Islam versus Europe

Lord Glasman, the leading policy adviser to the Labour leader, said the country should “draw the line” on immigration and even renegotiate EU rules that allow free movement for migrant workers.

He told The Daily Telegraph that Britain is “not an outpost of the UN” and the needs of the British people must be put first.

The comments are the most drastic yet for any of the major political parties and would effectively end immigration in to the UK.

However, the Labour party was last night quick to distance itself from the suggestions, insisting Lord Glasman’s views were “his own”.

Source: Telegraph

Glasman called for the EU's free movement rules to be renegotiated.

Lord Glasman believes the time has now come for a dramatic change where migrants would only be allowed in to the UK on a case-by-case basis and if their specific skills are needed.

In an interview with this newspaper, he said: “We've got to reinterrogate our relationship with the EU on the movement of labour.
“The EU has gone from being a sort of pig farm subsidised bloc. to

the free movement of labour and capital.”

He added: “Britain is not an outpost of the UN. We have to put the people in this country first."

Asked if that meant stopping immigration virtually completely for a period, he said: “Yes. I would add that we should be more generous and friendly in receiving those [few] who are needed. To be more generous, we have to draw the line."

He also compared Israeli settlers to jihadist supremacists.

Despite being a fervent supporter of Jewish tradition, he is highly critical of Israel, although he says it should not be "demonised" above other regional powers. "[But] I don't like Israel. There are terrible things going on. The Jewish settler movement is as bad as Islamic jihadist supremacists. What I see with jihadists and settlers is nationalist domination, and yuck is my general verdict."

This is an absurd comparison for many reasons, not the least of which is that the ambitions of Israeli settlers are confined to land that has historically belonged to them while the ambitions of jihadist supremacists extend to the entire world.

While Glasman sounds reasonable in some respects on immigration, it is important to bear in mind that:

a) Labour will not do it;

and

b) In a previous interview with the Times, Glasman called for an amnesty for illegal immigrants ("The country will have to have a “regularisation of illegal immigrants”.)

According to some estimates, there may be more than 15 million illegal immigrants in the country. The cost burden of regularising these people, as Glasman proposes, would crush our economy.

Still, it's good that he's said this. Even rhetorical shifts among the elite on topics like Islam and immigration are welcome. They make it more difficult for the thought police to play their anathema games, and may presage future policy changes.