Once a migrant...

The movement of People is increasingly fascinating to a wide range of individuals and communities, including political parties and academic researchers. Is it a human instinct, a survival mechanism, a basic need that has happened since the species began? Or is it a modern day social construction designed to irritate those 'put upon', to impose on their good will, to siphon diminishing resources to incomers away from those who 'belong'?

The debate rages on. (Who 'belongs' anyway?)

This caught my eye today: a report has found that low-skilled immigrants (read Mexican men) "were generally more likely ... to leave for a job opportunity." Some good money would have been spent on this by the (US) National Bureau of Economic Research to declare what seems to be the 'bleeding obvious'.

In my experience, when you understand the importance of feeding your family and yourself, of having a better life or prospect of one, you have tough choices to make - one of which is invariably tearing yourself away from your home and all that is 'safe' and knowable, and moving to where you can find the means to support your needs. You migrate. You find means to food, to survival. You find work.

And once you've done this uprooting process once, it gets easier. Especially at the lower skilled, lower income end. But isn't that the way society has grown the world and the economy that goes hand in hand with it. Powered by those prepared to or needing to move.

Which of course includes those at the higher skills level.

However, often it is the 'bleeding obvious' that is the point. Reading beyond the words of the article, I see the risk that challenges humans to move or not to move and the gains and losses each makes along the way. I see that reflected in the nature of society: closed vs open, stagnant vs dynamic, fearful vs hopeful, 'small' vs 'big', regressing vs blossoming. I know the society, the humankind I choose.

Humans have always migrated. Look how far we've come. And not. See how much further we could go.

Did ESOL work for the non-English-speaking 0.3%?

"Miliband says rightly that the ability to speak English is vital to those who plan to stay in the UK. The implication is that not enough do. Jonathan Portes, of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, points out that, according to the Office for National Statistics, only 134,000 – 0.3% of the population – don't speak English at all (and won't be helped by cuts to English language courses).”[1]

In my experience as a migrant and working with migrants and their communities, I have never met anyone who does not want to learn English. They may do more listening than speaking, in that universal fear of being embarrassed by their lack of fluency, and compensate by smiling a lot. Recognise yourself in a foreign land?

The ONS figures highlighted above show just how minimal an issue language is in the UK, if one even thinks there is an ‘issue’. Which is exactly what the disinformants choose to do.

Belabouring the point about migrants’ English language abilities merely serves to hide an even more tragic situation: how the very ESOL classes designed to improve immigrants’ language and capacity to “integrate” were not up to the task for that 0.3% of the population.

Too often at grassroots level, I have heard of immigrants dropping out of classes or even completing them without seeing much improvement. Why? Because the classes were too advanced and not pitched at the needs of the specific group or class. This ultimately was not good news to have circulated on the community grapevine. 

What a lose-lose situation; and all that money spent ineffectively attempting to make the so-called “hard to reach” learn English.

It must be said that some ESOL classes have benefitted a good number of new arrivals to find their place on the ladder here, as a refresher, transitory or grounding opportunity, or simply as a means to a certificate of achievement to find acceptance in the workplace. I believe this number is not the one objected to by those who harp on about migrants not wanting to fit in.

The “hard to reach”, those who “don’t wish to integrate” may well have had that basic urge to belong knocked out of them, for the n-th time, by well-meaning colleges and providers of ESOL courses who didn’t take into account participants’ education base, perhaps illiteracy; who didn’t consider their personal and life context (family, age, status, experience); essentially who weren’t flexible in supporting the different needs and learning styles of a spectrum of migrants.

In so doing, the marginalized were reinforced into that position – women, the home-bound, those with little or no education, the elderly and so on, who now have less chance of progress in these cost-cutting times, and who will continue to have their ‘lack’ of English held against them.

NB for a bit of extra background to this piece, see last blog below.

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[1] Editorial, The Observer, 30 March 2013: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/mar/31/immigration-politicians-dont-stoke-fears?CMP=twt_gu

Still underperforming!

Ah well, the story of my life. Still can't quite get to grips with this blog. Whoever would have thought being a hermit was this hectic.

One itch that's been irritating for a while has finally received some attention and I'll post those paragraphs shortly. It all started around 2004 when I realised how some migrant or black/minority ethnic women were not benefitting from traditional ESOL classes put on in Edinburgh. Largely because they were too 'formal' for those with a low education base, taught in a way that didn't match their participants' daily living context. Shame. The opportunity was lost to some very intelligent women who would have responded much better in a less 'academic' model.

Why Can't We Live Together?

The United Kingdom shames itself when it takes away the dignity and self-respect of the most vulnerable. Those who come here for safety and sanctuary do so out of necessity: we should honour their trust! The UK Government must not exploit their difficulty by imposing destitution and further degrading their humanity. The Government needs to change its approach - in just three simple steps set out in the Scottish Refugee Council’s Stop Destitution in Scotland campaign. Then perhaps the nation can hold its head high.

In signing the StopDestitution campaign petition, I wanted to remember the message (above) I posted. It also led me to think of why there is constant agitation about who’s in, who’s out, who belongs, who doesn’t. Not just in the global environment, it’s even in the tiniest village, perhaps even in the core family unit. How many of us parents agonise about the daughter or son-in-law to be? That’s where the fear starts of course. And it does build, through communities, countries and into the World.

Which is where I started.

Why can’t we live together? There is only one world, one atmosphere, one set of oceans, seas and lakes. We are scientifically only one species of human beings. We have travelled far, across many lands, throughout time. This is all ours, our inheritance, from the first homo sapiens in the Rift Valley.  

So why do we worry incessantly about who fits and do we fit, or how can we fit?

