POWER, POLITICS AND POLICY Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

POWER, POLITICS AND POLICY - Essay Example By 1980s, the immigration policy of the United Kingdom had two spikes where there very serious controls to the entry as well as strict protection of the rights of minority groups. The two prongs had contradicting effects on the position of the immigrant communities as well as their children born in Britain. As a result, the decline in manufacturing caused difficulty in obtaining work permits for both unskilled and semi-skilled workers but easier for high skilled professional workers (Bauer, Lofstrom & Zimmermann 2001: Jones 1973). This means that the largest percentage of the immigrants was coming from America, who invaded the industries and the banking sector. Australia, New Zealand and South African citizens were entering the country by taking the advantage of family ties. People from the South Asian region such as India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were entering the country as medical practitioners (Spencer 2002). The riots that took place in the year 1981 mostly occurred on racial lines. In the city of Brixton, which was the spiritual home of the afro-Caribbean community living in Britain, the rioting youth were claiming that the police were targeting black people believing that they were going to stop crime in the streets. There were also similar riots in the cities of Midlands and Liverpool (Steiner, Alston & Goodman 1996). In 1987, the appearance of British politics changed after the election of four politicians who were not white. This was the first time for this to happen during the same general election. Campaigners suggest that for equal representation of all people means that the number on non-white members in the House of Commons should at least be fifty-five. New legislation against discrimination in the year 2000 came in response made about the manner the police handled the 1993 murder of Stephen Lawrence who was a black teenager. After the collapse of