Immigration Controls

I do not think that they are either necessary or desirable for the simple reason that there is little net migration from one wealthy country to another. There has been some immigration from the new poorer countries that have come into the EU, and we should have exercised the powers that we had under the treaty to limit that. We did not, it is too late and I would not advocate leaving the EU in an attempt to put the clocks back—because that is what would be necessary to change the situation. In the longer term, there is likely to be little net migration within the EU unless and until we are foolish enough to allow Turkey in without appropriate measures to deal with the potential demand from that very large and very poor country. The co-chairman of the US Senate committee, Professor Teitelbaum, enunciated what he called Teitelbaum's law—that there is no such thing as temporary immigration from a poor country to a rich country. The counterpart is that flows between developed countries are normally for comparatively short periods, five or 10 years, and reverse themselves. As for the alleged social benefits that flow from mass immigration, I accept that some immigration does bring the benefits of diversity and cultural variety, but those benefits do not increase proportionately with the numbers. Having one Indian restaurant is fine, as is having two or three Indian restaurants, but 10 times as much benefit is not gained from 10 Indian restaurants, just as mass numbers of people with different cultures do not bring proportionately greater benefits than comparatively modest numbers. The idea that we need to allow unlimited—or mostly unlimited—immigration to achieve some of the benefits of diversity and cultural enrichment is mistaken.