I'm tempted by Nigel Farage !

Hello Joan, have not seen you on GN for ages and always looked forward to reading your views from over there!

Yes, Australia is a melting pot (now I have the song on the brain). From what little I see when I come over, it does take a generation or so before people think of themselves as Australians - when they have been through the education system perhaps. However, Australians are proud of their nationality, whereas a lot of British (I do mean British) sometimes seem less proud, even embarrassed or in denial.

Is NF concerned about immigration on race grounds or sheer number grounds as we are geographically such a small country?

And in just one generation, my wider family is made up of people whose countries of origin stretch from Barbados to Fiji, though none yet of Chinese origin. This doesn't mean I don't sometimes share fears about having to cling on to my own cultural identity, as the Britons, Celts, aborigines & many others have had to do, often at the hands of the white Brits, but I believe we have a choice to use the fears to motivate some positive results rather than the awful ones leading to strife.
Going to Australia & NZ last year also made me very aware how, in parts at least, these countries are no longer the place of escape for White Brits wanting to flee.

My lovely, caring and hard-working adult GD is mixed race, so it is likely that at least 20% of my descendants will be of mixed race, though if the 4 others have inter-racial relationships, it could very well be more. I hope I live to see some of my GGC.

Plenty of mixed race couples here in Australia. My son is marrying an ethically Cantonese Australian, whose parents fled Vietnam by boat in the 1970s. The Vietnamese post-war government wanted the Cantonese out, where they lived. Anyway, she's now a respected immunologist at a local hospital, part of a system that saves lives. Her parents run a cleaning company, and her brother is a maths lecturer at a local university. I think their family and ours are typical of migrants and refugees - working hard and educating our kids to do important, necessary, work.

Political parties like UKIP scare me - they are usually very right wing and ignore facts they don't like. They are only any good as a critical voice: they rarely have any serious policies that would work in the real world.

2080... quite a few generations of .... oh no! white Brits marrying non-white Brits and ... God forbid .... foreigners of various hues. I guess that will make significant inroads into the purity of our anglo/saxon/norman/celtic master race. This is definitely a disaster in the making. Particularly as us Brits are, (I seem to remember reading), more likely to make such ill-advised marriages than any other nation. Over a million mixed race britons, and rising every day. And that is not counting the ones who are half French, half Greek etc
news.sky.com/story/1023609/mixed-marriage-more-accepted-in-britain

Selective, Hollydaze.
What about the sentence before the one you quote?
What about the fact that UKIP are not bothered about the TTIP?

Oh dear, my sons' partners have sneaked in by being white and non-British. What should we do with them? Send them back where they came from? After all, they are both taking up jobs in our schools which could be had by white British. But then my sons would probably go with them, thus being a problem immigrant in their partners' countries. A problem, isn't it?

Thanks for correcting me Ana over my incorrect use of 'regardless'. What I was referring to was the para further down the page - 'Prof Coleman went on to say that even if net immigration was reduced to 80,000 a year white Britons would still be outnumbered by 2080'.
I took this to mean the proportion of white British will carry on diminishing even if immigration is reduced, especially because at the moment the birth rate of some groups is much higher than that of white British. At some point in the future it will happen anyway so we have plenty of time to prepare positively now for the future even if we are not here.

It will only continue as long as the UK economy needs the extra labour. There was mass emigration of Europeans from Ireland when the economy went belly up and work dried up.
As the proportion of non-working older people increases we will have to get workers and tax payers from somewhere. What is Nigel's plan B? Incentives for people to have big families?

'Figures from the Office of National Statistics show that if immigration remains at a long-term rate of around 180,000 a year the proportion of the white British-born population will fall from 80 per cent to 59 per cent by 2051.' (from the link you're referring to, gadabout)

Not ' regardless of immigration'. Just if it continues at its present rate.

Re Hollydaze's post on previous page: If David Coleman's statistics in the article you mention are correct, that white British will be in a minority by 2080 regardless of immigration, surely we have a choice & can choose to deal with the impending reality positively rather than with fear & division. The question could be, "What can all of us do now to ensure a good transition so all can live together well & with respect?" rather than wasting energy desperately trying to change a situation that probably can't be changed even if all immigration were stopped now. It does however need a place where people can talk about & deal with their fears.

It's going to be an interesting election isn't it.

I am very interested to see the voting outcomes for the French, Dutch, Hungarian and Greek nations just as much as our own.

The only bit I could see in that that would constitute a response to UKIP is

For the Tories this finds a scapegoat for their own failures; for UKIP it is a cheap vote-winner, pretending all our problems can be magically solved by “keeping them out” or “sending them back”.

Have UKIP put that forward as the solution or are they suggesting that limiting not just the numbers that come to Britain but also to include skill assessment - which is the criteria of many countries.

It isn't as though UKIP would be voted in for Parliament but if that's what people in the UK want, maybe those who have sat 'in power' for so long but ignored the people of the UK as nothing more than units of production that are as easily replaced as any machine part, should sit up and take notice. It may be best to read the message (rise in UKIPs popularity) rather than shoot the messenger (Farage).

nhap.org/features/euro-election-features/
National Health Action Party's response to Nigel Farage.

Brilliant, anno. Farage actually said he was a good candidate. Bet he wished he'd stood himself.

I feel that the main problem is, Silverfish, none of them are trustworthy. As I have said before: you can't expect those who benefit the most from the current situation to be in a rush to help you change it. The crop of MPs do tend to benefit from the existing system so no great changes will be made.

The very definition of madness is: to keep doing the same thing over and over again but expecting a different result.

The same is true of voting for the same parties over and over again and expecting a better outcome. I just wish there was a better voting system (but I'm not brainy enough to devise one unfortunately).

Think again: Peppa Pig is a subversive feminist!

(grin)

its all too complicated for me, ive thought of this and that and I still don't know who I might vote for if I ever vote again. Having said that I wish Pepa pig would form a piggies party. I would vote for them, harmless and innocent.

Well if this isn't the UKIP lunatic fringe, I don't know what is.

I do think it's important to gather all the facts Silverfish. The UK will, in all probability, only get this chance once. I have no axe to grind on the whole Europe thing (the Isle of Man is not part of Europe) as I don't live in the UK but from watching various politics shows, it is something that a lot of people are concerned about. It's only fair that the people of the UK have a say in what happens to their country - whether that be via UKIP or trusting David Cameron to keep his promise will be up to those who are concerned. You already know where Labour and the Lib Dems stand on this issue.

you have a valid point there Holly, Im undecided but will bear this in mind

UKIP have some support from Migration Watch and from Professor David Coleman, Professor of Demography at the Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford since October 2002, and a lecturer since 1980. He is currently based in the respected Department for Social Policy and Intervention.

Between 1985 and 1987 he worked for the British Government, as the Special Adviser to the Home Secretary, and then to the Ministers of Housing and of the Environment. He is a fellow of St John's College, Oxford.

He has published over 90 papers and eight books and was the joint editor of the European Journal of Population from 1992 to 2000. In 1997 he was elected to the Council of the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population.

Professor Coleman may be thought to know what he's talking about.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/8142176/White-Britons-to-become-minority-by-2066.html

Whatever personal beliefs are held, the British were never consulted about Europe, they were never asked about mass immigration; I fail to understand why people would object to a referendum; unless of course, some have more right to an opinion than others.

I've always said 'garaage' because that's how my family said it, although all Northerners. But the rest of my 'a's are flat - as in 'bath' rather than 'barth'. Funny that!

Aka - interesting link you gave and one that I was very pleasantly surprised and pleased to read the outcome. I have a general dislike for received pronunciation but even more so when it is considered the correct mode of speech.