zlacker

Incredible that you’ve managed to bring this conversation to immigration. In fact, it sounds like you’re saying the root cause of this crappy policy is somehow immigrants.

Far fetched and not cool.

>>nindal+(OP)
It's a valid topic for discussion. Even as a foreigner who was in UK on a visa and eventually got ilr I'm still concerned about it.

The current situation regarding small boats is not sustainable, particularly when it's proven that the majority are not fleeing persecution but are economic migrants. They're taking advantage of a system designed to help people in trouble, how could you defend that?

And when does it end? Will the UK always accept small boats ad infinitum?

I played by the (harsh) rules and got here legitimately. Why should I have bothered.

>>nindal+(OP)
Immigration is becoming the #1 political issue in the UK for a reason.

If they didn't want this, they could have just restricted it and it would have largely gone away as a topic of discussion, but current levels makes it inevitable it will become the main thing people think about

>>nindal+(OP)
None of these problems live in isolation. It all feeds back to the same system that is driving itself into the ground.

The refusal to accept these problems is what is creating a surge in far-right popularity. The very people that oppose them have inadvertently become their biggest cheerleaders.

>>nindal+(OP)
One of the reasons they want to make discourse on the internet as painful as possible is because immigration has become an mainstream concern in the UK. Many of the things that are being soft censored is clips about from the British parliament where this and related issues are being discussed.

Just because people like yourself happen to think it is uncouth to discuss, doesn't mean that it isn't part of the equation.

>>fennec+71
> It's a valid topic for discussion

not on a thread about vpn useage

> The current situation regarding small boats is not sustainable

the current situation regarding small boats is the inevitable conclusion to a badly implemented brexit policy and a negligent tory party rule over 13 years. Startmer took 5 months in power to talk to France and have them agree to tackle it on their side of the water. Also no brexit, no boats. The anti immigration chest thumpers caused the problem and then scurried like rats. Farage was impossible to be found the year after brexit won, dude aws the face and suddenly wanted to part of the "glory"

>>nindal+(OP)
Everyone always wants to bring it back to immigration, because they've seen US ICE snatch squads and internment camps and decide that they want some of that here.

>>pjc50+VS
It's very difficult to build a growing economy when you have mass unskilled immigration combined with free healthcare and a generous welfare system.

>>Veen+KW
Immigrants can't claim welfare, beyond the tiny asylum seeker payment, and the healthcare system is dependent on immigration for staff.

>>pjc50+s41
The US guarantees ER health services regardless of citizenship or ability to pay. They also get free public education (with all the burdens of being non-english speaking).

They pay taxes (in Texas) through gas, property and sales taxes which fund much of the state.

Yes, immigrants are a critical component of several industries like healthcare.

Legal permanent residency/work visas should be easier for skilled workers who want to work in high demand jobs. And all wealthy nations should be more wary of unlimited, unchecked economic migration by poorer populations.

(IOW it's complicated)

I think social media is at least as big a cultural weapon against us, and if I had to choose between deport/imprison a small number of business and political leaders who abuse that weapon or four million undocumented US residents, I would choose the former.

>>pjc50+s41
States such as California were allowing them access to Medi-cal, their version of medicaid. Many get free housing- NYC entered into a $980 million dollar contract to house people in hotels.

Federally, no, they aren't getting assistance, but it's all a slush fund as money flows back and forth between local and the federal governments anyway.

>>Veen+KW
Growth is much easier with mass immigration than mass emigration, regardless of if those crossing either direction are skilled or unskilled.

And the UK welfare system isn't all that good. I'm a landlord, and at one point a letting agency told me they refuse to deal with anyone on the welfare system because it's simply too difficult to actually get the council, who are supposed to pay, to actually pay. The necessity for food banks is another big hint that the government system isn't covering basics.

And the UK healthcare system has for a while now only been free to UK permanent lawful residents and a handful of others: https://www.nhs.uk/nhs-services/visiting-or-moving-to-englan...

(As in: migrants will be asked to prove entitlement, it won't be assumed).

If you moved to the UK for work, you're paying twice for the NHS, because not only is it supposed to be covered by national insurance contributions, but there's also an NHS immigrant surcharge: https://www.gov.uk/healthcare-immigration-application/how-mu...

>>unethi+oi1
I'm confused, I thought this was about the UK, and the US only got brought up in the sense of people wanting to copy them?

>>Arkhai+xO
> badly implemented brexit policy and a negligent tory party rule over 13 years.

