On the amnesty for illegal immigrants, he struggled big time on whether British citizens would be given the same tax amnesty that illegal immigrants would be granted, by dint of not having oaid tax during their 10 years in the country. He admitted they hadn't thought about it! Bearing in mind that Hughes largely wrote the LibDem immigration policy, he was surprisingly woolly. Bear in mind that the LibDems have said they would bring in another £4 billionby getting tough on tax evasion! You couldn't make it up.
Here is the transcript -
HUGHES: I think that British citizens would be entitled to say that they should be treated evenly. People that have been here all the time.As clear as mud then. They then moved on to discuss PR and coalitions.
Nolan: Would the Lib Dems give that guarantee?
HUGHES: It is not in our manifesto but you raise a good point and I think what you would have to do in that case is once people were legitimated and regulated, then if they had been working; part of the process should be working out what they should contribute. So I think that's a perfectly reasonable proposition.
Nolan: Even more important then, if you claim Cameron is wobbling, even more important for you to stand up very very tall and tell him what you would insist upon. Would first past the post have to go.
Hughes: I think it would have to go. Yes. I think it would have to go whatever the circumstances of the next parliament if there wasn't a clear overall majority. It would have to go and I think it will go.
So that's pretty clear. But it's further than Clegg has gone.
To listen to the whole interview click HERE and scroll in six minutes.
12 comments:
Lets face it - up to now the lib-dems could say anything they wanted from a policy point of view, as everyone knew they would never get their hands on the levers of power.
Their wooly thinking is now exposed.
But who out there, in the great unwashed, understand or care about it. Nick is coming over as a very nice chap, and as someone to vote for instead of Brown or Cameroon.
Scratch through the Lib-Dems veneer of cosy touchy-feely care-bear style rhetoric and you find the ill thought out and muddled concepts at their base. God help us all if anyone has to rely on them in a hung parliament.
Apropos of party differences, I thought I'd draw your attention to minutes of a hustings hosted by the "Stop the War" coalition on April 14 that have emerged:
http://fedrossi.angelfire.com/stop_the_war_hustings.pdf
I've contextualised them here:
http://draughtyoldfentales.blogspot.com/2010/04/old-holborn-is-independent-libertarian.html
Surely in the spirit of impartiality you should mention Stephen Nolan's 'eviseration' of the Tory shadow minister for culture (Jeremy Hunt) on Friday night. Even worse than the performance of Hughes and Harman. Do listen if you get the chance, and make sure you listen to the verdict of the phone-in listeners afterwards... Poor guy, I really felt the the pain of his naivety and inadequancy.
LibDems: Tax Amnesty for Illegals, But Not For Brits
Writing headlines for the Daily Mail now, Iain?
Latest figures in the Times suggest there are at present about a million illegal immigrants in Britain. If the Times knows it, why doesn’t the Government know it and what are they going to do about it?
The LibDem’s Manifesto proposes an ill thought out immigration policy with an amnesty for these one million illegal immigrants. If and when these people become ‘legal’, will not dependents of theirs living overseas automatically qualify to join them in Britain, under present British and European Law? That original one million could very well double or treble, who knows the final figure? The additional influx of these dependents, would increase the already unbearable pressures on housing, the NHS, Schools and the social services caused by the present Governments policy.
Experience in other countries has shown that the implementation of such an amnesty would undoubtedly encourage another million illegal immigrants to descend on Britain in the reasonable expectation of a future, similar amnesty.
Latest figures in the Times suggest there are at present about a million illegal immigrants in Britain. If the Times knows it, why doesn’t the Government know it and what are they going to do about it?
The LibDem Manifesto proposes an ill thought out immigration policy with an amnesty for these one million illegal immigrants. If and when these people become ‘legal’, will not dependents of theirs living overseas automatically qualify to join them in Britain, under present British and European Law? That original one million could very well double or treble, who knows the final figure? The additional influx of these dependents, would increase the already unbearable pressures on housing, the NHS, Schools and the social services caused by the present Governments policy.
Experience in other countries has shown that the implementation of such an amnesty would undoubtedly encourage another million illegal immigrants to descend on Britain in the reasonable expectation of a future, similar amnesty.
Woolly thinking perhaps but neither of the other parties have got any kind of policy with regard to Illegals (unless you think 'deport them all forthwith' is a policy). Of course these exploited, overwhelmingly poorly paid people must get a tax amnesty. Otherwise you would have a policy which starts from the point of view that bringing lots of law abiding people out of the shadows and into the tax-paying mainstream of society is 'a good thing' but which disincentivizes them to do so by saddling anyone who applies with ten years worth of back taxes. That would be pure madness.
Jonathan Mayhew, I think, coined the phrase,"No taxation without representation" - Imagine the voting power of one million until recently illeagals, who would almost certainly live in ghettos and disproportionately affect a first past the post democracy. So, if the Lib Dems legitimized these illegal immigrants, the logical, and safe thing to do, would it not, would be to introduce PR to counteract such an electoral anomaly?
After the interview one of the callers asked how you would prove an illegal immigrant had been here for ten years.
I hope Dave asks questions as pertinent as this on the next "Britain's Got Political Talent" show.
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Straight nick says above "If and when these people become ‘legal’, will not dependents of theirs living overseas automatically qualify to join them in Britain"
The other Nick says he wants these illegals to become taxpayers,but once these(low paid) people are joined by dependents they will cease to be taxpayers (no net income tax & NI is paid with income of £23,000 pa and 2 dependent children)
@Mr Parker "..from the point of view that bringing lots of law abiding people out of the shadows.."
If they are law abiding they wouldn't be in this country still!!
If they entered this country as visitors , they were made aware of the conditions under which their entry visas were issued and they knew about overstay which is breaking the law. If they entered as students and dropped out of universities which thousands of them are, their students' visa were issued for studies only in good faith and were issued with the understanding that they were to undertake the studies mentioned in the visa application and have to return to their countries if work permits after the studies were not given. These people have already broken the law!
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