The real evil of the Powellite formula is that, if there is to be a programme for encouraging immigrants to return to their countries of origin, it is inevitable that pressures, amounting to harassment, will be put upon them by those with an interest in seeing them go.
The mere fact, for instance, of an advertising campaign to set a departure trend would be humiliating and would generate feelings of insecurity certain to prompt social problems that do not now exist. To prophesy flaring hatred and national discord is mischievous. Our situation is totally different in kind from the problems in the United States. Most Britons, in their own muddled way, manage to get on with anyone, once they get to know _ them.
This prospect, however, will surely break down if Enoch Powell and his supporters ▪ provoke the country into fear and resentment.
If hatred does flare, it will be the creation of the Powellites, not something they foresaw 2 when the rest of us were blind.
• Immigration, of course, must change us. All
• men fear 'alienation', becoming another kind of person or nation. is it naive to answer that change can be for the better as well as for worse, and that, through the marriage of races and cultures, Britain stands to become a better place?
What we need at this time is not a prophet of doom but an intensive programme of 'education' to prepare us for a multi-racial society. It is not a threat that faces us, but a fascinating challenge.