← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Leveller
Thread ID: 4746 | Posts: 2 | Started: 2003-02-02
2003-02-02 13:08 | User Profile
Political Editor of the tabloid 'Sun' writes in the (London) Times about the write-in campaign against 'uncontrolled immigration' started by his paper. The response has been huge, The 370,000 he reports below is now up to 528,000. Both 'The Sun' and 'The Times' are owned by one Rupert Murdoch.
David v Rebekah: It'll be the Sun wot wins it don't even ask what this means by Trevor Kavanagh
David Blunkett's refreshing Yorkshire bluntness is valued by political journalists. But even his fans were surprised by his "racism" attack on The Sun, its Editor Rebekah Wade and myself for this week's coverage of the immigration crisis.
Home Secretary was upset by a Sun editorial suggesting terrorists, crime gangs and the alarming number arriving with incurable diseases have polluted the sea of immigration. We might argue his outburst proves we are doing our job by exposing the Government's abject failure on asylum cheats. When Labour is in deep trouble, its knee-jerk reaction is to traduce critics rather than address the argument.
Interestingly, Mr Blunkett carefully avoided including our 10 million readers in his diatribe. Indeed, he tried to drive a wedge between us by urging them to write to the editor in protest. Mr Blunkett may have lost his temper but he did not forget his electoral imperatives. Many of those readers voted for his party in two elections. He wants them to do it again next time. Unless he pulls his finger out, he could be disappointed.
The avalanche of support for The Sun's campaign against uncontrolled immigration - 370,000 signatories so far - suggests we are more in tune with them than is Mr Blunkett, or indeed Tony Blair. Our readers are appalled by the way the country is changing before their eyes.
You don't need to be racist to be alarmed by the arrival of a million uninvited people in just five years.You don't have to be racist to worry about terrorists or vicious criminal gangs, armed with guns and knives and ready to use them. This is not about the small number of genuine asylum-seekers fleeing oppression who deserve our help. It is about illegal immigrants jumping the queue of genuine applicants and barging their way into our country. Nobody asked the views of voters on this unprecedented invasion. Nobody has suggested how many may follow. Is it five million more? Ten million?
Many Sun readers are themselves immigrants or members of immigrant families. They include Muslims outraged by the way extremists have hijacked their faith. They have watched as parts of their country are colonised by foreign nationals who make no attempt to assimilate.
This is not a lurid tabloid allegation. It comes from Graham Mahony, a race relations adviser to Bradford council. "Colonists come into a country to displace the existing culture and establish their own," he said in a suppressed report to the council. "From colonist to immigrant is the dominant pattern historically. However, this process seems to have been thrown into reverse in Bradford."
My paper has a proud record of support for Asian, Chinese and West Indian communities who have added vitality to our society.More are welcome, as long as they come legally. What dismays us all is the arrival of criminal opportunists, transported by people-smugglers who make more money out of this traffic than out of drugs.
People believe their tolerance and hospitality has been taken for granted by this Government. They resent the deceitful way ministers have fiddled statistics and concealed plans for housing large numbers in former hotels and stately homes. Many think too much money is being spent on their welfare, NHS care and legal aid while needy citizens have to rely on inferior public services.
Mr Blunkett angrily blames us for stirring up "hysteria". But this is as unfair as it is absurd. The Sun has been raising questions about illegal immigration for many years. Now Tony Blair's Government is seriously rattled. But it is only the alleged murder of DC Stephen Oake by an Algerian "asylum-seeker" that finally spurred him into action.
The Government's unofficial "open-door" policy is now an inflammable vote loser. Sadly, it is already too late to do anything about the million who have elbowed their way into our country. But The Sun cannot sit idly by and watch another million turn up on our shores.
The author is Political Editor of The Sun
2003-02-03 06:33 | User Profile
What's happening in England right now is truly wonderful. The masses are coming awake and they are mad as hell. The only limits to how many council seats the BNP will win in the May elections will be in terms of party finances, personal and organization. The votes are there. Its unfortunate that the BNP took down its old internet article library which detailed how the party crafted its ideology and structure in order to be prepared to take advantage of what is happening now. They saw this coming five years ago when everyone else thought that the indigenous population had been thoroughly deracialized and that a nationalist revival was unthinkable.