I dread to think what would have happened if the levels of racism and xenophobia were around when my grandfather came to this country from Sweden via Norway, or when my mother came to live here from the Netherlands. Can you imagine what the Brexit generation would have been like? They’d have accused them of taking the jobs of British people, they’d have accused them of undercutting their wages, of taking their homes. They would demand their immediate repatriation and they would demand the government crack down on immigration.
If you know me, please don’t start on the “Ah, you’re different” bollocks. My family are no different from any of the Europeans throughout generations who have come here to work. They were foreigners, migrants, those terrible people the Daily Mail told you to avoid. The people who came here, worked hard, paid taxes, played by the rules and put down roots. But we don’t want their sort here, do we?
In some ways, ‘we’ have come to hate so many more people. ‘We’ used to hate people of colour because, well, they were different to us white people. We’ve extended that level of hate now to include lots of migrants who came here to work who are not of colour, like Polish people and the like. They seem nice enough when they look after our elderly relatives who are suffering from dementia, delivering our parcels or picking our fruit and veg. But they are foreign, damn it. If we are going to “take back control”, we’d better get on the case and now.
Tomorrow, I am on my way to Battery Point, Portishead to search for my grandfather’s ashes. It’s been 24 years since he died but in order to satisfy those Mail readers and Ukip supporters, I’d best get down there to start the process of his repatriation. And my old mum too. Her English was very good, but she still retained a Dutch accent. Christ, we can’t be having that. Once I have finished at Battery Point, I’ll get to Bristol South Crematorium to see what’s left. Probably, not much since I didn’t arrange to store her ashes. As she’s foreign, she should stand out. They always do, don’t they?
When you hear David Cameron described as the worst prime minister this country ever had, it is not to compare him with, say, Theresa May who is undoubtedly the most incompetent and out-of-their depth PM this country ever had. For much of his time in Number Ten, Cameron came across as knowing what he was doing. But then he called a referendum on the EU on party political grounds, solely to end the civil war in his own party. It was a gamble that failed disastrously and will destroy our country for a generation, maybe longer. That’s why he is the worst PM this country ever had.
Cameron’s disastrous decision-making once again made it acceptable to be a racist, a xenophobe and a bigot. He handed the country over, lock, stock and barrel to Nigel Farage and his odious outlook on life. Britain is now shaped in the image of Farage, a country where Alf Garnett ceased to be a figure of ridicule and became mainstream.
Now anyone who doesn’t have pure British blood is an enemy of the state. Where will they send us all on the not so glorious day?
