Territorial Sovereignty: Lock the Doors, Guard the Gates, Secure the Border
Graphic from Daily Mail article here.
This is Part 6 of our series "Basic Principles of Patriotic Sovereignty". Here we consider the National Border.
A nation without a border does not exist as a nation. It's ability to set the lines of its national border, and its ability to prevent a breach, is a measure of its sovereignty – its authority over its own existence!
Yet, an official Office of National Statistics report released on the 23-5-24 told us that over 1.2 million "long-term immigrants" entered the UK in 2023. This is a national emergency. It is a national security issue.
We expect that a Labour government, or a Conservative government, elected at the General Election on 4 July 2024, is unlikely to enact the policies we suggest here. Rather, we set them out for the benefit of those who are working to build a patriotic orthodoxy for the future.
Principle: A nation which is unable to enforce its borders, or is unwilling to enforce its borders – whether physical, or economic, or ideological – is not a nation. The default position is that the borders shall be closed and locked-down, and the gates shall be guarded. Just as a homeowner keeps their front door locked and allows only trusted individuals to cross the threshold, so a nation keeps its borders closed, locked and guarded.
Policy: Lock the Doors, Guard the Gates, and Secure the Border.
On Wednesday 23 May 2024, the Office of National Statistics (ONS) released its latest immigration report to the year ending December 2023. It can be viewed on its website here where it can also be downloaded as a PDF; or it can be downloaded as a PDF below.
The page numbers below refer to the pages in the PDF.
1.2 MILLION IMMIGRANTS into UK in 2023
It reported that a provisional gross estimate of 1,218,000 long-term immigrants had entered the United Kingdom in 2023. This compares to the 1,257,000 for year ending December 2022. (p3)
"Long-term" is defined as "A person who moves to a country other than that of his or her usual residence for a period of at least a year (12 months), so that the country of destination effectively becomes his or her new country of usual residence." (p30)
The long-term net total for year ending December 2003 (the number of people immigrating minus the number emigrating) was provisionally estimated to be 685,000.
The figures are "provisional" and "are released with the expectation that they may be revised and updated as further and more complete data becomes available." (p24) For example, this Report updates the net estimate for year ending December 2022, to 764,000. (p3, and see Table 2, p26)
Non-EU nationals accounted for 85% (1,031,000) of total gross long-term immigration, which is similar to levels to year ending December 2022. (p5)
SOME NUMBERS for PEOPLE ENTERING, YEAR ENDING DEC 2023
Non-EU Work Visas = 423,000 (of which 219,000 were dependents). (pp9-10)
Non-EU Study Visas = 379,000 (of which 102,000 were dependents). (p10)
Other routes include:
Humanitarian Visa Programmes:
a) Hong Kong – referred to as "British National (Overseas)" = 26,000. (p11)
b) Ukraine = 10,000 (p11)
The report mentions, but does not detail, the figures for the additional routes which include: EU citizens, Asylum, Family and "Other". (pp28-32)
THIS IS a NATIONAL SECURITY ISSUE!
The government and media will discuss immigration as an "economic" issue or a "human rights" issue, but immigration at these shocking levels is really a National Security issue. It calls into question whether Britain, as a nation, can even continue to exist!
It is time to stop framing this as an "economic" or "human rights" issue. It's a national security issue, and it's an emergency!
Table from ONS report downloadable above.
3 EMERGENCY POLICIES to ENSURE our NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY
Policy 1: Lock the Doors and Secure the Border; and Know that it is Perfectly Possible to Close the Gates almost Entirely
We saw this – at least for legal immigration – during 2020 when the airports and ports were temporarily closed to legal migration in and out. The government can do it if it really wants.
Policy 2: Use "GDP per Capita" and "Per Capita Income" as the Growth Measures for the Economy
Our politicians must stop using "GDP" as the best measure of a nation's economy, and shift to using "GDP per Capita" meaning per person, and "Per Capita Income".
This will mean that the "health" of the economy is directly related to, and specifically describing, the health of the bank account of the individual citizen; and not some sort of impersonal, abstract paper figure, entirely unrelated to the real life of each of us; and which not one of us can physically grasp and appreciate.
Let's explain the terms:
"GDP" means "Gross Domestic Product".
The ONS says here that:
GDP is the standard measure of the size and health of a country's economy. It's the way we measure and compare how well or badly countries are doing. (Diane Coyle, GDP, Princeton Press) In other words, the value, profits and consumption of every item, product, or service brought to market by workers, companies, or other economic resources resident inside a country in a period of time is part of the GDP.
It may be a measure of the "size" of a country's economy, but we take issue with the idea that is a measure of the "health" of its economy!
People who idolise the measure of GDP will naturally want to encourage more and more people to come into the country because more and more people mean a bigger and bigger GDP figure.
