In the UK, some claim that the immigrant population has experienced a phenomenal increase that threatens demographic statistics. In fact, however, at the time of the 2021/22 census, 16 percent of people in the UK were born abroad – a total of around 10.7 million migrants out of a total population of 66.97 million.

Despite all the far-right’s claims that Muslims dominate the country, only a tiny fraction of them come from a Muslim country. For example, according to the 2021/22 census, an estimated 32 percent of all foreign-born residents in the UK came from five countries – India (9.0 percent), Poland (8.0 percent), Pakistan (6.0 percent), Romania (5.0 percent) and Ireland (4.0 percent).

Proponents of ultranationalism make a lot of noise about Muslim immigration to Europe. Douglas Murray, for example, claims that Muslims were barely present in Europe in the mid-20th century, but by the turn of the 21st century, 15-17 million Muslims had immigrated to Western Europe alone, one of the fastest waves of migration in human history. This claim seems controversial, because between 1815 and 1915, about 30 million Europeans immigrated to the United States alone, and by 1960, Europeans made up 75 percent of all U.S. immigrants, although this number has declined dramatically in recent decades.

In addition, millions of Europeans emigrated not only to South and Central America, but also to Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Given that Portuguese is spoken in Brazil and the whole of Latin America has adopted the Spanish language, this migration may have been the fastest in the world and had a major demographic impact.

Numerically, Muslims are unable to change or transform European culture in any way. They are neither very strong financially nor do they excel in education. As of mid-2016, the estimated Muslim population in Europe was 25.8 million (4.9 percent of the total population) – up from 19.5 million (3.8 percent) in 2010. The current population of Europe is 745,003,089 people, including Russia, England and other non-EU countries. It is difficult to digest that a population of 4.0-6.0 percent can overwhelm a population of over 700 million, which is predominantly Christian.

The far right also tries to create the impression that all, or at least most, crimes are committed by immigrants, especially Muslims. Criminals must be considered criminals regardless of their skin colour and race, but in fact many murderers in Britain did not have an immigrant background. If you look at the list of serial killers, you will see that these claims contradict reality.

Dr Harold Shipman, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in January 2000 for murdering 15 patients while working in Hyde, Greater Manchester, is believed to have killed at least 250 people in Hyde and Todmorden, West Yorkshire, over 23 years. Beverley Allitt was found guilty of murdering three babies and an 11-year-old child, attempting to murder three other children and seriously wounding a further six children between February and April 1991 at Grantham and Kesteven Hospital in Lincolnshire.

Notorious serial killers Fred and Rose West tortured, raped and murdered an unknown number of women between 1967 and 1987, most of them in their home in Cromwell Street, Gloucester, which became known as the “House of Horrors”. Rose, a mother of eight, was convicted in 1995 of murdering 10 young girls and women, including her eldest daughter Heather, 16, and stepdaughter Charmaine, 8. Her husband, a construction worker, committed suicide in prison while awaiting trial on 12 counts of murder. Peter Sutcliffe, another serial killer, murdered 13 women in Yorkshire and north-west England between 1975 and 1980, brutally attacking at least seven others who survived.

Ian Brady and his partner Myra Hindley lured children and teenagers to their deaths in the 1960s, torturing and sexually abusing them before burying their bodies on Saddleworth Moor in the South Pennines. Mary Ann Cotton, often described as Britain’s first serial killer, was convicted of the murder of her stepson Charles in the late 19th century and was responsible for the deaths by poisoning of eleven of her children, three husbands, a lover and her mother.

None of these murderers who committed horrific crimes were of immigrant background. They committed heinous crimes and society has declared them nothing but criminals and given them exemplary punishments. Likewise, criminals – whether Muslim, black, white or any other race – must be brought to justice. When a criminal kills a child, rapes a woman or tortures his victim, the entire community cannot be held responsible for his crimes.

One could argue that this is history, and that every other day far-right activists upload photos of Muslims, Asians and immigrants claiming they killed a woman or sexually assaulted a defenseless white girl, without backing up their claims with concrete evidence. Yet so far this year, 50 women have been killed and over 40 killers appear to be of non-immigrant background. Most victims were killed by their partners or people close to them.

Immigrants are in a precarious legal position. They know full well that any violation of the law would land them in big trouble and jeopardize their chances of settlement. They come to this country having burned all the boats, so why should they risk their future by committing heinous crimes? This is not to say that they do not commit crimes at all, but to emphasize that crimes should be treated as crimes without raising questions of race, color and religion.

Many on the left in Britain believe that the far right represents the elite of British society, seeking to drive a wedge between working classes of different races and religions. They claim, for example, that during the Industrial Revolution and afterward, millions of workers worked 12 or 14 hour days, including young children and pregnant women, and that tens of thousands died working in mines and factories.

During the Industrial Revolution and for several decades afterward, toiling white men, women and children were mercilessly exploited, and those who squeezed the life out of them by making them work like machines were not strangers to them. They were not from another continent or country, but people of their own race and color.

Left-wing activists believe that the class question is the main problem and the policy of the ruling elite that controls the state. They claim that these far-right activists never demand that poor white working-class children be given access to elite schools or that sons and daughters from low-income families be given access to prestigious universities.

Ultranationalists are also reminded that they ignore the fact that – from brown Rishi Sunak to white David Cameroon and Muslim Sir Anwar Pervez to Jewish Len Blavatnik – all members of the elite can send their children to prestigious schools and universities, while the children of the brown, black and white working classes are inevitably enrolled in state schools that lack staff, money and adequate facilities. While the elite pay high fees for their children to be educated at top universities, poor white young people struggle to repay student loans and meet other educational costs.

To be continued

The author is a freelancer

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