SUGGESTATION

(via Bloggerheads)

Seems that you can’t even go for a drive in private these days… Well, of course, we all knew that really, but who expected traffic camera images to be transmitted to the US? That reciprocal is it? Yeeeaaaah. Didn’t think so.

Not the only big brother story floating about today.

Came across this Times article on Blears talking about immigration’s effect on communities etc etc. Usual stuff, stretches resources, can’t be sure of the impact, need to gather more data etc, with a throwaway comment towards the end about using footfall in supermarkets to measure population growth. Boggle. I didn’t think too much of that, but someone else did -

Supermarkets ’should spy on migrants’

Ho ho. Paying in cash? Sound foreign? Let our supermarket checkout assistant guess your nationality. Stay off the couscous!

Bit of an overreaction I think, though it’s been a long day and I’m tired. Would you get any meaningful data at all out of supermarkets? Certainly not on nationality - and even straight up population figures are surely going to be skewed by a whole heap of variables in different towns.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/apr/16/immigrationpolicy.immigration

The Guardian has an article up on a study conducted for the Association of Chief Police Officers, which shows that despite scare stories in the tabloid media about an influx of eastern european immigrants causing a massive crimewave in the UK, crime rates in general have continued to fall - rises in crime numbers have only been proportional to the increase in population. In other words, immigrants are no more likely to commit crime than the British born populace.

Tabloids often like to confuse rates with simple figures - One of the biggest issues highlighted is the burden that immigrants place on infrastructure and public services. Problem is, that despite the increased tax revenue that immigrants bring, public spending has not risen in line. The problem is solveable, but it is much easier to blow a dogwhistle blaming immigration for the deterioration in services, or flat increases in crime figures than to open up purse strings.