I do find the 'stopping of the boats' rhetoric a little bit odd, sometimes/usually followed by 'the country is full etc' yet in reality I think 30,000 people used that crossing last year, which as a % of the population won't touch the surfaces.
As LL said, this thread is likely to get very busy between now and election time. Lets just hope we can keep things civil.(ish)
I've posted numerous times over the years regarding real stats when it comes to immigration/refugees/asylum seekers/illegal immigration {all of which are different things, unless a person who doesn't like anyone different, just see's them bizarrely as some form of threat/vermin etc} and they've never, been close to or a patch on anything to generally concern the larger issues of the UK with.
It's madness we continue to have these discussions about it nationally - especially when the real cost of the asylum system to each of the c30m UK taxpayers is around about... 13p per day - but let us not have that large tax burden impact our job prospects, pension funds and any other false excuse that we'll pretend is the reason of impacting our own privileged prospect and that of any future or existing DNA...
This nation {yes even in relative austere times} can definitely afford this mostly nominal-problem and I bet most who buy their Starbucks or Costa every morning likely ''throw away'' more than what it costs to fund the asylum system. Also add to the fact it would help if the current government had actually processed any asylum applications {most of which actually do end up getting declined anyway}, instead if having their fingers up their arseholes or preferring to spend time just having a good old boys club slanging match in the HoC.
RE: Keeping things civil...nahh BO, we want fecking carnage of course