In the 60s and 70s under what circumstances were immigrants allowed in the UK?
Thursday, August 26th, 2010 at
7:22 am
Fine, but I also heard that you had to have children who were under 20. Or something along those lines. Do you know if that is true?
More 60s 70s Fancy Dress
Filed under: Info
Like this post? Subscribe to my RSS feed and get loads more!
Hi there
I saw the waves of immigration through the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. It is only as an adult that I have read about their personal circumstances. Countries of the former British Empire who had fought in WW11 were allowed to come to the UK. Enoch Powell and others toured the Commonwealth targetting drought ridden areas to recruit labour to come to the UK.
Here was the catch: the immigrants’ qualifications were not recognised so they were kept on low paid and low skilled jobs so the indigenous people could take the higher skilled jobs. Immigrants were allowed £3.00 per head to take from their own country and bring to the UK. They could not access benefits until they had been in full time employment for a qualifying period.
Beds in lodging houses were rented on three to a bed basis. One sleeping at night, one in the day then one in the evening. There was usually one outside toilet and no bathroom.
Lodging houses would advertise rooms to let with the proviso: no coloureds, no Irish, no dogs.
The men usually came first with their wives and children joining them many years later.
There was rampant racism with Paki bashing occurring most weekends.
Thank God those days are over.
There have always been waves of immigration. There was no Schengen Zone back then, but Irish citizens have always been allowed to travel freely to the UK, to settle, to work, without work permits, visas or passports and allowed to vote.
There were waves of immigration in the 50s and 60s from India and Pakistan to help satisfy a labour shortage, particularly in the northern cotton mill towns. My mother worked in one at the time, which had grown so big it needed to introduce a night shift so it could open 24 hours. No workers were forthcoming to work the night shift, so eventually all the night jobs were given to Asian workers (who worked for less money than the British workers). Needless to say it caused instant resentment, and people suddenly wanted the work they had previously rejected.
This town lost its mills, and at the same time lost its Asian immigrants, who largely followed the work to places like Bolton and Bradford, where the next generation is still living.
for filling the gap in labour market