Migration why is still an issue?

We've all heard the furore about migration and the scandal which caused the home Secretary to resign. However I still fear there is a somewhat negative connotations around the whole subject which reveals a real lack of understanding.

As human beings we often fear what we don’t understand. This in itself in my view is the stem of most of this countries migration problems. The worst thing is we've never learnt from our previous mistakes and are still blind to the issues and complexities around the whole subject. 

The migration of species regardless of generis is perfectly normal. It's happens throughout nature and mankind. So why do we as humans have issues with it? Usually this is down to when the local population is trying to conserve resources or there is less to go to round. The strong dominant species will usually blame the migrants for the issues or lack of resources or it is portrayed as such by the powers that be..

From a personal perspective, as the son of a migrant, born in this country to often i hear let's teach them English to integrate. Let's publish documents in different languages. Produce a plethora of statistics which are never used unless they want to apply for funding that is. 

Perhaps the issue is with the local population and not the migrants. Let's take a step back and explain the issues that have been created with regard to migration from a migrant’s point of view. This is how I heard it from my father.

My father was a proud Migrant, being a part of the commonwealth meant that he felt he belonged to a larger family. When the call came that England needed workers, he didn't hesitate in coming forward and traveling 1000's of miles in the hope of a better life for him and his young family, which he initially had to leave behind.

As always the industries that needed them welcomed the people with open arms. However the society in general where anything but good to him. He faced racial and physical abuse everywhere from housing with regular signs in B&B’s saying no blacks, no dogs. Even when he found somewhere he was regularly abused by the owners. On the streets he didn't feel much safer, he was looked at suspiciously and often had been attacked violently, as a young child I was a witness to this even in the early 70’s. The only safe place he felt was at work, where he met other migrants in similar situations.

When this is the state of things right at the beginning, it is obvious to protect themselves they will build communities for the religious, cultural needs and safety needs. Due to cheap housing this always happens areas of poverty and before long you have what the local population call no go areas. 

This happened back in the 50's, 60's and 70's. The sad thing is nobody learnt from these lessons back then. The society or powers that be never considered the long term implications and thus in the 00' ties. The same thing happened with migrants from Eastern European countries. Yes come over and do the jobs our people don't want to do. But then without support or long term integration plans we are back at blaming migrants for the problems of the country.

May be its a historical thing, or even familial but I feel very strongly that we've never treated migrants well in this country and when they have done so much for it. 

So where do we start. Well hopefully before they come over, let's understand their cultural needs, their beliefs their language. They have given up their homes and families for us, can't we at least let them in to hearts.

A few years back I was in hospital I had a young polish care assistant helping me with very personal needs. I was going to be in the hospital for a while. So I asked him if on my rooms white board he wrote 10 basic polish words. I started to use them regularly in our conversation, just basics hello, thank you, please etc. One day he asked me why I was interested in learning his language I explained my own historical past and explained that considering he has come over to this country to take care of my most basic needs the least I could do was thank him on his own language in some way recognising not only him but his culture. 

If only we opened our hearts and truly understood that it's not Just about the money, but in order to fully integrate its not just about asking them to see things our way,  but we should also see things there way.

As a start i think the local authority should specifically employ people who work at local levels in those communities to build ties with them. About 10 years ago whilst working for a local authority and being asked to look at language services. I was astonished with the cost of translation services and what we were being charged. Surprisingly most of the communication wasn't about legal or technical matters it was just fact finding or information they needed. So rather than paying for professional translators we encouraged locals with a good grasp of English to come forward as community interpreters. We gave them some basic training and understanding of how services worked and called them in if we needed their expertise. The programme was a two way street, it gave us access in to their communities and a better understanding of their needs. I had plans to push this further, and the system worked well for a few years, with the bonus of reducing spend on language services by 60%. Unfortunately as with most projects the effort wasn't sustained by the powers that be and I believe we lost a huge asset in community relations.

There are other things we can do like encourage the communities to have open days so the locals can find out about their neighbours culture. Within this the sharing of food and tastes, languages and beliefs should be encouraged it is after all only by knowing and understanding that we can truly work together as one community. A community of mankind. With the emphasis on the latter part of that word. Be kind.