Liberal hypocrisy over immigration has just been brutally laid bare

Telegraph

3 days ago

The Guardian is increasingly worried about a grave threat to British jobs. In an editorial this week, it begged UK firms not to replace university graduates with Artificial Intelligence – because AI 'must not be allowed to eclipse young talent'. It would be awful, the Guardian continued, if graduates' prospects were 'short-sightedly shut down in the name of cost savings'.
Quite right, too. I agree with every word. There is, however, just one small thing that puzzles me.
Glad as I am to see the Guardian highlighting this threat to middle-class jobs, why does it rarely seem quite so concerned about an equally grave threat to working-class jobs?
Over the past couple of decades, any number of working-class people have complained that their livelihoods are under threat from mass immigration. Again and again, however, the Guardian has published articles flatly dismissing these fears.
It's run headlines such as, 'The Tory Fallacy: That Migrants Are Taking British Jobs and Driving Down Wages.' And: 'We Keep Hearing About 'Legitimate Concerns' Over Immigration. The Truth Is, There Are None.' And, as recently as May this year: ''Things Could Fall Over': Businesses and Public Services on Starmer's Immigration Crackdown.'
Anyone who disagreed was liable to be accused of racism – even if they were children. 'Racist and Anti-Immigration Views Held by Children Revealed in Schools Study,' reported the Guardian in 2015, noting with horror that '60 per cent of the children questioned believed it was true that 'asylum seekers and immigrants are stealing our jobs''.
Maybe I missed it, but I don't recall the Guardian thundering that immigrant plumbers and builders 'must not be allowed to eclipse young talent'. Or that working-class people's prospects must not be 'short-sightedly shut down in the name of cost savings' offered by cheap foreign labour.
But perhaps it's different, when it's your own children's futures at risk.
Slaves to wokery
Believe it or not, some MPs are still insisting that our country owes reparations for the transatlantic slave trade. Even in happier times, it would have been difficult to persuade the wider public of their case's merits. But imagine trying to do it right now.
'Good evening, sir, I'm from the Labour party. As you will be all too well aware, these are very tough times for the nation's finances – so I'm afraid that at the next Budget we will have no alternative but to increase your taxes. Oh, and then increase them a bit more, so that we can give away vast sums of your money to countries thousands of miles away in compensation for crimes that took place hundreds of years ago and which you personally had nothing to do with.'
Not the easiest sell. None the less, the campaign continues. Last week, the Jamaican government – which is extremely keen on reparations – petitioned the King to seek legal advice on the issue. And this week, Bell Ribeiro-Addy – the Labour MP who chairs the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Afrikan Reparations – said: 'I think it's important that people are moving forward with legal remedies, because ultimately enslavement was ended with the law, the reparations to slave owners happened under the law, and so reparations to those affected must happen under legislation.'
Reparations to 'those affected'? Very well. If she can find me an 18th-century Caribbean slave, I will be only too happy to compensate him. He can use the money to throw a lavish party for his 250th birthday.
Unfortunately, however, I won't be able to make the same offer to anyone born more recently. Because they're no more victims of the slave trade than I'm a victim of the Great Fire of London.
Sultana fruitcake
Personally I'm delighted that Zarah Sultana, the 31-year-old ex-Labour MP for Coventry South, is about to launch a new Left-wing party. Because it will give us the opportunity to ask her an important question.
On January 29, Ms Sultana voiced her furious opposition to the planned expansion of Heathrow airport, denouncing it as 'reckless, short-sighted and indefensible' in the face of the 'climate emergency'. Yet, on March 26, she readily endorsed a campaign for a brand new international airport to be built in Azad Kashmir, Pakistan – on the grounds that it would 'serve the vibrant, worldwide Kashmiri diaspora' (of which Ms Sultana happens to be a member, as her grandfather came to the UK from Kashmir).
The question for this exciting new political leader, therefore, is: what changed? In the eight weeks between these two pronouncements, did the 'climate emergency' suddenly end? If so, I'm surprised that the Government hasn't made more of this wonderful news. Think of all the money it can save, now that net zero is no longer required.
Alternatively: perhaps the 'climate emergency' is still raging, but a new Pakistani airport wouldn't exacerbate it, because, unlike nasty British planes, Pakistani ones don't emit greenhouse gases. In which case, we must beg Pakistan to share its astonishing aeronautical secrets. When Ms Sultana becomes prime minister, I hope it will be the very first thing she does.
Way of the World is a twice-weekly satirical look at the headlines aiming to mock the absurdities of the modern world. It is published at 7am every Tuesday and Saturday