According to newly-released official documents, Tony Blair’s Labour Government pressed ahead with plans to open up the UK’s border to Eastern Europe in spite of mounting concerns by senior ministers.
In 2004, after the EU accepted eight former Soviet countries, including Poland and Lithuania, former Prime Minister HTML1- HTML0 HTML
The National Archives in London has papers that show the then deputy PM John Prescott, and the foreign secretary Jack Straw urged a delay in the policy. They warned of an immigration surge if restrictions weren’t put in place.
Others, including the then Home Secretary David Blunkett, argued that the country’s economy would continue to thrive if migrant workers were able to provide the “flexibility” and “productivity” it needed.
These records were released as part of an annual release of Cabinet Office documents that are over 20 years old.
There are also:
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- After being excluded from talks between Blair, the leaders of France and Germany and Berlusconi, Silvio felt like a “jilted love”
- Former Prime Minister , Sir John Major wrote privately to Blair to urge him to order England’s cricket team to not compete in a “morally repugnant” tour to Zimbabwe due to concerns over its human rights records under Robert Mugabe.
Rethink Open borders calls
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By the time of the referendum in 2016, the Blair government’s policy of open borders is seen to have helped fuel anti EU sentiment.
In the years following, immigration increased dramatically. Net migration rose to over 200,000 per year.
In 2013, Mr Straw acknowledged that his failure to implement any transitional controls, as almost all other EU nations had done, had been “a spectacular mistake” with far-reaching implications.
The Home Office predicted that the impact of giving new countries unrestricted entry to the UK job market would be limited. But within weeks, the number of people arriving far exceeded previous estimates.
Three months before this policy was to be implemented, Straw wrote Mr Blair to ask for a change of heart, stating that “other countries who we thought would join us have started to peel off”.
Sir Tony Blair on Leadership
“France Germany Spain Austria Belgium Finland Greece Luxembourg all have transition periods of two years or more. Portugal will likely follow suit,” wrote he.
“Italy has not decided.” Sweden, Netherlands, and Denmark (who were with us) have all announced that they will be introducing work permits and/or residency permits for those who wish to take advantage of this concession.”
M. Prescott backed him up, saying he was “extremely worried” about the pressures placed on social housing by a sudden inflow of new migrants.
But Mr Blunkett insisted that they should continue with the plan “for economic reasons”, backed up by Andrew Smith, the work and pensions minister, and the Treasury.
He said they would tighten the regulations in order to prevent migrants from travelling to the UK solely to claim benefits, but he rejected calls for work permits as “not just expensive and bureaucratic, but I believe that it is ineffective”.
Mr Blair also appeared to express doubts about whether stricter rules for benefits alone would be sufficient.
“Are you sure that this works?” He wrote in a note that he didn’t want to go back to the subject.
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“I’m not sure if we should also have a approach to work permits. Why not? “It gives us an additional string to our bow.”
Mr Blair also stressed that it was important to send a “message” to deter people from taking advantage of benefits. He wrote in a letter: “We need to do the most difficult package possible on benefits & announce this, plus the power to revoke the visa plan and a message to Romas.”
Bush’s’mission from God’ to Iraq
In other Cabinet files, there were records of candid conversations between Richard Armitage (the US deputy secretary of state) and Sir David Manning (the British ambassador to the US in those days), about the Iraq War.
Mr Armitage, in a meeting with the US commander for Iraq, dismissed his claims that he would be able to put down an uprising of major proportions in Fallujah in a matter of days as “bulls**t”. He also called on Mr Blair to convince Mr Bush there was a need for a “broader political process” to restore order.
In a second meeting, Mr Armitage said that President Bush was confronted with “a dose of reality” regarding the conflict.
Sir David reported that Rich summarized the whole thing by saying that Bush thought he still was on a sort of mission from God but that recent events made him “rather sober”.
Italian PM felt like ‘jilted lover’
Other newspapers described a fallout with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, after he had been excluded from a Trilateral Summit of UK, France and Germany.
He was said to be “hurt” by the fact that he, unlike the two other nations, had supported Britain and the US in their invasion of Iraq and had threatened to challenge Britain’s EU rebate every chance he got as a consequence.