David Farrar: The changing face of Europe

I’m going to quote from UK’s Matt Goodwin. I do so as someone who is pro-immigration. I think moderate, controlled immigration is good for a country, and specifically has been good for New Zealand. But a good thing can become a bad thing is if it too large, or uncontrolled. If NZ took in 1 million immigrants a year (for example), it would be bad. Our infrastructure would not cope, and new migrants would not integrate as well as they currently do in NZ.

Goodwin writes:

More than 75% of Brussels is now foreign-origin, with over 60% coming from outside Europe. Nearly 60% of Amsterdam’s population is of migrant background while only one in three children have two Dutch parents.

In Frankfurt and Rotterdam, native populations are already minorities. In Stockholm and Vienna, close to half the population is now foreign-born or of foreign origin.

In Hamburg and Stuttgart, it is about 40%. In Berlin, official statistics just revealed that more than half of all children and teenagers have a migrant background.

In London, entire boroughs are places where more than eight in ten children have at least one foreign-born parent — often from South Asia, the Middle East, or Africa.

These are not marginal changes.

They are civilisational shifts.

They are quite staggering statistics.

And according to Pew Research, if current trends continue, by the year 2050, only 24 years from now, around 31% of Sweden, 20% of Germany and Austria, 18% of France and Belgium, and 17% of the UK will be Muslim — not through conquest, but through choices made by elites who never asked the public for consent.

Some immigration is inevitable. Some is beneficial.

But what Europe has experienced is neither controlled nor moderate. It is change at a scale and speed that no society in history has ever absorbed without tension.

The key words here are controlled, moderate and with consent.

Again NZ does this well. We have a points system where your ability to get a skilled migrant visa is dependent on your qualifications, income, occupation, work experience.

But the reason there is such a populist uprising in Europe is because the pace and extent of uncontrolled immigration has caused huge problems. Cities in Sweden like Malmo have become ganglands with teenage assassins. The gun murder rate is 30 times higher than in London. 45% of guns crimes are done by teenagers.

David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders