Europe

makes me laugh in the debate is the argument of the amount of British ex pats in europe
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Makes me laugh that when it's people moving here they're immigrants and when it's people leaving here they're expats.

Brits living abroad are immigrants too.

And nonsense about being a stain on society. It's a fact that EU immigrants in UK pay more in tax than they take out. And there are Brits abroad claiming benefits too.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/19/-sp-thousands-britons-claim-benefits-eu

I used Spain as an example because I worked in Barcelona myself a couple of years. People take about immigrants in UK making isolated communities, no integrating, which is exactly what the British communities do in the south of Spain. Have their own schools, don't learn the language, make their own pubs etc.

Best Fans ............. I lived in Portugal and it's the same there .... "expat" communities (immigrants) making a little Britain existence for themselves, with only a few actually bothering to "integrate". Does make me laugh where we have a go at johnny foreigner in this country when our own do it across the globe and have done for centuries.

If the UK leaving the EU has an adverse effect on them then that's tough. They chose to leave and make up home in another country. Those left behind, paying uk tax, shouldn't (and I won't) consider there circumstances whatsoever when making my decision - for me it's irrelevant.

If I ever go on holiday and see a "Brit pub" then i'll avoid it like the plague.

kinda annoys me when people who voted to bomb syria then kick off about housing any of the refugees.

Did anyone vote to bomb Syria? Does/would anyone actually vote to bomb anyone? Whether we like it or not the elected government made that decision Rich. We get the opportunity to vote them out at the next election ....... not sure you can say that for the people of Syria about Assad ? Regardless of anything, horrible situation for the innocent members of the public who are caught up in what must be a nightmare in that country.

Seems I hit a nerve with Best Fans.

1. Please evidence this 'fact' that EU ex pats pay more in tax than they send home? You can't because you can't quote statistics on personal bank accounts, you can only quote what the treasury takes in tax giving you an unbalanced statistic.

2. Please reference where I have referred to said 'immigrants'?

3. Nowhere have I said anything about cultural integration in the UK or EU. I merely stated that economically the groups I mentioned aren't comparable as one group is just spending their life savings in the sun and the other has made an economic decision to make a better life.

Not hit a nerve Davidoff. This is a forum to debate.

1. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c49043a8-6447-11e4-b219-00144feabdc0.html

2. You didn't directly say it. People call British immigrants abroad 'expats', whereas immigrants here are calling 'immigrants'. Just a comment on the use of expats.

3. You implied that immigrants here are a 'drain on society'. I never said you mentioned cultural integration, hence "people talk about".

My point is just that people complain about immigration here, when we have our own immigrations abroad. Just a lot of hypocrisy I feel (not from you, just general) regarding immigration and EU.

Valid points, can't read the article as it wants subscriptions but that looks like they pay more in tax than they receive from the treasury.
The point I was making is that the monies they make is sent back to their home country whereas the majority of our ex-pats are spending in the country they adopted.

A fairer comparison would be economic migrant to economic migrant.

On the ex-pat / immigration point that is just language

i.e. an English ex-pat in Spain is an immigrant to the Spanish and an expatriate to us.

a Spanish ex-pat in England is an immigrant to the English and an expatriate to them. It's all about which person is referring to migrant.

It's only in recent years has the word immigrant had negative connotations, largely down to tabloids

Too many lefties and/or PC brigade members and/or immigrants in this country. I fear for the future

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