Let's take an example of how GDP increases in practice.
Student Visas: The Addiction to Foreign Money
Why are so many Student Visas issued?
The answer is because giving visas to large numbers of foreign students is a way to directly increase the GDP.
The government is deliberately using foreign students as a way of bringing money into the country to make the GDP figures look better.
Here is how it works:
Foreign Students pay money to colleges and universities in the UK. This is effectively an "export". We are "exporting" education, in the sense that we are selling it to people abroad, and foreign money is paying for it.
Furthermore, anyone who has walked around the centre of Glasgow (where we are based), or any major city recently, will notice the large amount of "Student Accommodation" development which is springing up. This is to house the (often) foreign students.
These new-builds are helping to drive the construction industry, and once built, the rooms will be paid for by foreign money. All this works to drive up the overall GDP figure.
So the politicians can then boast that "GDP is rising". But, in this case, it is only rising because of the mass importation of foreign students!
In addition, what is also happening is that a lot of the students, once they graduate, can switch to another visa in order to stay here and work. So a Student Visa can be an initial method to acquire long-term entry into the country.
The House of Lords explained the Truth about GDP in 2008
In 2008, a cross-party group in the House of Lords released a detailed examination of the costs and benefits of immigration – which has not been attempted or bettered since – entitled The Economic Impact of Immigration, Vol 1.
You can download it here as a PDF:
It says this about "GDP".
49. GDP – which measures the total output created by immigrants and pre-existing residents in the UK – is an irrelevant and misleading measure for the economic impacts of immigration on the resident population. The total size of an economy is not an indicator of prosperity or of residents' living standards.
50. GDP per capita is a better measure than GDP because it takes account of the fact that immigration increases not only GDP but also population. However, even GDP per capita is an imperfect criterion for measuring the economic impacts of immigration on the resident population because it includes the per capita income of immigrants, which may raise or lower GDP per capita through a compositional effect. A new immigrant with a higher average income than the average resident worker could raise GDP per capita without necessarily changing the average income of the resident population.
51. Rather than referring to total GDP when discussing the economic impacts of immigration, the Government should focus on the per capita income (as a measure of the standard of living) of the resident population.
66. The overall conclusion from existing evidence is that immigration has very small impacts on GDP per capita, whether these impacts are positive or negative. This conclusion is in line with findings of studies of the economic impacts of immigration in other countries including the US.
You can see more of the House of Lords Report in our summary here.
So what does all this mean in reality?
It means that if your concern is having a high "GDP" then you have every incentive to encourage more and more people to come in because it will automatically raise the GDP figure – and then you can go on the telly and boast about the "health" of the economy!
However, if your concern is the economic benefit per capita – that is, per person – then you have no incentive to encourage more people to come in. Instead you will look to other ways of growing the economy in order to improve the genuine economic health of each particular person.
That's why we need to shift the measurements from overall "GDP" to "GDP per capita" and especially "Per Capita Income".
As for "where is the money going to come from"? Well, there are plenty of ways to improve an economy, as well as the fundamental fact that a sovereign government can always find money if it has to as we said in Part 4 of this series.
It is important to grasp this point because once you change the fundamental economic measurements, then politicians will become economically confident enough, and politically free enough, to restrict visas and lower immigration!
Policy 3: Immediate cap on Work and Study Visas to 20,000
In the absence of closing down the border entirely, we need an immediate cap on Work and Study Visas.
As above, there were an astonishing 802,000 non-EU Work and Study Visas (423K Work and 379K Study) released in 2023.
The pro-restriction organisation Migration Watch has said that net immigration should be "less than 100,000 a year" which is still very high! However, it's report here makes some useful points:
8. The way forward is a cap on overall numbers. Under the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition the UK introduced its own cap on higher-skill visas (20,700 p.a.) for non-EU nationals. It worked. The cap was never breached and played a significant part in non-EU migration falling to its lowest levels since the 1990s. Caps have also been used with varying degrees of success in the United States, Canada, and Australia.
9. At present there is no effective control of immigration. The system has, in effect, been deliberately delegated to employers and universities with no limit on the numbers they can bring. This has to change. The government must take back decision making and impose a cap on immigration to be determined at the start of each parliamentary term. This should be set at a level to ensure net migration is less than 100,000 a year. A cap is the simplest and most effective means of control. In short: no cap, no control.
We don't know why it chose the net figure of 100,000, but we would urge a much smaller number.
Why not, for a start, cap Work and Study Visas at a fifth of that?
Why not say "no more than 20,000 Visas allowed a year", as under the Coalition government, as above.
After all, the aim is not to appease as many hopeful immigrants as possible. The aim is to deliberately cut down on their numbers!
Table from ONS report downloadable above.
