From The TimesSeptember 1, 2007
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/commen ... 364349.ece

The immigrant trickle that became a flood

A century hence, what will historians consider the most significant social change to Britain during the Blair years? Quite possibly they will conclude it was how immigration transformed the country. One in four children born in Britain last year had a foreign parent. This changing ethnicity has been further accentuated by a growing flight of British citizens, almost 200,000 of whom emigrated last year.

From a historical perspective, the emigration of this many native Britons is not so remarkable. Paradoxically, the greater Victorian Britain became, the more its workforce sought opportunities abroad — not just in the empire but also in the United States.

By contrast, today’s rate of immigration is producing the most significant change in the national make-up in 900 years. Indeed, it is noteworthy how relatively small waves of immigration nonetheless perturbed the natives. To his eternal shame, Edward I expelled England’s Jews even although they numbered much more than 5,000 very useful subjects. By the mid-15th century there were perhaps fewer than 16,000 foreigners living among England’s 2.5 million inhabitants.

And it is unclear why Elizabeth I felt the need to complain about there being “of late divers blackmoores brought into this realme, of which kinde of people there are already here to manieâ€