Eight in ten Britons want tighter controls on immigration ... even Lib Dem voters want cap

The public, including a sizeable majority of Lib Dem supporters, want far stricter controls on immigration to the UK, according to a poll released last night. The YouGov survey found 81 per cent support for the government's cap on economic migration - which will slash the number of non-EU workers given visas by a fifth.

It is part of a policy to cut net migration - the number of people arriving in Britain, versus those leaving - from 215,000 to the 'tens of thousands'. However, the public, including a large chunk of Lib Dem supporters, is calling on the Coalition to go much further. Some 70 per cent of the public thought that net immigration of 50,000 or less would be 'best for Britain'.

This was the view of 61 per cent of Lib Dems. The figure will surprise party managers, who had widely assumed their supporters wanted relaxed immigration controls. During the consultation over the government's cap on economic migrants, Business Secretary Vince Cable repeatedly complained the Home Office was intending to be too tough. The party is also known to be unhappy with David Cameron's 'tens of thousands' pledge, which did not appear in the Coalition agreement.

But the survey, carried out for Migrationwatch, found 16 per cent of Lib Dems want net migration of 50,000-a-year, and a further 36 per cent want no net immigration - which means the same number of people arriving each years as leaving. A further nine per cent said there should be more emigrants than immigrants. Overall, this is the view of 19 per cent of the population. In terms of the cap policy, there was 79 per cent approval by the Lib Dems, compared to 95 per cent of Conservatives and 69 per cent of Labour voters.

The figures will be useful in continuing negotations between the Tories and Lib Dems over cracking down on other routes into the UK, such as marriage and student visas.

Separately, the YouGov survey found public concern about a report, published by an Oxford University academic, warning that white Britons will be a minority by 2066 if immigration continues at the current rate. Prof David Coleman said that, If immigration stays at its long-term rate of around 180,000 a year, the white British-born population would decline from 80 per cent of the total now to 59 per cent in 2051.

By then white immigrants would have more than doubled from 4 to 10 per cent of the total, while the ethnic minority population would have risen from 16 to 31 per cent. If the trend continued, the white British population, defined as English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish-born citizens, would become the minority after about 2066, Prof Coleman said.

The poll found that 73 per cent of the public would feel 'unhappy' if this scenario proved accurate. Some 85 per cent of Tory voters held this view, compared to 67 per cent of Labour supporters and 55 per cent of Lib Dems. A fifth of the public said they would be neither happy nor unhappy.

Sir Andrew Green, chairman of Migrationwatch, said: 'These results are a strong vote of confidence in the government’s recent measures to control economic migration. 'But they are also warning that the public, who would like to see even lower levels of immigration, are very unhappy about the long-term consequences of immigration for the make-up of our society. '

Last week, Home Office ministers announced a 21,700 cap on visas for workers from outside Europe - a reduction of 20 per cent. They also promised sharp reduction in the number of student visas being handed out - with most applicants for non-degree courses being rejected.

Figures released by the Office for national Statistics, two days after the announcement, showed the scale of the task facing the government. In the year to March 2010, net migration was 215,000. Some 580,000 people moved to Britain, including a record 211,000 students. In the same period 364,000 left the country - the lowest level in a decade. The net migration totals for 2008 and 2009 were 163,000 and 198,000 respectively.

The Office for National Statistics has said that the population will hit 70million by 2029 if net migration runs at 180,000 a year.

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The DREAM Act Is Amnesty

For most of us, the holidays are a time for reflection. You would think that the Democrats would take advantage of the opportunity after their latest “shellacking.” Instead, the Party of Pelosi, Reid, and Obama sees the season as just one more opportunity to sneak past legislation to rob the American people of a future.

Even as our troops in Afghanistan fight a growing insurgency, Senate Leader Harry Reid used a defense bill to try to push the so called DREAM act through the lame duck Congress. The Democrats have learned nothing from their historic defeat, and are doubling down on amnesty for illegal aliens.

Shockingly, they are even being assisted by Republican collaborators like Senator Richard Lugar. Since they are unpopular with Americans, the Democrats’ strategy for political survival is essentially a massive voter registration drive for criminals. Meanwhile, RINO’s like Lugar, in pursuing praise from the liberal media and money from corporations lusting for cheap labor, blind themselves to what the Democrats clearly understand. Immigration has finished the GOP in California, where Ronald Reagan was once governor, and amnesty will finish the party as a national force.

Harry Reid is self-interested but, unlike Lugar, is not stupid. His latest piece of chicanery combines a cutsey title and happy talk about “the children” and education to disguise its true intent. Proponents describe the bill as a way to provide a pathway to legal residency for illegal alien “kids” who just want to go to college or serve in the military. However, the true scope of the act is far more broad.

Under the act, illegal aliens under 35 – hardly children – can apply for permanent residency. Any illegal who came to the country before he was sixteen, has been here for five years, and has dodged deportation is rewarded by being allowed to apply if they say they want to go to college or join the military.

As a bonus, illegals will receive in-state tuition under this act. Not only do the Democrats cheapen citizenship, they make it an outright disadvantage. That’s not even the worst part. Because the law has no enforcement mechanisms, an illegal alien simply has to claim that the United States before he or she was sixteen to be eligible. As illegals are, as they themselves like to say, “undocumented,” there is no way to prove the truth or falsity of their claims. There is also no way to prove that an illegal is over 35 and therefore ineligible. The act also leaves intact the “chain migration” system that allows illegals to bring in their entire families. Essentially, the DREAM act is a path to permanent residency for any criminal alien who can plausibly claim to be under 35 – and their entire families.

Make no mistake – the DREAM act is amnesty. All patriotic Americans concerned about crime, education, health care, unemployment, or the staggering budget deficits of states like California that are coping with the illegal immigrant invasion should be outraged that we are even considering this legislation.

In 2006, and 2007, we were able to overcome the leaders of both political parties in the past to stop amnesty. Amnesty advocates know they can’t win if there is an open debate on illegal immigration. If the DREAM act sneaks through the lame duck Congress, apologists for illegals will undo that victory by accomplishing their aims through trickery and deception.

The American people are out of work and out of savings, with paying the bills – never mind college for their children – as a real dream. Rather than lending assistance, the Democrats and Republican collaborators like Lugar are actually taunting them, forcing them to pay for their own dispossession. Democrats caring about actual Americans is the real dream.

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