Dogwash

Celebrants of the Multiculture are for ever telling us of the wonderful benefits that immigrants have brought to the UK. Chicken tikka masala, they remind us, is now officially Britain's favorite repast. The subtext is that this and similar cultural imports justify the presence of 3 million people of Subcontinental origin in the country. (Are they really all curry chefs and their dependants, then? OK, some drive minicabs. That must account for the numbers.) Indeed, without the beneficence of assorted foreigners we dumb Brits would still be daubing woad on ourselves and subsisting on a diet of turnips, mutton and small beer.

Bollocks.

Spaghetti bolognese is a popular British meal. Does that necessitate the presence of a large Italian minority to service that demand? No, we have learned the recipe from the Italians, to whom we are suitably grateful, and we make it ourselves. Potatoes are an Andean vegetable. Is the English countryside full of Bolivian and Peruvian peasants, cultivating this excellent staple? Not that I've seen.

Like most nations, especially trading nations, we import both goods and ideas from abroad. That does not necessarily mean we have to import the populations of the source countries en masse as well. This facile and dangerous link, much favoured by the diversity celebrators, needs to be challenged whenever it sneaks into the discussion.