Are you ready to welcome the apparent flood of bulgarians and romanians....

I think we may be in agreement Jess. I think it's disgraceful to take money as rent from your workers for the often squalid housing. No spin is intended.
Many farmers pay agencies/gangmasters to recruit these workers and between them they know the workers are being paid below the minimum wage.

This is from the Gov Uk website, Jess:

"It’s a criminal offence for employers not to pay someone the National Minimum Wage or to falsify payment records."

"Accomodation and food is deducted from their wages so they just don't have the same bills to pay as anyone doing the same job but living in their own home with all the usual household bills." - that is an interesting spin penguinpaperback on a long and extremely dishonourable way of treating workers. People in the Welsh valleys still remember when miners were treated like that.
also
Is it not against the law to not pay the minimum wage. You don't seriously think that a farmer would have gone on TV to be interviewed by Nick Robinson to say that he could not recruit Uk workers to pick strawberries if he had been at risk of investigation or prosecution?
Yes people did go hop picking etc in the 50s and 60s. The country and the people that lived in it were a darn sight poorer there. It was a welcome break from the slums of the east end for many people. We are a much, much richer nation now.

The work ethic has disappeared, hasn't it? Which was what I was trying to say, clumsily. We tried to make life easier for our children, and perhaps we made it too easy.

POGS I've heard Nigel Farage make the comment it's not all about money and I agree with him. merltgran around some of the market towns here immigrants are living cheek by jowl thanks to either gangmasters or farmers arranging their accomodation. Accomodation and food is deducted from their wages so they just don't have the same bills to pay as anyone doing the same job but living in their own home with all the usual household bills. As they tend to be here for seasonal work although the living conditions must be truly awful the money still makes it worthwhile to send home to their family.
I must admit although I did watch the BBC programme last night I didn't catch, or perhaps it wasn't mentioned whether the fruit farmer was paying the minimum wage. A lot of farmers don't pay the minimum wage and so there is little incentive for the local unemployed to apply for any seasonal work. This is often glossed over and farmers moan they can't find the people they need to work the land when the real problem is they are paying well below the minimum wage. I expect the power of the supermarkets now has done nothing to help this problem.
When I was a child my family and many others would catch busses to pick fruit during the school holidays. I remember sitting on an upturned bucket with a plastic mac on, typical summer downpour while Mum picked fruit for the much appreciated cash at the end of each day. Us kids would be encouraged to pick too. This was the 1960's. My young parents had just bought their first house, a typical 1930's semi. They had 3 small children and although Dad was a white collar worker money was tight. Mum worked for the cash for school shoes, coats, essentials not luxuries.

On the subject of second hand. I don't know about Estonia but I did live in Bulgaria for 5 years. It's not that they have any hang up about second hand stuff, it's not in their world.
Second hand is very new to Eastern Europeans. They haven't had the stuff to throw away. So when they come here, and see what we do, they follow us.
You have no idea how much they look up to us. A lot of this comes from them listening ( under the threat of death) to the BBC world service.

When I lived in BG I have seen people follow me round a supermarket and copy what I put in my trolley. This was because they believed what I bought must be good.
I was in BG 2 months ago and bought myself a new winter coat( so much cheaper) as I was trying it on, a woman stood there looking at me and promptly bought one herself.

Blimey, I must be eastern European then on that basis. [confuse]

Money and class don't always go together' sometimes they are at total odds with one another, thank goodness.

My daughter uses Freecycle and does bootfairs too - but we are, i have to admit, a middle-class family. Her partner is not, they are working-class and have fought hard to make good lives for themselves and his sisters are horrified at the thought of using anything secondhand, they feel it demeans them. They really do feel defined by their possessions and designer labels, like my own sister-in-law who had a tough upbringing. I know it's a generalisation, but they would have far more money to spare if only they lowered their 'standards' a little. Most eastern europeans have no such hangups. I have seen an Estonian young lady dance around a local Red Cross shop with a pair of lovely leather boots that cost only £7, she was so happy. I rarely see any british people in there under the age of 50.

