Immigration Controls

Indeed, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I have heard you make no pronouncement on this subject for a very long time. I must tell the hon. Gentleman that if the problem is absence of will, we shall have to find the will. We shall have to implement the systems. That is what today's debate is is about: it is about finding the will that has been remarkably lacking in the past. The second strand of immigration is the equally lawful but vast-scale immigration from the eastern bloc of the European Union. We had an answer to that, if only we had implemented it: to set quotas. It is possible that some of it will right itself, with people going back because of the economic downturn, but we need to take a much firmer approach to understanding that even if immigration is welcome—and I welcome the Polish plumbers: they are terrific—if it is on an unpredicted large scale, it will put a sudden pressure on the infrastructure with which we simply will not be able to cope. One of the reasons for the deep resentment that sometimes emerges from various sections of the community is not that the immigrants are unpleasant and not that people do not want them, but people's recognition that schools, hospitals, housing and other services simply are not geared up to deal with a sudden influx of that order.