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Blair's think tank airbrushed link between crime and immigrants
Joe Murphy, Political Editor27.10.09
Possible links between mass immigration and some crimes were censored from a keynote government report, the Standard can reveal.
The report originally contained passages highlighting the risk that organised criminals had exploited higher migration.
But they were taken out of the published version, a milestone study that shifted Labour policy towards encouraging economic migrants.
Published by the Home Office in 2001, the 80-page report - Migration, A Social and Economic Analysis - has been criticised for painting too a rosy picture of the impact of immigration. The draft shown to the Evening Standard reveals it went through several changes that removed paragraphs that could have been seized upon by critics.
The most striking was the removal of the section headed "Criminal behaviour", written as part of a chapter on the impact of migration.
It is understood that the passage on crime was removed because Downing Street was "nervous" that critics including extremists could seize on such candid remarks.
Another section cut proposed a cross-government "communications strategy on migration" to promote a more positive attitude among members of the public and to rebut media myths.
Moreover, in the draft it was asserted that Britain's record towards Jews fleeing Hitler's Nazi regime was "positively shameful in some respects". It also said racism towards black migrants in past years had come "not just from extremists or working class communities, but from politicians and policy-makers at the highest level".
Both comments were airbrushed from the published version. Damian Green, the Conservative immigration spokesman, said the disclosures showed a "disgraceful" attempt to massage the findings of the report.
"With every day that passes it becomes increasingly clear that the Government tried to deceive the British people about immigration policy," he said. "This is a disgraceful episode."
The report has already been at the centre of a row this week after claims that officials involved in the review of immigration policy seemed to be motivated by party political considerations. It was written by members the PIU think tank set up by Tony Blair under the lead of Jonathan Portes, 44, now the senior economic adviser at the Cabinet Office.
The missing section warned: "Migration has opened up new opportunities for organised crime." However, it said migrants were not more likely to be criminals, despite foreign nationals forming a higher proportion of the prison population than of the general population. The disparity, it stressed, was almost entirely caused by foreign visitors held for drugs smuggling at ports and airports, and nothing to do with settled migrants.
It reported: "There is emerging evidence that the circumstances in which asylum seekers are living is leading to criminal offences, including fights and begging."
A Cabinet Office spokesman denied that any political pressure was brought to bear on Mr Portes and his team.
"Objectivity and impartiality have always been core values of the civil service," he said.
Passages that were missing from the report
Criminal Behaviour
There are three ways in which migrant criminality may differ from that of the general population:
* The international criminal who travels across borders to pursue criminal activity, for whom screening at ports of entry is increasingly the focus of international cooperation between police forces to detect on entry.
* Organised crime identified with a particular migrant group, including commercial fraud and trafficking in drugs, in illegal migrants and in women — also the focus of attention by police and immigration staff.
* Crime associated with conditions of migration and reception, including recovery of debts by migrant-smugglers, marriage rackets, breaches of immigration control and crime associated with the migrant's circumstances (lack of work, hostel living conditions).
Migration has opened up new opportunities for organised crime. Data is necessarily tentative, but it is estimated that the global profit from trafficking illegal migrants is $5-7 billion.
We have no data on trafficking to the UK (the Home Office estimates “thousands”) but examples from abroad are illustrative. Some 750,000 migrants from the former USSR entered Israel in the Nineties and £2-5 billion of Russian organised crime money is estimated by police to have been invested in Israel between 1991 and 1998.
The illegal migration of 600,000 Fukienese Chinese to the USA yielded an estimated $3.2 billion profit to the criminal gangs and was followed by “institutionalised Fukienese crime with its services and predation”.
In New Zealand, however, a study of Asian immigrants found lower levels of offending than for the resident population.
* Taken from Preliminary Report on Migration, 11 July 2000, written by officials in Tony Blair's Performance and Innovation Unit. This section was omitted from the public version of the report, Migration, A Social and Economic Analysis, published by the Cabinet Office in 2001.
Reader views (35)
And don't think Camoron will be any different. Where have the Tories been while all of this has been going on? I knew what was happening, so surely polititians did. The Tories are also guilty by association. We all know in our heart of hearts that there is only ONE party that will sort this, and the EU, out, as they have been trying to wake the public up on this issue for years. That is why they have been in the news so much now that the Lib/Lab/Con chickens are coming home to roost.
- Brian, Littlehampton, Sussex
We are well on the way to a seriously Right Wing government. They will give smart facist uniforms to the sink estate indigneous youth and arm them !
Somebody in government, this or the next best wake up.
- Dave Morris, Sunderland UK
It does look like no chance for Labour.
- Vlad, London
What does one expect with this government ? All the nasty news is hidden from us. It is said that Labour don't like the British, especially the lower orders who they are supposed to stand for. So they want to swamp the country with immigrants, mostly undesirables.
