Conversing Over the Gap: Perspectives on Immigration and Society

Introducing the Participants

Stephen, 64, Canvey Island

Profession: Former underwriter

Political history: Usually Tory, apart from when he resided in “the socialist republic of south Hackney” and supported the SDP

Amuse bouche: His focus in underwriting was kidnap and ransom: People often claim that insurance is boring, but it’s far from it when you’re planning evacuating people from South Korea because the North Koreans have activated the missile silos”

Evie, 25, London

Occupation: Graduate in psychology

Voting record: In her home country, Aotearoa, she voted a combination of Labour and Green

Amuse bouche: Eva has been employed as a singer on cruise ships; her longest trip was six months, which is a long time to be on a boat

For starters

She: Steve seemed there to have a nice time, to be open

Steve: She seemed like a very intelligent, articulate, nice person

Eva: I had a caprese salad, pasta with fungi, and a creamy dessert thing, it was delicious

The big beef

Eva: He was certainly on the side of immigration being reduced. He thinks that UK residents who are native to the area, including non-white white British, face limited access to the things that they need, because increasing numbers are arriving. However I just disagree that the figures are so problematic

He: I’m for skilled immigration, I have no desire to reside in a homogeneous, WASP country with tepid ale. But I maintain that governments have used immigration to fill the jobs they struggle to staff without increasing salaries. Wages are kept low, so taxes have to be kept low, so we can’t do things better – spend more money on childcare, on education, on innovation

She: I am not deeply informed of the EU referendum, because I was 16 and not living here when it occurred. He explained it to me in a different perspective. He informed me about EU labor migrants – people could arrive in the UK and receive solely the salary of the their nation of origin

Steve: Macron spent 24 months getting the EU to abolish the system; it was reformed in 2018. Previously, posted workers coming in were undermining local employees. Under Gordon Brown, it was oil workers that were brought in; since then it’s been service industry, agriculture. She grasped that, because she’d worked on a cruise ship and said she was earning significantly higher than international colleagues

Sharing plate

Steve: It would be ideal to have a different energy source, transition from fossil fuels. I disapprove of environmental harm, I love the clean air, I love the countryside. We agreed on a lot of that. But I said, “What do you think of Norway?” Their energy revenues skyrocketed after the conflict began, they used that money to develop green infrastructure

She: So we’re using their oil. You can see that’s an unfavorable approach to proceed. He was supportive of continuing our own oil exploration for the small amount we’ll require in the coming years. I kind of agree with him. We’re still going to use planes. We both think we should be advancing to environmentally friendly options, turbine fields and water power

Dessert topics

Eva: We briefly discussed anti-Muslim sentiment, though we didn’t call it that. He seemed worried by radical ideologies entering – he did note that a many individuals in the Arab world were extremist, which I felt was not fair. I think it’s discriminatory to make judgments based on religion

He: I come from the eastern part of London. I asked her if she’d been to Whitechapel, and she said it had been modernized. Naturally, I would say that: full of yuppies. But when I go down Chrisp Street market, I look like a foreigner. People stare at me because it’s become very Muslim. She had a little look at me about that. I used the word segregated area. Eva’s got Polish-Jewish ancestry – she doesn’t like that word, to her it denotes poverty. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes theirs.” I consented to substitute a different word – maybe community?

Eva: I believe that followers of Islam are really disproportionately shown in the media as doing things wrong. It appears a somewhat discriminatory, or prejudiced against foreigners

Conclusion

He: I think we separated amicably. We had a embrace at the station

Eva: We both said that we’d had a lovely time