Yes, Britain is a small island. Some are concerned whether we can sustain more lives here. A bit of perspective might be helpful: Britain could easily fit into a third of Namibia, just one country in the southwest of the African continent. Or 13 Britains could exist within South Africa. The doom-mongers will argue its more than geography or even agricultural opportunity; many more resources are needed to support a population of 70 million. Apparently.

But humans are resourceful – we can, we must, we will come up with solutions for how to live together on this blue marble of a planet.

However, thinking only to the end of our noses shows up how small we are. I suppose that’s not too strange, after all we are islanders. We have been big thinkers before though; some great minds over the last 500 years or more have come from this island. Perhaps it was that those visionaries of the past thought bigger and wider, over the horizon and beyond. It is not their colonizer, imperialist mentality we need today. It is the bravery to go beyond ourselves, to embrace the wider world, the Other’s space. In true reciprocity. We are one Earth after all.

Rec.i.proc.i.ty (noun)

The practice of exchanging things with others for mutual benefit, especially privileges granted by one country or organisation to another.  

Dare I suggest “from one person to another”?




To add your name to the StopDestitution campaign click here.

Well, this blog is genuinely irrational! Needs more attention to say the least.

Wonder how it'd be to mark the end of British Summer Time with a resolution. Like a sort of " ... it's a new dawn, it's a new day ..."


Here's to shorter, in the moment blogging! Wish me success, Nina.

What affects how Scotland thinks about immigration

First thoughts on today’s Migration Observatory report on the IPSOS Mori poll on regional support for reducing immigration to the UK

Largely the report presents responses that reflect the general intuitive reaction to immigrants by Scots. A national liberal psyche does embrace new arrivals and does appreciate the desire for everyone’s capacity to contribute to the overall good and welfare of the nation.

However, as is the limitation of any poll, the sample group may not have included the broadest spectrum of opinion, particularly that which receives the high attention of the tabloid media. Today’s Everyman concerns are having as much impact on the ground as elsewhere across the United Kingdom: the difficult conditions in employment and the economy are biting deep. There will no doubt be Scottish opinion coming to light after this Migration Observatory report that declare negative sentiment about immigration and immigrants.

What is most interesting in the Variations Enigma is the standout result that “surprisingly, Scotland has the highest levels of support of any region for reductions in immigration of high skilled workers”.

It is an enigma and there may be a host of reasons why. It really suggests that deeper or different questions need to be asked of the Scottish people.

How aware are we of the skills we need across the nation?

Of the skills we have already.

Of the skills we are being trained or should be trained to achieve?

Of how those relate to national, UK and global, economic and social drivers.

How realistic are we of what we are capable of right now, today?

How and what are we (not just the Government) prepared to do to ensure the future of the country?

As the UK (and of course Scotland) faces societal and global challenges, as we all negotiate our place in 21^st Century reality, net migration has been presented as a cure-all. It may be wise to sidestep the high tension of ping pong between the political parties and look to resolving the many and complex needs of People.

No doubt this includes migrant people in a world that has been created by migration flows over time immemorial.

Facing up to the Real Questions

It's curious that the UK Government asserts authority over people's lives, deeming this or that to be the 'right' thing for citizens, without really looking at the fundamental conditions that are behind all those 'wrong' situations (alcohol consumption, social housing, employment, welfare benefits, 'foreigners').

In her blog on Research impact: thinking outside the tick box, Bridget Anderson looks below the surface of some of the trite even convenient proposals presented in the UKBA's consultation on Employment Related Settlement, Tier 5 and Overseas Domestic Workers and wonders why the real questions are not being asked. These are political and theoretical, she states, but in fact are "the questions that affect us all". I share these musings on the two cited by Ms Anderson:

Do we want a sustainable population strategy?

Britain faces a land, demographic and economic conundrum in which it appears we resort to crisis management according to political whim. Will our nanny state leaders look beyond restrictions and curtailments to the valuing, respectful governors they purport to be? They espouse "integrated, cohesive communities" but these are just words when there is no genuine buy-in from all concerned. 

Now HOW do we achieve that and keep focused on a thriving, successful UK, at the same time! In order to deliver a sustainable populaton (if we had a stragegy), our political leaders need to realise that a comprehensive, holistic and truly inclusive approach across human society and related systems may be challenging but may well work! Sadly, personal agenda will be the price to pay and that may be too high, not just for the politicians and government workers but also for individuals, communities and political parties everywhere. It is a tough call; perhaps altruism is too idealistic, too utopian. Take the handful of leaders who may be considered to have held 'altruistic' ideals: while Gandhi, King, Suu Kyi and Mandela may fit the label, the accumulated impact of their lives' work on humanity and world citizenry is barely recognisable to my cynical eye. 

Still, our difficulty in putting aside personal self-interest is not about to bring the world to its end. It is just a shame our progress as a 'human' species does not match our technological, scientific advances. 

Why is domestic labour not considered work?

That human species that we profess we belong to continues to be at a loss about valuing each other, the assets that we are and the potential that we have to shared coexistence on a tiny blue planet. We may not have come far enough on our evolutionary road as conscious beings to maintain the rational learnings of the 'liberation' and rights movements of the last century. I can only assume we have merely taken the earliest steps on that route, with a very long way to go yet. How else can one explain the arrogant ignorance of those who demean the work of fellow human beings with supporting roles as mothers, carers, cleaners, labourers etc? How can any contribution, however 'lowly', to the fullness of our human existence be considered insignificant, inessential, unworthy or invaluable? Surely every task, every effort impacts on our human endeavour as the sentient beings we believe we are.

Yes, these musings are more philosophical, moral and idealistic, not to mention individual. Nevertheless, they ask fundamental questions of ourselves as a civil, thinking society and should not be swept under any carpet of 'evidence'-led rhetoric based on power or political designs.