Note that "British national" does not necessarily mean a British citizen returning. There are 6 different definitions of "British national", as per page 28 of the report. For example "British national (overseas)" refers to Chinese from Hong Kong.
An IMMIGRATION EDUCATION: Some HELPFUL FOOTNOTES
We have written on Immigration and Asylum for many years, and we lay out moral, logical, workable and helpful philosophy and policy. The following documents appear on this website:
Some people find it awkward to speak about immigration. Too often, many of us are easily confused and silenced when confronted with aggressive "virtue signalling" from the Open Border advocates who attempt to seize the "moral high ground". Realising this, we put together this "Declaration of Moral Principles" which helps to position immigration-control policy within a clear set of fundamental Moral Principles, which counter the virtue-signalling, and false morality, of the Open Border advocates.
The Basic Principles of our Position (28-5-18)
We summarised the 2008 House of Lords Report on the Economic Impact of Immigration. It a good summary of our basic principles on immigration.
We Need a UK Population Policy (1-2-24)
No British Government to date has approached this vital matter in the logical way that we lay out here.
Defund the Immigration Industry (28-5-24)
The UK Government has to stop giving our taxpayers' money to those people and organisations who are promoting open borders and working against a restrictionist immigration and asylum policy. We show how!
We said:
1. Stop Mass Immigration.
2. Stop the Boats and Send them Back.
3. Ensure No Resettlement of such people in Scotland.
4. First Minister John Swinney to meet with a delegation from A Force For Good to discuss our concerns.
5. Politicians to recognise the normal and necessary concerns of millions and not attack people with smears.
This is related to the false "We need a rising GDP" theme. The notion that we need immigrants to "fill vacancies" is also economically illiterate.
Asylum – The Abuse of the Process (10-2-24)
Our Asylum law is being abused as a route into the country. We know this when we compare today's figures with those from the 1970s when asylum was virtually non-existent. We look at why this has changed, and the role of well-funded, often taxpayer-funded, lawyers and NGOs.
Asylum – How to Stop the Abuse (7-11-23)
We made the following Policy suggestions in the above article.
1. Leave the ECHR.
2. Re-write elements of the UK's Human Rights Act where necessary.
It is not actually necessary to "abolish" the UK's HRA – indeed it could be strengthened to ensure stronger free speech, and freedom of assembly, rights.
But we do need to leave the European Convention on Human Rights because it prohibits us dis-applying the ECHR's Articles 3 and 8 in certain circumstances, which are necessary to do in order to stop fraudulent asylum claims.
3. Create a new law "Qualification for UK Asylum Act" which will, where necessary, dis-apply the similar Articles 3 and 8 which exist in the UK's HRA in certain specific instances of immigration, asylum, and deportation.
It shouldn't really be necessary to have to leave the UN Refugee Convention.
All we need to do is adjust elements of it in our domestic law, in order to reflect our own unique British circumstances. For example, we could extend the definitions of those who are not eligible to be considered for asylum (such as economic migrants).
This may, or may not, provoke a conflict with the United Nations regarding membership of the UN Refugee Convention, but either way, a serious UK Government must press on!
4. Abolish Legal Aid for all Immigration and Asylum Cases
The massive and lucrative legal industry which encourages, facilitates, services, maintains and has a vested financial interest in perpetuating this endless invasion at British Taxpayers' expense, must be defunded.
5. Abolish the Right of Appeal for Asylum Cases
As mentioned above, the right of appeal is not required under the UN Refugee Convention. It was introduced into the UK by the Asylum and Immigration Appeals Act 1993, and is presently found in the Nationality and Immigration Act 2002, secs 82-84.
Once you have the legal ability to do things then you can build the physical ability to do things, which might include:
6. Disband the entire Home Office immigration department which is failing miserably to deal with this, and contract it out to an arms-length, private sector organisation which does it for financial incentive.
7. Build up the Border Force, stop boats in the Channel, physically return them to France etc.
8. It is also possible to scrap the Asylum laws entirely, and simply have ad hoc "humanitarian" visa programmes for particular groups of people, as and when necessary, as we have seen recently with the Ukraine and Hong Kong humanitarian visa schemes – which operate independently of the usual Asylum legislation.
A History of Immigration to Britain (26-2-24)
We compiled this comprehensive paper which helps to debunk the "nation of immigrants" notion!
BASIC PRINCIPLES of PATRIOTIC SOVEREIGNTY Series
Part 1: Ensure the Integrity of the Democratic Process in the first place: Scrap Postal Voting on Demand.
Part 2: Uphold Freedom of Speech, Debate, Enquiry, Assembly and Protest: Abolish Anti-Free Speech Laws.
Part 6: Territorial Sovereignty: Lock the Doors, Guard the Gates, Secure the Border: 3 Emergency Policies to Stop Mass Immigration
Part 10: Self-Defence for Self-Determination.
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