- Michael, London, UK
@ Keith Price, Luton England
You're a funny guy, nice one LOL.
He's not serious is he?
- Barry, woking, surrey, UK
there can be no doubt now that this gov is going to go. there is also no doubt that they will hang on to the very last second and push through every policy that they can in the meantime even though they know they do not have the support of the people. Surely this can't be legal? there must be some way that they can be held accountable for the damage that they are deliberatly doing?
We can have Blair and Brown in court for war crimes almost certainly, but if they were found guilty would that actually mean that us, the British taxpayers, would end up paying damages to Iraq and afghanistan whilst Blair and Brown weasle out with a few years behind bars?
- Barry, woking, surrey, UK
Blair's think tank airbrushed link between crime and immigrants.
Just as well the public didn't then because many of us have been keeping stats. We've known this was true for a long time - this govt are disgraceful traitors and must be brought to book.
Not only have they usurped the Magna Carta (treasonable offence) they have breached the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) by socially engineering mass immigration to change the face of this country. What despicable people we have in power these days.
When are we the people, going to do something about this betrayal?
- Zordana, Bucks
All the men (assuming that P Stalker and Democracy Please are not women) who have responded with bile and hatred towards people of colour and immigrants have conveniently ignored one of the "airbrushed" passages. Joe Murphy writes that "in the draft it was asserted that Britain's record towards Jews fleeing Hitler's Nazi regime was 'positively shameful in some respects'. It also said racism towards black migrants in past years had come "not just from extremists or working class communities, but from politicians and policy-makers at the highest level".
Mr Murphy also quotes another mising passage which makes clear that in 2000 the Home Office had "no data on trafficking to the UK". Any figures produced were based on examples of what was happening abroad. You all seem to be ready to witchunt people on the basis of guestimates and hearsay. These are very dangerous times when the anger of 20+ individuals can be so easliy generated by government deceit. Since they lied about weapons of mass destruction - why would you believe anything politicians write or indeed rub out?
- Crissie Warren, London, England
International Law says an Asylum seeker is meant to claim asylum in the first safe country they come to. So we as an Island..have NO LEGAL ASYLUM SEEKERS..what they are are robbers and crooks..thieves and liars. The same as the crook that breaks into your house and steals all your stuff.
Line them up and tell them thay have 6 months to get out.
- Clif, London
Neil London
just read Dan Brown's The lost symbol have we.
- David, London
Just done some research which shows the white male prison population in 2001 was 50,000 and the total male population to be about 62,500. By 2007 the prison population was 75,500 of which whites made up 55,000 so a whopping 62% of the increase in our prison population is due to foreigners and ethnic minorities. These are the figures the government hides from us because their multicultural experiment would be stopped in its tracks if the true figures were known.
- Richard, Hastings
I hope the Conservatives have the guts to make a hell of a row about this.We should drastically curtail immigration and deport all illegal and criminal immigrants.When they've finished their sentence,take them straight to the airport.
- Mark Taha, london,britain
No doubt labour will threaten the whistle blower and this story will change over the next few days. Rather like the Neather story last week. We are being governed by evil cowards who continue to cover up their lies and deceptions.
- Tom W, London
We have been lied to for three terms and this government simply has to be replaced ASAP. The brainwashing, and the lies, is now clearly evident now along with the expenses scandal aka stealing public money. Has anyone noticed not one SINGLE charge has been taken against any of this lot? TIME FOR CHANGE!
- Democracy Please, Northolt, London
Is anybody seriously surprised that this shower have been lying to us all along? They have no respect for democracy, free-speech or the general public. The quicker we get rid of them the better. It's time we all start looking beyond party's useless promises and look at the undelying ideologies.
- Mark, London
It's long past the time this disgraced, shambolic government of thieves and liars was forced too call a general election.
- Kevin T, Beckenham, Kent
I respect the fine upstanding man, husband, leader and PM that Tony is and was. I am surprised that people on here have such short memories. Hating seems to have become a disease recently
- Keith Price, Luton England
" The recent attempts to smear our former PN are disgraceful"
Presumably, Keith, the abbreviation PN stands for Prime Nitwit.
I am not sure what our European cousins will make of this latest revelation of Blair's mendacity. According to the media their doubts about his suitability for EU President seem to stem mainly from his reluctance to take the UK into the Euro. Oddly his record as a war criminal, bankrupting his country,and turning it into a third rate police state does not seem to bother them very much.
- J Peters, London
Labour's so-called immigration policy has made us the dustbin of the world for other countries' criminals. Now we find that they've been lying to us about it (hardly a surprise, when did that lot last tell the unvarnished truth about anything? )This has to be the number one reason why people vote BNP in disgust.
Any non-citizen who deliberately commits a crime or crimes serious enough to warrant imprisonment, should automatically be deported, either after or instead of serving time in jail. If such a convicted criminal claims assylum, it should be provided only within the walls of a detention facility. Why should we ever again trust someone who has proved himself willing to bite the hands of the people who offered him sanctuary?
