Thanks to John Barker for the provenance of the figure of 153,000. It
doesn't alter the basic criticisms of Migration Watch's figures. Their
numbers don't add up. There is liberal rounding up - 233,000 becomes
"nearly 250,000", 153,000 has 50,000 added for illegal immigration, and 5.9
million people become 7.6 million people. Projections are based on the
highest annual figure available: average immigration since 1971 has been
less than one-sixth of their projection for the next thirty years.
Countervailing trends - like the out-migration of half all in-migrants
within five years - are ignored. There are inconsistent figures used,
chosen to show their case in an alarmist light. The main appeal they make
is to the changing cultural and ethnic character of the population through
these population flows, which is crudely xenophobic. This is a political
position, not a reasoned appeal to evidence.
Both Migration Watch and Gaia Watch claim that the UK has reached a limit
for population density - Gaia Watch refer to the UK's limited "carrying
capacity". This is myth. At 77,925 square kilometres, Scotland is the
same size as the Czech Republic (78,370 sq km). Scotland has about five
million people at a population density of 65 people per square kilometre;
the Czech Republic has 130 people per sq km. Italy, to take another
comparison, has a population density of 193 people per square kilometre.
Scotland would need 5 million more people before it reached the same density
as the Czech Republic, and 10 million more people before it reached the same
population density as Italy. The problem currently with expanding the
population is not the numbers of people per se, the quality of the climate,
or the scope for different land use; it is the lack of an adequate economic
infrastructure to support it.
Paul Spicker
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