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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   22621 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 1, 2026

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I know that, but why? Does Britain allocate immigration slots by lottery? Is it just whoever gets on a British Airways flight in Mumbai? Did they consider a merit system and decide against it, or did the issue never come up at all?

A dam in Pakistan displaced people, Some employers wanted cheaper labour too:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirpuri_diaspora

Under the British Nationality Act 1948, citizens of Commonwealth countries had the right to enter and settle in the UK freely. They then tightened this up somewhat later on. But in effective terms the gates are still wide open since there are ways around these rules and a political elite that actively resists immigration restriction.

The timeline of Mirpuris in the UK is roughly:

1947-1961 - After Pakistani independence, the UK still allows free immigration of Commonwealth citizens. For reasons that are not obvious, working-class Pakistanis moving to the UK are mostly Mirpuri. Some low-wage industries like textiles are actively seeking to hire Pakistani immigrants because they are cheaper than white Britons.
1961-68 - the Mangla Dam is built, displacing about 110k Mirpuris. About 5k moved to the UK and joined the existing Mirpuri community in the UK before the doors closed.
1962 - The Commonwealth Immigrants Act ends free immigration for Commonwealth citizens. At this point there are about 25k ethnic Pakistanis in the UK, mostly Mirpuri.
1962-1983 - The Mirpuri population in the UK doubles more than once a decade due to chain migration and natural increase.
1983 - The Thatcher government introduces the "Primary Purpose Rule", saying that marriage to a British citizen doesn't get you a visa unless you can demonstrate that the primary purpose of the marriage was not immigration-related. In effect, this means that you can no longer use obviously-arranged marriages for immigration purposes. The doubling time of the British Mirpuri population increases to about 15 years.
1997 - One of the first things the incoming Blair government does is to abolish the Primary Purpose Rule, which they consider racist. Chain migration increases, with arranged marriages to cousins becoming a problem.

You have to add two extra spaces at the end of a line in order to make a line break.

Also there's a ton of Indian background chain migration especially considering how many commonwealth countries have established market dominant minority Indian populations. I think it can create a misnomer with certain anglosphere countries where direct Indian immigration has gotten a lot higher recently but their overall Indian levels were already higher than expected due to outflow of African Indians.

Market dominant minorities tend to have more mobility/opportunity to emigrate.

UK, Australia and NZ did not historically filter as well as the US. In NZ and Oz, it's typically rural Punjabis who apply for the cheapest course they could find that's eligible for a student visa, drop out mid-course, and do some shady stuff to get on a work visa. There's been many incidences of Indian owned restaurants in NZ underpaying other Indian migrant workers.

Chain migration also going to make it difficult to filter. I'm an Australian and I'd say like half of the subcontinental classmates I had in high school came via other parts of the Commonwealth where their parents or grandparents had emigrated

Presumably there's something to do with the former Empire relationship.

I don't know how Britain allocates its immigration quotas, but the obvious main difference would be that the US has been selecting for ability to qualify for H1-Bs and Britain has not.

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