Racism against central/eastern European immigrants in Britain.

[Jacobtm]

So if you watched Question Time, you heard everyone lining up against Labour for getting the policy on immigration wrong. They estimated something like 60,000 immigrants would come from central and eastern Europe if they opened their borders to all EU members, but more than 700,000 came.

The representatives for the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives both scolded Labour on this point, though weren't willing to verbally elaborate why this is such a big problem.

To me, it seems like the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives were saying to Labour: If you hadn't let in so many Poles, we wouldn't have had this problem with the BNP gaining support.

I understand that in any country, especially during an economic downturn, you have people complaining that immigrants are taking their jobs. But is racism against Poles and other central/eastern European immigrants particularly strong in Britain, compared to say, racism against Carribeans, South Asians, Africans, etc.?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Actually the number of workers from Poland & etc has been falling for a few years now. There's no evidence that it's led to much of an increase in support for the BNP (with a few exceptions - such as Wrexham), though the general media hysteria about immigration certainly has... but that started years before Poles started to turn up in processing plants and in fruit fields.

There is a degree of racism against Poles (and it sort of is only against Poles as all workers from the old East here are considered to be Poles by the sort of people who...), but it's nothing like that directed at the immigration from the West Indies in the '50's or from India, Kashmir and Bangladesh in the '60's and '70's. It's not even as bad as racism towards (for example) Asian families that've been here for over fourty years.

[afleitch]

There is a degree of racism against Poles (and it sort of is only against Poles as all workers from the old East here are considered to be Poles by the sort of people who...), but it's nothing like that directed at the immigration from the West Indies in the '50's or from India, Kashmir and Bangladesh in the '60's and '70's. It's not even as bad as racism towards (for example) Asian families that've been here for over fourty years.

True. Though it is interesting to look at various microcosms. Glasgow unfortunately has seen incidents of racism against Poles, Slovaks etc in Pollockshields. They are also housed in poor, unfit for purpose private landlord accomodation. But the owners of the property and the perpetrators of much of the racism are second/third generation Asians concerned at an 'influx' of Poles into their area. It's unfortunately common knowledge and other than individual prosecutions there is not much of a community or police reponse (it also doesn't help that the close or extended families of the property owners are often 'on the Cooncil')

Of course just making the above statement to people of a certain mentality leaves me open to the charge of being 'racist' or 'damaging community relations'