Former Labour MP Steve McCabe has called for the UK government to focus on the "quality" of immigrants rather than their countries of origin.Speaking about immigration policy, McCabe emphasised that "people with a trade" should be the priority.READ THE FULL STORY HERE
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00:00to immigration. But what about the types of people? Because there's been suggestions today
00:04that actually when it comes to immigration from poorer countries, we should be tightening our
00:10belts and restricting the numbers on that side of the fence and instead looking more favourably
00:15on immigration from the likes of EU countries. Well, the only research I've seen on this
00:21comes from Denmark and the Netherlands. We've never done any research on this.
00:29But what it showed there, convincingly, is that immigrants from poor countries, and I'm
00:36talking about Bangladesh and Pakistan, are a net cost to the exchequer of quite a substantial
00:42amount. And immigrants that come actually from Western Europe, right, are a net gain to
00:48the exchequer, which actually plays to the argument, which is that we should rescind Brexit because
00:54the quality of immigrants coming to our country will be higher. But that's a completely different
00:58argument. So, but however, these are the only facts we've seen. We should carry out research.
01:05Remember, the Home Office would never, ever, ever say, break down crime by country. Now
01:11they've decided to do it. They could definitely work out. Under pressure. Under pressure.
01:15They've not just worked up and thought themselves as what they're doing. So we've seen some pressure
01:18start now. So therefore, actually, we should now see the Home Office, Yvette Cooper, who's had
01:25a latter-day conversion to this kind of view, right? Her announced we're going to work out
01:29which immigrants are making money for us and which are a cost to the country.
01:35Steve?
01:36Well, I'm not sure we should be focusing on countries. I think we should be focusing on
01:41the individuals who are coming here. We should be making sure we have people with the qualifications
01:46and the skills that will benefit this country and will be an addition to this country. I think it's
01:53actually quite difficult to be clear about it on a country basis, because despite the research you
02:00mentioned there, I mean, I think there's also some research that shows that Pakistani Americans do far
02:07better in American society than the vast majority in this country. That would suggest it may be something
02:16about the people you're actually bringing in. I don't know enough about it, but the point I'm making is
02:24we should concentrate on the individual. And there are examples in the past. I mean, I know that Bangladesh
02:30has made some economic progress in recent years. But at one stage, we used to have a reciprocal health deal
02:36with Bangladesh because we could get well-trained doctors and nurses there who came and helped our
02:44health service and actually invariably went back to Bangladesh and helped their country as well.
02:50So it's about the quality and the skills of the people you're bringing in. And it's about their record.
02:56If they've got a criminal record, what sort of person are you inviting into your country?
03:01Well, I've seen that research, which shows that the Pakistani Americans came from a better area of
03:10Pakistan. We seem to get the rejects and they get the good guys. So perhaps we should start looking
03:17at whereabouts they came from and before we make a decision about whether we should allow them in or
03:22not. Well, what do you think to it all? I think no matter what side of the fence anyone sits on or the
03:27viewpoint you all have, transparency, data transparency can only surely be a good thing,
03:33can't it? Because I was watching some commentary yesterday and the suggestion was it was pandering
03:38to the so-called far right to try and ask for this data. I mean, how ridiculous is that?
03:44You get your data, surely, and from there you can make decisions and have proper,
03:49honest conversations. Can you not?