A new study by the
National Institute of Economic and Social Research suggests that 160,000 “British
Jobs” have been lost to foreigners in the last 15 years. The tabloids quickly
came up with loads of headlines saying things like “160,000 Brits lose jobs to
migrants!(The Sun)”. This is utter nonsense. But like every time the
capitalists get us in a big mess they try to blame it on someone else.
Immigrants seem like an easy target. There are a lot of non-domestic workers in
the UK, especially from the EU.
These workers however
are not stealing anyone’s jobs. Freedom of the movement of labour is a
fundamental and necessary right. After all, about 6 million Britons live and
work abroad. Are these 6 million jobs ones the British have stolen from other
people? As for wage dumping, who is it that discriminates against foreign
workers by paying them lower wages? It is the bosses and capitalists! They want
to use foreign workers as a tool of pressure to force down wages in Britain, to
have lower costs for labour and more money in their pockets. So instead of
blaming foreigners, wouldn’t it be more sensible to demand fair wages for all
workers in Britain, no matter where they come from?
The real job killers
are the capitalists! It is them outsourcing literally millions of jobs for the
reason of a cheaper workforce abroad. It is also them and their Tory government
who have slashed 376,000 public sector jobs since the general election in 2010.
And Mr. Osborne in his review said that there will be a total of 710,000 public
sector jobs cut by 2017! Unemployment in the UK is sky-rocketing (currently
2.62 million unemployed) and wages are dropping. Taking into account inflation
workers in the UK had their wages cut by 4.5% last year!
The capitalists don’t
want to take the blame for the misery they produced. So they and their media
try to blame foreigners to split the workers and causing disunity. If the
workers in the UK would take a united stand against the bosses, then they could
really topple the roots of their problems and they would be a massive force. As
long as the workers let themselves be disunited by divisions of nationality,
they will be in a weak position and are easy targets in the capitalists’ hunt
for profits. Workers in the UK-no matter what nationality-have a common
opponent: the British capitalist class.
