Introducing the Individuals
Stephen, 64, Essex
Occupation: Former insurance professional
Political history: Usually Tory, except when he resided in a left-leaning London borough and voted for the Social Democratic Party
Amuse bouche: His focus in insurance was kidnap and ransom: People often claim that insurance is boring, but it’s not when you’re discussing evacuating people from the Korean peninsula because the North Koreans have opened the weapon systems”
Eva, twenty-five, the capital
Occupation: Graduate in psychology
Voting record: In her home country, Aotearoa, she supported both progressive parties
Interesting fact: Eva has worked as a singer on cruise ships; her longest trip was six months, which is a long time to be on a boat
For starters
Eva: Steve seemed there to have a nice time, to be receptive
He: She came across as a very bright, articulate, nice person
She: I had a caprese salad, mushroom pasta, and a creamy dessert thing, it was very good
The big beef
She: He was definitely on the side of immigration being curtailed. He thinks that British people who already live here, including non-white white British, face limited access to the things that they need, because more and more people are entering. However I just disagree that the numbers are that bad
He: I’m for qualified migrants, I don’t want to live in a homogeneous, WASP country with warm beer. But I believe that governments have used immigration to fill the jobs they can’t get people to do without raising wages. Wages are kept low, so levies have to be minimized, so we can’t do things better – spend more money on childcare, on schooling, on technology
She: I am not deeply informed of the EU referendum, because I was 16 and not living here when it happened. He clarified it to me in a new light. He told me about “posted workers” – people could come here and receive solely the salary of the country they came from
Steve: The French president spent two years getting the EU to do away with the scheme; it was revised in 2018. Previously, migrant laborers coming in were undermining British workers. Under Gordon Brown, it was petroleum staff that were brought in; later it’s been hospitality, agriculture. She understood that, because she’d worked on a passenger vessel and said she was earning significantly higher than workers from other countries
Sharing plate
Steve: It would be great to have a different energy source, transition from fossil fuels. I don’t like pollution, I value fresh atmosphere, I appreciate rural areas. We agreed on a lot of that. But I said, “What do you think of the Scandinavian nation?” Their energy revenues skyrocketed after the conflict began, they used that money to develop eco-friendly systems
She: So we’re using their oil. You can see that’s an unfavorable approach to go about things. He was in favour of continuing our own oil exploration for the limited quantity we’ll require in the future. I kind of agree with him. We’re still going to use planes. We both think we should be moving towards greener solutions, windfarms and hydro
Dessert topics
She: We briefly discussed anti-Muslim sentiment, though we avoided labeling it. He seemed concerned about extremism coming here – he did mention that a many individuals in the Arab world were radical, which I didn’t think fair. I think it’s discriminatory to form opinions based on religion
He: I come from the East End. I asked her if she’d been to that district, and she said it had been modernized. Obviously, I would say that: full of yuppies. But when I go down Chrisp Street market, I appear out of place. People stare at me because it’s become very Muslim. She had a little look at me about that. I used the word segregated area. Eva’s got Polish-Jewish ancestry – she doesn’t like that word, to her it implies poverty. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes their own.” I agreed to use a different word – maybe community?
Eva: I feel like Muslim people are really overrepresented in the media as engaging in misconduct. It appears a somewhat discriminatory, or prejudiced against foreigners
Takeaway
Steve: I think we parted on good terms. We had a embrace at the train stop
Eva: We both said that we’d had a lovely time
