A fiery row has broken out between Deputy Leader of Reform UK, Ben Habib, and commentator Fahima Mahomed, on Britain's soaring migration levels.
The conversation was spurred by new figures released by the Office for National Statistics yesterday which showed net migration was at a record high of 672,000 in the year up to June 2023.
Habib began the discussion: “The social fabric of the country is bound to be tested with such dramatic movement in people.
“In the last 25 years, I think we've had more migration to the United Kingdom than we'd had in all of history before that. And I'm not against migration.
A group of people thought to be migrants crossing the Channel in a small boat traveling from the coast of France and heading in the direction of Dover, KentPA“The interaction of indigenous British people, for want of a better description, and people from different cultural backgrounds, different heritages, is a very healthy thing.
“Societies can only evolve and become stronger and better if they have diversity of thought and if they have to interact with people from different backgrounds.
“But what we've had is unbridled migration at a rate where cultures are not being absorbed into the UK. As a result, multiculturalism has not become an assimilation of what is best for the strengthening of a homogeneous society.
“What we've got is multiculturalism being operated in multiple silos across the UK without integration.
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Ben Habib and Fahima Mahomed discuss rising net migration figures
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Mahomed came in, saying: “We have had recent studies and articles this in September from the Migration Observatory in Oxford University stating that the higher educated you are that you would actually be OK with immigration. Because it's it's depending on how you look at it, from which aspect, whether you're looking at it from the race that you allow into this country, whether it's the skilled.
“When we talk about integration, we have of so many people that are working in the UK that are highly educated and integrated. In fact, three quarters of the UK is owned - probably the land even on this building is probably owned - by foreigners and immigrants.
“I am born and bred in South Africa, coming from an apartheid state when I was a child and you know coming here for equal opportunities in the West. So we can't just say ‘just because I look and be in a particular way, you probably won't even assume that I actually was born and bred in South Africa.
“Integration is about the fact that we just have our own prejudice and we just don't know how to actually understand the world better. And if you're well educated and well travelled you'll realise its no issue. It’s just a cognitive bias.”
A group of Conservative MPs has admitted that the party is facing an "existential" threat at the next election, demanding the Government publish a plan to tackle migration todayPAHabib came back, saying: “The whole point about interacting with other cultures is for diversity of thought. And what you've just tried to do is shut down discussion. What you're trying to say is ‘if you're not prepared to accept our views in our culture, the way we express them, then it's you who's being bigoted!’
“There is an outright assault on Western democracies from unbridled immigration all the way from Europe, the United Kingdom and the United States."
Mahomed interrupted saying: “And it is the West against the East! There are certain cultures that are actually favoured more than the others.”
“No, it is not!” cried Habib. “That is trying to introduce prejudice into a debate where no prejudice, at least in my mind, exists.”