How about:

2018 - Sandhurst Treaty

2022 - Interior Ministers’/ Home Secretaries’ joint declaration of November 14th

2023 - UK-France Joint Leaders' Declaration

Yes, these did nothing. Starmer's/Macron's joint declaration will also do nothing. If you don't understand why, try starting with the past 204 years of anglo/French relations.

>>fennec+71
> Why should I have bothered.

because you had the privilege to

>>nindal+(OP)
Why is it that the only people who have to justify their beliefs are those who are not in favour of enormous demographic, economic, and political change required to facilitate mass immigration?

>>Arkhai+xO
One of the topics being censored on twitter is footage of what many would call a side effect of migration.

>>Arkhai+xO
If we are going to start discouraging tangents on HN, which would be a drastic change, we're not going to do it selectively for topics you don't want to see discussed.

>>fennec+71
ilr == indefinite leave to remain.

>>ben_w+cr1
If going on tangents is a problem, start with the person I was responding to.

My comment on social media as the #1 catalyst of societal disassembly applies to the UK as well as the US.

>>pjc50+s41
Total benefit in dollar value for a typical illegal immigrant in Los Angeles with a wife and three children

-------- Cash-like income

• CA Earned Income Tax Credit (CalEITC) 2,400 ‑ 3 qualifying kids and earned income around $20 k → ~$2 000 CA + $400 YCTC add-on.

• Young Child Tax Credit (YCTC) under age 6 $1,080

• County “Breathe” Guaranteed Income Pilot $1,000

• Child Tax Credit (federal, kids=U.S. citizens) $6,000

• CalWORKs Stage 1 child-care voucher (parent copay $0) $8,500

• Los Angeles County General Relief (“GR”, undocumented adult) $2,348/yr 221 × 12 ≈ $2 650; actual monthly household max 2 adults = $442 (LAC DPSS 2023 schedule). Family with kids rarely gets full GR cash, so book 50 % = $2 348.

-------- Food

• CalFresh for 3 citizen kids $8,940

Max allotment for 3 children household = $780 / mo × 12.

Housing-subsidy value (Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher)

• Local Payment Standard (3-br in Central LA, 2024) 28,640 FMR $2 655 / mo × 12. Actual voucher covers 26 600 after utility allowance; market-value differential is tax-free.

-------- Medical care (only the kids qualify under “Restricted Medi-Cal”):

• Children’s Medi-Cal (MC+) HMO PMPM $3,600 ~ $3 000 capitation + dental + mental health wrapped.

-------- Education / daycare substitutes

• State Preschool slots, 3-4-year-olds (county rate) $8,520 6.5 hrs/day × 180 days × $14.50/hr teacher-cost ≈ $8 520 “value”.

• Title-I supplemental services at public school $1,500

-------- Energy / utility

• LADWP low-income discount (ELECTRIC, $0.11/kWh credit) $720

• SoCalGas CARE discount (≈20 %) $240

-------- Transportation

• LADOT universal student pass (DASH), 3 riders $360

TOTAL ANNUAL BENEFIT VALUE

Cash/benefits truly delivered: $2 400 + 1 080 + 1 000 + 6 000 + 8 500 + 2 348 + 8 940 + 28 640 + 3 600 + 8 520 + 1 500 + 720 + 240 + 360 = $73 848 / year

Market-value package ≈ $74 k rounded.

>>greena+jN1
Immigrants can't claim welfare in the UK. Visas are all "no recourse to public funds".

How does identity verification work for those if you can claim while being undocumented? How do you know the claimants are real at all?

>>unethi+dK1
What tangent? pjc50 was responding fairly directly to points in the comment he replied to. Who was in turn replying directly to his comment. Which was a direct reply to the next parent up. Which was expressing surprise to immigration being present at all in a root level response to a story about UK use of VPNs.

>>holler+CG1
>If we are going to start discouraging tangents on HN, which would be a drastic change

This is straight from the guidelines

"Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. It tramples curiosity. "

Bringing up immigration policy in regards to a new internet identification legislation seems less like a "discourageable tangent" and more of an "overt breaking of one of the few enforceable rules of the site"

>>ifwint+23
It’s a #1 political issue because certain political factions keep leaning on it, constantly, and have done for years.

>>ben_w+dQ1
Veen made a comment about US ICE suggesting that political positions limiting immigration are a backdoor to human rights violations as a matter of fact, and suggesting that immigration has nothing to do with the push for more surveillance.

My comment was responding to that and to pjc50's reply.

>>Arkhai+2X1
My advice is to read again and try to understand why it hasn't yet been flagged despite being up for hours with now 60 points.

