Monday, September 25, 2006

Where will the Bulgarians go?

Joy of joy, I'm on a training course in Guildford this week. This means instead of the nightmare of the tube I have the nightmare of the M25. It also means that I don't have a paper to read, I have the Today programme to listen to.

The first thing in this morning's show that caught my ear was a paper roundup at 6:30. Reference was made to a Guardian article that showed "research" that when Bulgaria and Romania become part of the EU the inevitable migration exodus will hit Italy, Greece and Israel, rather than Britain.

I may of course be being utterly cynical, but I can't help thinking this sounds a bit like the argument given when the other eastern europeans countries entered the EU. Back then, rather than being told of research showing migrants would go elsewhere we were simply told the numbers would be insignificant. Anyone who questioned it at the time was labelled some sort of rabid racist.

Don't get me wrong here, I have nothing against immigrants at all. In fact, I'm glad that people want to come here and work. What bothers me is the fact that these jobs have to be taken up by economic migrants when the number of unemployed steadily rises. Unlike the old cliche of "bloody foreigners stealing our jobs" we should be saying "bloody lazy Brits refusing to take jobs"

4 comments:

Ellee Seymour said...

I know a deputy head teacher married to a Bulgarian who has given up her job and is selling cheap properties in Bulgaria. I can't imagine wanting to buy there myself, some of the other Eastern European countries I would though.

Praguetory said...

Not keen on buying in Bulgaria either - long way away and over-hyped. I'm keeping the areas that I think are a good LT investment under my hat.

Praguetory said...

Oh and the Grauniad never gets this stuff right. Truth is the first victim when thaey have an axe to grind.

Praguetory said...

More BBC propaganda where they quote a Bulgarian estimate suggesting 3,500 migrants to the UK - did the Beeb ever consider that the Bulgarian gov't is conflicted? More speculation about everyone who wants to go already being there, blah blah. these are calculated lies. I wasn't fooled last time (May 2004) and I'm not fooled this time. Bulgaria's average wage is 30% of the UK's minimum wage. They'll be over in droves.