Despite what Mr Brown says, the issue of emigration continues to be a factor that he has to look into. In fact, one worker demand to know what Mr Brown was planning on doing about the emigration problems in the UK during the question and answer session of the speech. It was at this point where Mr Brown insisted that he understood the sense of public concern regarding emigration. He went on to point to the Government’s introduction of an Australian style point based system for workers coming from outside the European Union as proof.

Gordon Brown finished up by saying that he understands the worries that people have about emigration overall. He understands the concerns about what is happening to the neighborhoods. He also understands the fear that people are living with. However, the UK has taken action with this new point based system. Net emigration to the UK is now coming down.

It is still not clear if people believe that this new point based emigration system will work. However, the government seems pretty sure that this system, that is now in place, will bring down the net number of emigrants to the UK.

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Just last month, the UK Statistics Agency warned politicians that it would be watching them during the course of the election campaign. They said that any politicians who misused official statistics could expect to feel the agency’s actions.

This issue at hand, or one that is being addressed in the election, is whether emigration has been getting out of hand recently under the current administration. Also, if it is getting out of hand, by how much? Just recently Brown claimed that this government had presided over a significant fall in net emigration to the UK from 237,000 in 2007 to 163,000 in 2008, and even lower numbers in 2009. He went on to use these figures to claim that the new points system that was introduced in 2008, determining which skilled workers from outside the EU can enter the country, had actually radically changed the way that they are dealing with emigrants.

However, critics and the UK Statistics Agency were very quick to point out that that these claims are not entirely accurate. They point out that these 2009 figures were provisional and also excluded asylum seekers and those who had overstayed their visas.

The chairman of the UK Statistics Authority, Sir Michael Scholar, wrote to Brown just recently and explained the error that he had made. He went on to tell Brown that the Statistics Authority hopes that, in the political debate over the coming weeks, all parties will be careful in their use of statistics to protect the integrity of these official statistics.

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In Brown’s third major speech on emigration since becoming a Prime Minister, he acknowledged that the question of who comes to Britain is a reasonable issue for voters to consider in the upcoming general election. He also said that it is right for politicians to address their concerns on the matter. However, he did go on to attack those, who he says, are spreading the impression that emigration is out of control for political reasons. Figures show that this is, in fact, false and inward emigration has clearly fallen over recent years.

The Prime Minister will call on all mainstream parties to present a united front against those who seek to bring a halt to emigration simply because of their animosity toward emigrants. He said that the question is who has the best plan to control emigration, not who can appeal to the worst instincts of nationalism and xenophobia. Who can appeal to the best instinct for a fairer Britain for all?

Brown also said that by controlling emigration for a fairer Britain, by investing in the skills of the workforce, everyone can ensure that the flexibility for UK businesses is there. Everyone can opt for an arbitrary and unworkable quota and deny UK businesses the skills that they need. This would damage the UK’s competitiveness and threaten the future of Britain altogether.

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Mr Gordon Brown will express the government’s regrets over the child migration program in a statement to the House of Commons. Under this scheme, which ran all the way from the 1920’s to the 1960’s, an estimated 150,00 kids were shipped off to Commonwealth countries such as Australia and Canada. The kids that were shipped off were between the ages of three to 14.

However, after arriving overseas, most of these kids ended up being abused in their new foster homes, state run orphanages, and religious institutions. Children were often told their parents were dead, and the parents were given very little information about their offspring.

Kids that survived the events told how, upon arrival in the new country, they would be separated from their brothers and sisters and subjected to brutal physical abuse. They also told stories of how many of the young girls would be sexually abused by their new foster parents. The Australian prime minister, Kevin Rudd, has also apologized for his country’s part in this very tragic event.

Although this government program was started in the 1920’s, the UK had been practicing child migration for centuries. Records show that, as early as 1618, 100 children were sent from London to Richmond, Virginia. However, very little is known of what happened to these kids after they were shipped overseas.

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Shaikh was arrested in the north-western city of Urumqi in September 2007 after he was discovered to be carrying 4kg of heroin. Shaikh maintains his guilt and denies any knowledge of the drugs. In court, it was claimed that Shaikh suffered from mental illness associed with bipolar disorder but this was not enough for his appeal to be successful. His execution date has been set for the 29th of December which would make him the first EU citizen in over 50 years to be condemned to death in China.

