Divorce Between England & European Union : Bad Politics of ”Equality of Unequals’ Hurts Good Economics . But Why Target Indians Immigrants ?
Rajiv Upadhyay
The British elections on June 8th snubbed its Prime Minister Theresa May as she lost the absolute majority David Camron had given her in parliament .But interestingly both major political parties ie Tories and Labour who were supporting staying with in EU in June’16 referendum, did not support it in the election this time and Brexit became from a distant unlikely to an inevitable disaster for UK . The British pound has already lost almost 20 % value vis a vis Dollar and may lose more if Free access to EU market is denied to UK.
Unfortunately both EU and UK are going to lose heavily in the long run by this divorce.
But was this divorce necessary ? certainly no !
It is a result of blunderous mishandling by the Bureaucrats of EU and lack of political wisdom in EU leaders particularly powerful and idealist dreamer ie Germany .
Britain was not an original enthusiast for European Union . It had its British Commonwealth of 52 countries and joined European Union only in 1973 along with Denmark and Greenlad .Original EU countries were Germany , France ,Belgium,Netherland,Italy and Luxemburg . Upto this stage all countries were equally well off economically and in in Human Development Indices .
The European Common Market was a great successs so was a common Schengen visa and borderless travel in Europe. The problems began when the newly free East European countries were admitted in EU and membership rose to 28 countries. These countries were relatively poor and UK along with Germany and France had to bear economic strains . For example UK’s contribution to EU rose from 2.3 billion pounds in 2008 to 11.3 billion pounds ( 17 billion dollars ) in 2013 .For a nation cutting its health expenditure due to non availability of money this was not an easy support but could have continued . The anti EU fever really came from a surge of Polish immigrants 7.5 lakhs of whom settled in UK from 2003 . Syrian refugees and likely opening of floodgates of immigration to Romania and Hungary were the nightmares for the British voters as they perceived hordes of immigrants taking away their jobs .UK wanted to put a time limit of four years before immigrants became eligible for its free social services like health etc . This too was not agreed .
EU reacted in a typical power drunk bureaucratic fashion by quoting rule book, not realizing that uniting unequals requires patience and politically deft handling .Unfortunately common political sagacity became so uncommon in European Union as well as amongst British politicians .
Polish Immigrants in UK
Unfortunately Indians got trapped in the cross fire on immigration .
Undoubtedly they are the biggest immigrant community . But has India not contributed to British history and wealth much more than the new wave of immigrants from say Poland , Romania, Syria or Greenland . But the typical anti Indian BBC bias is reflected in bunching of Indian hindus ( including Sikhs and Jains ) along with Pakistanis and Bangladeshis as Asians . Indians have more than twice the average wealth compared to Pakistanis and thrice as compared to Bangladeshis . Indians in UK are almost equal to British whites in average income ,tax payment education and are certainly not pulling the British white population down . By giving equal weightage to country of 1.2 billion as to smaller nations like Pakistan , Bangladesh or Syria they are making a grave mistake . Indian is the sixth biggest foreign investor in Britain and supports 100000 jobs compared to a total of 130000 low salary jobs being supported by British investment in India. A large number of Indian companies use Britain for their European operations .Peaceful , law abiding and intelligent Indians , Chinese and Jews are different from rest of the Asian or African immigrants . The new IT professional or bright students pursuing higher studies in UK are the new generation of Indian immigrants which will help Britain in meeting shortage of skilled work force .
Britain needs to realise that its history has more in common with India than say Syria or Romania and India is far more useful than say Pakistan or Ghana .India as world’s fastest growing economy will be far more useful to Britain in future too and mishandling relations with India will not be in the long term interests of both the countries .It should link immigrants to the importance of country for British economy.
Also France and Germany even at this late stage should consider saving EU by agreeing to reasonable British demand of limiting immigration and four year cooling off period before eligibility for NHS and social services .EU has to also consider imminent donor fatigue and plan a solution for possible collapse of economies of Spain , Italy and Portugal without damaging the common market and VISA regime .
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