Skip The Budgie

So while I wanted to rip him into tiny pieces, I realised that it would serve no purpose other than to feed my ego. Instead, I thought I'd try to be more diplomatic, and present a case for people to do their own research and this is what I wrote:

It is extremely difficult to find accurate statistics on figures such as the population density and even the population of Britain and I suppose we will always have contradictions. I would be interested to find where Mr. Budd is getting his figures from, as I'm sure their creators will have as much interest in massaging them to reflect their interests rather than reality. The numbers I used came from the refugee Council and the government. The National Audit Office has produced an extensive report into the difficulty of calculating asylum figures, so I think that no-one is truly qualified to provide an accurate answer. With different offices having interests leaning in opposite directions, I suppose the truth is to be found somewhere inbetween. The stress in my letter was to emphasise the need for education, to get a balanced view, and to stop propagating the ridiculous myths that surround this issue.

Of course my letter was one-sided, and I still stand by it for the simple reason, as I stated before - that not only do we have a responsibility to these people, but we also need some kind of perspective on the issue. Although Section 55 was found to be inhuman in court, we are still feeling it's effects. In that case, the judge also ordered an immediate investigation into the interviewing process, which was found to be inhuman - leading to more successful claims than less - because they have a right to be here.

The reason we have no accurate figures on how many illegal immigrants there are is because they are illegal! Are there degrees of legality that the rest of the world is not aware of? There are so few bogus claimants deported because we can't afford to send them home, because they are homeless, starving and destitute, because they are working illegally at night in Morecambe Bay. The problem of illegal immigrants cannot be solved by having stricter laws, because the law is already strict. How is it possible that officials 'allow' illegal immigrants to enter, unless they themselves are breaking the law?

As I stated before, there is a difference between Asylum Seekers and Illegal Immigrants. Mr Budd concentrated on Illegal Immigrants, which I do not dispute. I would very much like to see an accurate table showing how the money spent on Asylum and immigration compares to the money spent on other things like maintaining unuseable nuclear submarines (around ??15 Billion a year, I heard), national defence and our own government's WMD's. Really, compared to this ??2 billion is a very small amount of money.

Yes I have a personal agenda against war and racial hatred and Governments that exploit the people for their own gain. If we did not invest so greatly in exploiting our position in the world, you would not have to worry about the tiny amount of our overall expenditure the fallout costs us. It is ridiculous to claim that we have to build more homes to house the huge numbers of immigrants, since once you have been granted asylum you have the same rights, you go on the same housing register, you wait your turn just like everybody else. If his figures are to be believed then we are spending a lot less on overseas aid than we should be.

Mr Budd's letter shows he has put a lot more store in the BNP's 'factual leaflet' than in searching for the truth himself. I don't know why people are trying to get to Australia. I would dearly like to know which muslim countries they pass on the way, why they want to try and get into what is possibly one of the most anti-asylum countries in the world and I would also like to know what Australia is the 'furthest country away' from because it certainly isn't Afghanistan. Does Mr Budd know the situation in Afghanistan? How can you blame those people for wanting to leave? We need to remember that the luxury in which we live comes at a great price, that of millions of lives and the least we can do is act like decent human beings and stop wanting everything for ourselves.

There are hundreds of books, journals, web sites and offices people can go to to inform their opinions. They should ask themselves why the BNP have concentrated on only one issue in their propaganda, and why not one word of it can be found repeated in ANY reputable information source. Then they should decide who they are going to vote for. If enough people did this, then perhaps your MORI survey would tell a different story.

So there. It might be a bit too long for them to print however, so we wait...