Our Great Immigration Non-Debate

According to recent media reports, President Donald Trump and his team are working with Republican senators on a bill to halve legal immigration – to 500,000 per annum – into the United States. Across the Atlantic, Prime Minister Theresa May has vowed to reduce immigration to less than 100,000 a year. In launching the Tories’ recent election manifesto, May said immigration to the UK needed to be brought down to “sustainable” levels. In 2016, she argued that there was “no case, in the national interest, for immigration of the scale we have experienced over the last decade.”

Immigration has also erupted as a major issue in the lead-up to the September New Zealand election. The country’s main opposition party, Labour, has pledged to slash the migrant intake, which is presently running at record levels. Perhaps more significant is the recent surge in support for the populist New Zealand First, led by the wily Winston Peters. The great survivor of Kiwi politics, known for…