Despite the sentencing Shaikh will continue to be the subject of ongoing political pressure from within the UK. The Foreign & Commonwealth Office has repeatedly appealed to the Chinese for leniency but to no avail. His case has been taken up by human rights organisation Reprieve who has demanded that the British Prime Minister talk to his Chinese counterpart over the sentencing.

Reprieve, whose mission is to promote human rights and campaign for fair trials, expressed concerns that Shaikh was not made an example of in the political climate that followed COP15, urging Gordon Brown to talk to Premier Hu in order for a full medical assessment to be undertaken by British doctors.

The family of the convicted man have begged for leniency, arguing that his mental state when he left for China was not stable. Shaikh had originally intended to launch a career as a singer in China, despite no public background for such a profession. Previously he had attempted to establish an airline in Poland.

His family claim that he had been tricked into carrying the drugs, most likely by someone promising him work.

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Among the changes mooted by the Tories would be a complete overhaul for skilled migrants under the Tier 1 and Tier 2 system. Chris Grayling, the Shadow Home Secretary declared that under his government a greatly reduced number of immigrants would be encouraged to travel to the UK.

The details were brought to light when Grayling faced questioning by Labour MP and Home Secretary Alan Johnson, in which Grayling argued that the Conservatives would seek to implement a immigration capping system to standardise numbers entering the country each year. Grayling used statistics which indicated that under Labour there were well over 150,000 migrants registered as entering Britain in 2008 under the skilled migrants program. Under the Tories, this figure would be reduced to tens of thousands said Grayling, not hundreds of thousands.

The shadow Home Secretary’s claims were a step up from previous statements made by Prime Minister Gordon Brown who last week said Labour would be reviewing the skilled worker numbers with an additional limiting of the total allowed under law. Brown has continually refrained from making any mention of a capping system but has acknowledged that changes to the Tier 2 system would be rolled out.

Grayling’s fellow Tory and Mayor of London Boris Johnson had earlier suggested that English lessons should be mandatory for all of London’s refugee community, albeit at the tax-payers’ expense.

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The survey, which looked at a range of policies regarding border control, revealed that 67 percent of voters feel that there was a negative effect on the UK from immigration. The majority of pollsters expressed concerns that immigration was resulting in foreign workers and illegal migrants taking jobs from British nationals, with calls for deportation high on the feedback.

Research company Angus Reid Public Opinion carried out the poll which once again shows that immigration will be a key issue in next year’s general election. The poll also revealed widespread scepticism over all of the main political parties’ immigration policies.

Labour was backed by just 12 percent of voters as the best political party to control British borders as opposed to the Tories which gathered 30 percent of the voting support. The Liberal Democrats were supported by just 8 percent.

The poll data comes just two weeks after Prime Minister Gordon Brown made his first major speech about the topic of immigration policy. In that speech Brown said the issue of immigration was not one for fringe parties and nor was it a taboo subject.

A spokesman for Angus Reid said the survey clearly shows how important the issue of immigration is right now within the UK, with numerous recent rule changes and open debates keeping the topic firmly in the limelight.

Over 2,000 people were quizzed in the survey, with 57 percent saying that deportation should be mandatory for all illegal newcomers. A further 56 percent were convinced that British workers were suffering from job losses to illegal immigrants. Only 23 percent of Britons said that illegal immigrants should be allowed temporary work in the UK and just 13 percent were in favour of them eventually having the opportunity to become citizens.

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In the parliamentary response to the state opening of parliament, David Cameron went on to launch an attack on Gordon Brown’s record in office. He went on to refer to the 15 bills that have been put forward by the prime minister, saying that these are plans that only the prime minister could draw up. It has made a dividing line, and Gordon Brown has found himself on the wrong side of it.

David Cameron went on to say that Mr. Brown had often lauded his economic stewardship. However, despite the prime minister’s claims to have ended the boom, Mr. Brown has presided over the longest recession in recent memory. Cameron he continued that the economy has now been overtaken by Italy. He noted that the UK now has the biggest bank bailout in the world and the biggest bank run in Europe, yet there has been very little real reform.

Of course, Cameron did not stop there. He went on to mock Mr. Brown’s self asserted moral compass. David Cameron said that the prime minister was simply borrowing slogans directly from the far right BNP. He pointed out that the government now represented a moral failure for the prime minister, as well as a monumental failure for the country. It now seems that the answer to every single problem is more big government spending.

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