The message should be simple. Criminals not wanted here!
- Nigel, London
"migrants were not more likely to be criminals, despite foreign nationals forming a higher proportion of the prison population"
Like the 22% of the prison population?
- P Staker, London
Keith Price
Another one for the looney bin
if he cannot see the damage this guy as done
kow a multi millionaire with the Kinnocks and the Prescotts do me a fovour. go away
THIS NEW REPORT ABOUT IMMIGRATION AND CRIME AND THIS IS REMOVED FROM THE REPORTS ETC.
Honest BLAIR. IF HE COMES THE NEW EU PRESIDENT THERE IS NO HOPE IN THIS WORLD
- Terence Mccarthy, South Africa
The purpose of mass immigration is to foster such discord and chaos in this country that we will engage in violence and martial law can finally be fully implemented. Ordo Ab Chao.
- Neil, London, London UK
Keith...what planet do you live on...Blair has done nothing for this once great country...well apart from ruin it and send our troops in to an illegal war...just so he could acquire cheap oil!!! Then again we are still living with his policy on immigration or migration as "New Labour" like to call it!!! As for a "European leader" NO WAY!!!
- Mark, Sidcup
The recent attempts to try to smear our former PN are disgraceful. Three successful general elections. Over a decade in charge of Britain. Tony will make a fine European leader. Most people across Europe already accept that.
- Keith Price, Luton England
Care to put that to the vote, or are you another EU loving democracy shy hoon?
- Zachary Albion, Ibstock Leicestershire
Perhaps the question is what David Milliband and Gordon Brown will receive in return for their loving support of the disgraced former 'Dear Leader' ?
Barring some unthinkable transformation, it is unlikely they will have much work post the next election, so have everything to gain from a bit of duplicitous sycophancy towards their 'choice' of European president
- John, Twickenham
'Who exactly do you mean and how many of the 490 million EU population have you questioned in this regard!'
Ij, Wisbech
Or how many of the 490 million have the EU elite asked whether they want this warmonger as president?
Democracy at its finest and some very dark times ahead if this is how it's going to be from now on.
- Stephen, London
Keith
you have been brain washed by lies or you are brain dead look at the mess we are in thanks to Blair and his Muppets none of them elected or electable
try watching a evening show called border control see how the aussies takel imigration we need this here and now
- Terry Chambers, London
What's a PN Keith? A Prime Numpty! and when you say that "MOST" people across Europe accept that "Honest Tone" would make a fine European leader! Who exactly do you mean and how many of the 490 million EU population have you questioned in this regard!
- Ij, Wisbech
If all the illegals capture at or after entry to the UK were immediately deported then it would put the people traffickers out of business. We should fully enforce the 1951 Convention that all asylum seekers seek that asylum in the first saafe country they enter. no excuses no special treatment they are not our problem
- John Mac, Sevenoaks Kent
this wretched and evil government have only remained in power through the burying and the falsifaction of the truth. This is of Stalinesque proportions. Blair leaves a country utterly bankrupt in every sense. and a melting pot to become the centre of world unrest
- Mark Armstrong, london. uk
Keith Price : Blair sychophant.
- Captain Black Of The Mysterons, Broxbourne
Are there still people like Keith Price around totally amazing? Shall we remind him of his Fuhrer's words - "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime", yeah right. How about "education, education, education" and after 12years soaring illiteracy and employers have no faith in the results. Or how about the revealation that Blair gave the orders to "colonise" England with third world immigrants. Or how about his assurances that only 5,000-13,000 migrant workers would come from Eastern Europe hmn clearly Blair knew full well it would be 500,000 plus. Then of course we had "the NHS safe in our hands" what a disgraceful lie that turned out to be and just to finish off on this egocentric Scottish traitor we had "Blair's illegal war".
- Richard K, Hastings
Well Keith - Why let the truth get in the way of policy making.
- Hansel, London
"What you sow you shall reap". By censuring the truth and closing down legitimate discussion on the effects of mass immigration then the government has only itself to blame for the ever growing opposition to the immigrant population. Everyone knows first hand of the problems that are blighting our communities caused in the main by the goverments open door policy on immigration. Just look at the number of people that have been murdered in recent years by people who should not have been here in the first place. To rewrite the truth just shows what a dishonest administration we have had for the past 13 years. They seem to be rather adept at telling lies - and all of from a labour government, led by Blair and Brown, who both tried to convince us they were honest as the day is long. Mind you Brown only carried on from Blair who was a past master at writing iffy documents - remember the one on WMDs adn what that led to.
- Brian G, Norfolk Gorleston
The recent attempts to try to smear our former PN are disgraceful. Three successful general elections. Over a decade in charge of Britain. Tony will make a fine European leader. Most people across Europe already accept that.
- Keith Price, Luton England
