Enemies of Reason Poundshop potshots at the media moral maze.

Is being anti-immigration racist?

You might think the straightforward answer would be "Sometimes", or even "Frequently", or you could even opt for the slightly more complicated "There may be concerns about the impact of immigration upon public services and the ability of the state to deal with an increasing population in general, but the fact that these concerns exist doesn't necessarily mean they are legitimate; and nor does it mean that these concerns are not frequently used as a mask for racists to hide behind, shielding their inherent prejudice from view."

You might, but we're told today that the Government believed everyone - that's everyone - who complains about immigration was racist. If the source of this information came from anyone except MigrationWatch, you might be tempted to think: "Cor, that's a bit dumb of them. Surely they're a bit more sensible than that?" But this story did originally come from MigrationWatch, and this is part two of an actually-rather-feeble-but-presses-the-right-buttons-so-given-far-more-column-inches-than-they-should-be series of ''revelations' about the Government's immigration policy. Go and read Five Chinese Crackers, if you haven't already, for a good summary of part one.

Part two, then, was what was behind my silliness earlier today, with that front-page headline in the Daily Express, which really went like this:

At which point I'll say what I didn't have time to earlier, namely: don't include me in your we, Daily Express. It's a clever enough bit of phrasing, which immediately gets the anger juices flowing. The dialogue between the Express and its reader might go something like this:

Labour says you're a racist!

Who, me?

Yes you! You! Labour says you're a racist. Just because you read the Express and want to close the borders, and send them ba... er, not that bit, obviously, but you get the general idea.

I'm very angry all of a sudden.

Don't worry, we can help you get more angry. They've got a secret plan to flood the country with immigrants, just because they think it's a good idea, or something, and they think that if you complain about that, you're a racist!

A secret plan? Really?

Well, since you ask, no, not a secret plan at all. There are some vague mentions of 'social objectives' and 'wider economic benefits', which, if you interpreted them in the way that MigrationWatch have, means Labour secretly trying to enforce multiculturalism on whitey. But that's quite a leap and there appears to be very little evidence for that. Hang on a minute, I appear to be actually giving a shit about what's accurate. I must have stopped being a Daily Express journalist all of a sudden.

Now I'm confused, and a little frightened.

It's OK, we'll get through this. How about we watch a Black & White Minstrel Show episode together. That's not racist either. It's just good old-fashioned family fun, and if the PC Brigade want to call it racist, then they're wrong as wrong can be.

OK, but don't touch me again. Promise me you won't.

I may be embellishing a bit, but I'm pretty sure that's exactly what happens. The thing is, the justification for this latest story is even flimsier. It's 'secret' because it was never published. Well there are a couple of ways to look at this* - you could say it wasn't included because it's a big secret, and it was all a massive plot by Labour. Or you could say it wasn't included because it was rejected. Which one do you think the Mail and Express have gone for? Here's the Mail:

The thinking on immigration among Labour leaders was set down in 2000 in a document prepared for the Cabinet Office and the Home Office, but the key passages were suppressed before it was published.

The paper was finally disclosed under freedom of information rules yesterday. It showed that ministers were advised that only the ill-educated and those who had never met a migrant were opposed to immigration.

They were also told that large-scale immigration would bring increases in crime, but they concealed these concerns from the public.

Can you imagine a world in which all Daily Mail stories had to be released in their original form, before they were edited? Pure, unadulterated Littlejohn and Moir. I mean, look at what actually makes it through. Do you think they might contain things that could be considered mistakes, or which were rejected? Would you consider it 'secret' or 'suppressing' or 'concealing' that we don't get to see that? Or do you just think some kind of editorial process took place? Can't Governments do the same thing - editing what finally gets published? (You should see some of my blog posts that never made it - dreadful. You may reply "Well it would be hard to tell, lol!" and then I'd cry.)

So is this really suppressing the truth? Or is it something else? Did 'the Government' really think that everyone who disagreed with immigration was racist, or was the phrasing a bit more nuanced than that? Was it someone else who drafted the document, which was then rejected? Was it all a secret Labour plot to flood the country with immigrants because they thought they'd all magically vote Labour? Was something else going on? We don't know for sure, but one thing is for sure - we won't find out the truth from reading the Mail or Express. We need the original source material so we can decide for ourselves.

* And it's hard to tell for sure without the original document, which I haven't got access to myself - if any of you can tell me where to find it then that'd be skill. For some reason - and call me a big cynic - I'm not too sure if MigrationWatch's view of this reflects the entire reality. I can't even find the press release for this on the MigrationWatch website.

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