>>ifwint+23
It's the #1 issue because the Tories spent 15 years running the economy into the ground and are now trying to blame someone else. It's a power grab - don't look at their piss-poor fiscal policy, it was... uh... immigrants! Please elect us again!

>>zdragn+Hm1
California also has, like, the 4th highest GDP in the world. Take complaints about their money mis-management with a grain of salt - of course people from economically failed states like Louisiana and Tennessee are going to tell you California has all these problems. PS - I live in the South.

>>greena+jN1
Is this actually what a typical immigrant is getting, or did you just pull this straight out of your ass? Who is actually getting these benefits to this degree? Do we not understand that it's very difficult to apply for a lot of these and most people don't know how to do it?

Also, elephant in the room: California has the 4th highest GDP in the world. Clearly, what they're doing is working. So well that they provide what, 1.5x more federal dollars than they take?

I mean, Louisiana doesn't provide jack shit to nobody. And how's their economy holding up? Anybody check on them recently? Last I checked, despite providing fuck-all, Louisiana isn't even breaking even with federal dollars, let alone touching California's 1.5x ratio.

>>passwo+Rd2
Sure, let me break it down. You attempted to dress up the point about increased survailance (low trust society -> increaed authoritarianism to control low trust society) which is tangentially related to the VPN regulation, in a number of far right buzz words. that gives it enough cover to not count as flamebait or politics, even though it arguably IS both of them and should be removed.

The guy below you, whom I replied to, is nowhere as good at dogwhistles as you and straight up brought up the boat conversation, which has 0 to do with vpns and honestly its just "build a wall" but for the sea, a conversation so boringly transplanted from american media is almost not wroth discussing.

You bragging about how you manged to say the things you shouldn't by talking around it and how many people either fell for it/or agree with you and know the dogwhistles is not something I would be proud of.

Just to be perfectly clear, the far right is surging because the demands of the lower and middle class are ignored, in serving both old money aristocrats, landlords, media moguls and foreign oligarchs all of which are economical leeches. We are in a post Tatcher "there is no society" world, not in some kind of left kumbaya "we are the world" reality. The far right is up because they thrive in dog whistles and anger like you are riling up, good at burning down Reichstags more than building any sort of succesful society.

>>unethi+bc2
Veen did not: >>44712342

Veen was in reply to pjc50, who also did not: >>44712105 — "they've seen US ICE snatch squads and internment camps and decide that they want some of that here."

("here" can be read as either being "the UK" or "all places outside the USA", but the one place it can't be read as is "the US" because the US already has that).

>>Arkhai+DZ2
That's a lot of assumptions in one comment. No one claimed that the far-right is the solution (or at least I didn't) but rather the consequence. HN demographic is not even generally far-right and the agreement comes from the fact that people understood the context of the comment that you just failed to understand.

>>passwo+q93
> That's a lot of assumptions in one comment

thats the advantage of dogwhistling, is that you can always feign ignorance

> No one claimed that the far-right is the solution (or at least I didn't) but rather the consequence.

the consequence of the far right economic model of hyper individualism? So far right breeds more far right, and calling it out is just "making assumptions"?

> HN demographic is not even generally far-right

It is one of the more susceptible groups to fall for their spell though. HN tends to skew nerdy and libertarian, two groups that think of themselves as intelligent which means if you trick them into thinking something they tend to internalise it because they think they came to the conclusion themselves. It is also a highly targetted demographic by far right groups.

Or do you think its a surprise that the "far left hippie" Sillicon Valley reputation got shredded in a second when half of LA was in Trump's inaguration? We had tech bros in front of elected officials. Crypto, videogames all oriignally very HN areas are all now constantly under threat of "manosphere" influencers, all paid by the same 5 think tanks, and far right billioanires.

> he agreement comes from the fact that people understood the context of the comment

Sure, thats not an assumption, that is you being an all knowing entity that can analyse why 60 people upvoted something. I mean it could be one russian farm pushing for "destroy cultural identity" text recognition as they have been known to do on X and Reddit. Or it can be 60 hyper rational individuals all of which understood the context I clearly seem to miss. But your assumption is right of course.

Just to be clear, I am not accusing you of being far right, you are just repeating their talking points and strategies. If you are doing it on purpose and pretending to be unaware that bad. If you simply are unaware I am explicitely explaining how and why they do and say the things you said and did.

>>Arkhai+kd3
Well you clearly have a higher sense of awareness and probably intelligence than a lot of other people in the community. I'm just going to let the Russian farm and the easily tricked continue to engage how they want.