Janerowena

You are wrong, my daughter and my family happily buy from charity shops and car boots etc.

You say ' I think their expectations of living standards are more realistic'. I do not argue with that comment so I will ask this to all on the thread.

'If immigrants and decent people who take low paid jobs can manage to show their children that it is responsible to work and provide for your family, how ever difficult that may be and we have job vacancies, How do we have so many able bodied people on benefits?

I hold my hands up to wanting fewer immigrant and free movement from the EU numbers. I also think there is an argument to be made as an objection to that in that immigrant and EU workers are doing jobs our own people 'refuse' to do.

It has to be said both sides to the coin need adault debate.

merlotgran, a lot of expats in Switzerland earn vast salaries compared to the average Swiss (most Swiss are NOT rich actually) and compared to 'back home' and yet they moan constantly because some things are more expensive than 'back home'. They are also attracted to areas where taxes are low, then complain bitterly that rents are higher there. It's funny, really.

Janerowena, very amused by your post earlier - I've heard similar things myself! AND some of our extended family have emigrated to Canada and Australia...whilst muttering about immigrants themselves!
However, I have to disagree slightly about what you said re Freecycle. Our daughters DO buy things from charity shops - our elder daughter in particular is VERY frugal, doesn't buy loads of 'Stuff' ( I sometimes have a hard job persuading her to let me treat her to a few new clothes at Christmas and birthdays).... she enjoys making things, recycling things, cooking from scratch and is extremely careful not to waste anything at all. And if she can't afford something, she does without. Her shared, rented (albeit shabby) home is furnished almost entirely from items from Freecycle or charity shops. She's not proud. I do worry that her standard of living is very low in creature comforts and not what we are now used to - but she says she has enough to eat and a roof over her head and she rides a bike. She doesn't live on benefits: she works as a part-time lecturer at UEA (hasn't got a permanent contract, so the work and therefore pay isn't consistent), does some proof-reading, tutoring and teaches music for SISTEMA. She works hard and doesn't earn much.
I also use Freecycle a lot: have Freecycled a lot of our unwanted possessions and found things from it ourselves. My OH buys all his maps from charity shops - he says he doesn't need new ones!
I haven' t watched the programme from last night yet - have recorded it to see later - so I'll hold fire on commenting further until I do!

Our own children aren't prepared to buy clothes from second hand shops and furnish their houses from Freecycle, though. Having moved a lot, I have freecycled many of my unwanted possessions, and bootfaired too. Most of the takers have been foreign workers. I think their expectations of living standards are more realistic. Also fear of getting into debt as they have not been used to having any safety nets.

Having watched the programme last night there is one thing I find baffling. Some of the immigrants interviewed said they could earn six times as much over here. What about their cost of living though? If our young people can't afford to buy or rent and food and heating costs continue to go through the roof, surely all that extra money is going to be needed to live. It's all relative, surely?

Brits abroad are 'expats' didn't you know, and not immigrants ;)

Many take the trouble to learn the local language and adapt to some extent to the local culture (keeping their own too- which is totally fine), and take part in local life, etc. Too many do exactly what their reproach other immigrants to do: live in enclaves, live a parrallel life, with separate schools, clubs, etc. I know Brits abroad who can barely buy a loaf of bread in the local language after 20+ years abroad. On the expat Forum for where I live, constant requests for English speaking, vets, doctors, plumbers, carpenters, dentists, etc, etc. And constant complaints that they went to a shop to buy something, and the shop assistant 'could not even give the instructions in English. for goodness sake, etc- which I find mind-blowing (after several years..).

Anyone else watch the programme last night? Interesting what he said about Blair and the desire for a bigger EU overriding any concerns about immigration. Gus O'donnell surprisingly forthcoming - i guess he can talk about what was not discussed (but not what was)

One weekday night DBH and I had just returned from a long trip, so decided to eat before going home at a small inn not far away. It was packed, much to our surprise. The tables were filled with chatty older couples, all discovering that they were there because of an offer for a cheap midweek break with a certain newspaper, DBH and I being the odd ones out as we don't read the paper (I'll leave you to guess which one) and lived nearby. They were all without exception Londoners. They got on to the subject of immigration, and had us in stitches - unwittingly.

