Agree 100%
A big problem with the EU is that to slightly ballance the books as such, the goverment has to place strict rules on many non-eu states to try and limmit the number.
I am english, and my wife is chinese - she is similar to your partner, highly skilled, experianced, masters degree etc, no history at all of ever using benifits. But its really hard to get her a permanent visa, even though we are married.
Its really tempting me to vote out, because if we as a country had a system where all people from other countries (except genuine cases of migrants etc) have to go through the same system of merit based selection (see new zealand etc), then my wife would get a visa no problem.
As an english citizen who lives in china now, our choices are litterally the following:
Save 62,500 pounds, and keep it untouched in a bank account for 6 months, then apply.
Or
I come to england, work for 6 months, then apply for 2 months, all without my wife. Meaning we must spend 8+ months apart.
Whilst yes, someone from a different nationality can just walk right in.
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Serriously, if we are genuinly concerned about the future of our country, then we need to consider our immigration policy in a serrious and non-racially charged way.
We must look at moving to a system where we have people coming to england on thee basis of them being:
1 - a humanitarian case.
2 - a person who would benifit the UK.
3 - a person coming with dirrect family links (strict rules)
Anything beyond the two is surplus.
Race should have no impact, african, asian, america, european.. it does not matter.
Religion should have no impact, nor should their culture of origin.
-- as long as a person fits the requirements they are allowed to live here, under the probationary terms for the first few years.
If they break the probationary terms, they are sent back.
If they keep to them, they are given a full visa.
Simple.
Those who say that immigration has done lots of good for this country are right.. it has helped us hugely in many areas. But its not perfect, and just because it has been good in the past, does not make it immune to criticism, or shelter it from an effort to make it even better.
We can get to a system where immigration works for our country and the people entering in, in a much much better way then it does now, by accepting the reality that immigration is part of modern western society, but no accepting that in its current state it cant be improved, and by moving past the simple ideas from both sides of less or more = right or wrong.