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The Office for National Statistics (ONS) had announced some startling new figures: Britain was taking in 1,500 immigrants a day, while 1,000 Brits left. That means more people were moving out as well as in, and that a growing number of emigrants — by no means necessarily racists — were quitting because of the numbers coming in.
Earlier in the week Mervyn King, the governor of the Bank of England, had complained to a committee of MPs that it was hard to manage the economy when nobody knew how many people were in the country.
Less privileged folk will pay a heavy price if our unprecedented experiment of mass immigration goes wrong.
Immigration alone, of course, is not the only source of their problems, and there is a danger of immigrants becoming the whipping boys for every grievance. The trouble is that random population growth impacts directly on everything feeding rumbling middle-class discontent: rising taxes, rising mortgages, failing schools, the overstretched National Health Service, crime and insecurity of every kind. I do not anticipate riots or demonstrations, but a mood of semi-suppressed nastiness could gradually develop.
Think of it: 7m more people in 25 years, according to the ONS. This is the equivalent of seven more Birminghams — not a pretty thought — or another London if you prefer. All this in the most crowded country in Europe.
In retrospect it is extraordinary how easy we had it. In 1970 you could have bought a Victorian house in west London of some 3,500 sq ft for £16,000, with a mortgage based on 2 times our (smallish) income. Last week a building society began offering loans of five times income. Meanwhile, as space per person shrivels, parents helping out with the deposit stare in disbelief at the few square feet that their thousands of pounds will stretch to. For those without big daddies with big money the big squeeze has begun.
Parents can be equally appalled by some of the urban neighbourhoods that their home-seeking offspring move to in order to raise their own families. The percentage of the children of minorities in primary schools has risen from 11% 10 years ago to more than 20% today (more in parts of London). This is natural and inevitable, but those who tell us that it is something to celebrate usually educate their children elsewhere: in London the number of those opting for private education is 13%, twice the national average.
Obviously there must be some immigration and of course it can benefit Britain — especially at higher income levels. But those who claim that it benefits everyone will have to explain how — unlike the governor of the Bank of England — they can do a profit and loss account, extra GNP against extra social costs, if nobody knows who’s here.


Is there a danger that the rich British will simply upsticks and emigrate,and the country will be a suburb of Pakistan,Iraq or Bulgaria?