what is clearly a concern to large parts of our population. If nothing else, this referendum shows strengths of feeling on both sides
The population of the UK was not dropping, so talk of ghost towns cannot be correct, Cologne. Since 1964 the population of the UK has grown by over 10 million people (18.7%). About half of this growth has occurred since 2001.(source - Office of National Statistics) The UK population will rise by almost 10 million over the next 25 years, according to official estimates. (source - The Guardian 29/10/15) This is part of what the referendum is about, and as I said in the post I just sent to Stan, it does go beyond the EU. Cameron thought he'd get a smooth ride in the referendum - all political sources say he thought he had it in the bag. But voters are voicing their concerns about all uncontrolled (not just uncontrollable) immigration