>>passwo+Jg3
I dont, im a dumbass like everyone else. But im not unaware of the kind of people visit HN or what our achilles heel is. Knowing that far right movements are infiltrating and would like to use me to repeat their viewpoints is something I found worrying and worthy of self reflection.

Your flipant attitude is either lack of self reflection or worse, you are aware of what youre doing and downplaying bad faith dogwhistling.

>>Arkhai+DZ2
> increased survailance (low trust society -> increaed authoritarianism to control low trust society)

That might be a factor, but the main things I see is that British society is very sharply divided -- dangerously so maybe -- and that these new online safety rules might be an attempt to reduce the ability of one side of the division to influence the public discourse and to engage in collective action. If so, then immigration policy is relevant to this thread in that it is probably the issue most central or essential to the division.

>>pjc50+9O1
You are 100% correct.

NGOs engage in money laundering ops in the UK to give illegals handouts using a multi-step process to steal taxpayer wealth from Britons.

----

Primary Grantors:

UK government departments (DWP, Home Office, DLUHC)

EU Legacy Funds (2020-2023) via Shared Prosperity Fund

Lottery-funded charities (e.g., National Lottery Community Fund)

--

Key Recipient NGOs: Organizations registered with the Charity Commission targeting "migrant integration," "asylum support," or "poverty alleviation."

NGOs apply for high-value grants (e.g., £500k-£2M). Examples:

"Holistic Integration Project" (Home Office Fund)

"Urban Inclusion Programme" (DWP Social Mobility Grant) Documentation often includes inflated beneficiary counts and ghost project proposals.

----

Fictitious Expenditure Fabrication

--

Shell Vendor Creation:

NGO leadership registers dormant companies (e.g., "Community Outreach Solutions Ltd") as "service providers."

Invoices issued for fake deliverables:

"Cultural Sensitivity Training" (£120/hour)

"Temporary Shelter Management" (£2,500/week)

--

Fund Diversion:

Grants disbursed to shell vendors’ accounts → funds withdrawn as cash via "business expenses" loopholes.

Apparent spending: ~70% declared for "operational costs" despite <15% actual delivery.

Street-Level Handlers: Charitable workers / NGO affiliates directly distribute cash bundles (£50-£200/person).

Cover Mechanisms: Officially declared as "emergency subsistence stipends" (exploiting reporting gaps in small-sum transfers). Physical cash avoids AML scrutiny (<£10,000/transaction).

HMRC estimates £1.2 billion in fraudulent charity fraud annually (2023), with ~25% linked to migration sector schemes.

--

Confirmed Cases:

Refugee Action Leeds (2021): £370k diverted via shell company "Unity Lifeline."

London Sanctuary Network (2022): £890k laundered for cash-in-hand construction workers.

Charity Commission ex post audits detect fraud only after fund exhaustion (~18-month lag).

----

Trusteeship overlaps allow corrupt board members to approve fictitious vendor payments.

Underground Hawala Couriers: Shell vendors remit cash to illicit hawala brokers, who distribute to:

Landlords: Covering rent for illegals in overcrowded slums (£400/month cash).

Employment Fixers: Kickbacks to gangmasters employing illegals.

Direct Cash Distribution Points: Mosques/churches in African neighborhoods (e.g., Peckham, Birmingham) via coded vouchers.

----

AML Evasion:

Cash withdrawals <£10,000/month avoid automated reporting under Proceeds of Crime Act 2002.

Tax gaps: £500 "<essential expense>" cash allowances weekly to illegals bypasses PAYE.

----

Non-existent grant audits through:

Front projects like "Go Green!" and "Ukraine Crisis Aid" masking London-Nigeria hawala flows.

Donation recycling: Public crowdsourced funds diverted into laundering flows.

>>teamon+f02
If this were the case, then you have to explain why other things that are heavily leant on (e.g. global warming, or trans issues just to give two obvious examples) by a large part of the political establishment and mainstream media fail to have much cut through with most of the population.

The reason immigration has cut through is it corresponds with people's own direct lived experience. It's not an abstract concept to people, it's visceral and real

>>ifwint+4Z5
There are some issues that people are absolutely feeling: housing costs, low wage growth, job losses and unemployment, stress on the NHS, crime, societal change etc. These are very real issues that are causing people pain.

Some politicians and certain parts of the media are blaming immigration for all of those issues. There's a constant barrage of talking points on the news and other forms of media. They cut through complex issues and appeal to 'common sense'.

People are directly feeling the pain. People are being given a reason for the pain. People feel that reason is the direct cause of their real pain.