They complained bitterly for an hour at least and it all got quite depressing, until the photos came out, of their children and grandchildren. Then it was 'This is *, he is a doctor in Spain'. 'Hannah is picking grapes in California'. 'Felicity is a teacher in India' and we just looked at each other in amazement. We could hardly believe what we were hearing. They were completely oblivious.

I live near a small town in East Anglia. It buzzes and thrives. The shops are all open, the streets are busy and I love it. It would not be like that if it were not for the eastern europeans and portuguese who live here. They look smart, speak well, and I despair for our own children who look heavy and scruffy by comparison. However, the next generation will soon integrate and I hope that they will learn from each other. Maybe I'm just an optimist, but I think it has given us a shake-up that we needed, our own young people really do seem to be lacking in many areas.

I think it's our fault, as parents, but unwittingly. We wanted a better life for our children than the one we had. Maybe they need a tougher life. We needed to be cruel to be kind. I would rather tackle that problem than try to keep immigrants out, from what I can gather few of them intend to stay here for more than a couple of years any more than our own children intend to stay abroad working for ever, although of course there are exceptions. I bet most of us have relatives who emigrated. We would be incensed if they were on the receiving end of racial abuse.

This thread has been fascinating to read.

It varied, what he said, according to the interview. Nick Robinson interesting last night.

Jess M

You post 'Even Forage admits the country would be worse off without immigration'

I saw him being interviewed on BBC News today and if that is your reference then he also went on to say, when the interviewer said 'Ah so you agree immigration is good for our economy then' He replied 'NO' It's not always about money is it'. I don't recall his exact words so I can only say it went something on the lines of 'It's also about the social fabric of the country, jobs, housing and schools'. He then said, 'Personally I would rather loose out financially and make that my concern than worry about the country's GDP figures which let's face it can be argued over anyway'

Fair point made I thought.

Absolutely granjura - that's the market. Of course they know.

A large EU with no border controls between us all is heaven for the criminals.

The poor foreign girls are tricked and exploited by their foreign pimps- dreadful, shameful. But WHO ARE THE PUNTERS? ARE THE NOT TO BLAME (as they know jolly well what does on)?

I know we have the internet today which can keep people rooted to the country from whence they came and makes a whole load of things possible, not always in a good way.

I know about 150 years ago, JessM, I was actually pondering on whether this was going on before mass immigration, say 30 years ago. I'm not talking about prostitution it's been around for ever, as I guess pimps have been the demand isn't going to go away. If women want to become prostitutes of their own free will fine then supply the demand. Trafficking women, possibly children to supply sex slaves or simply slaves is vile. I can't believe the wholesale demand for this was around say 30 years ago on the scale it seems to prevail at the moment, but I don't know I many be wrong.

Supply and demand bananas you can't sell something if there is no market. And if there is a market, someone will exploit it.
Go back 150 years to the streets of London - they were awash with prostitutes. In London it is estimated by some that there was one for every 12 adult males.

Horrible report on BBC London News about Hungarian men based in Croydon trafficking young girls from their homeland to work as sex slaves over here, the usual story of unwitting victims who thought they would be going to work at something legitimate and then threatened with violence or death if they didn't co-operate. Same old same old. What was uncovered was merely the tip of the iceberg. I hate the way we appear to be regressing into some sort of Dickensian nightmare complete with dark underbelly. Possibly forced prostitution and slavery may have been with us before mass immigration but were they both as prevalent in the near past? I think we could do without the monies from these vile activities sloshing around in our economy. Covert exploitation seems to go on for quite a while before it's dealt with, possibly because either there isn't the money to throw at a work force to infiltrate these sort of gangs and deal with them effectively. I can't help thinking a blind eye is turned at times.