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Meeting the Individuals

Stephen, 64, Canvey Island

Profession: Former underwriter

Political history: Usually Tory, apart from when he lived in “the socialist republic of south Hackney” and supported the Social Democratic Party

Interesting fact: His specialty in insurance was kidnap and ransom: People often claim that insurance is dull, but it’s not when you’re planning evacuating people from the Korean peninsula because the DPRK have opened the missile silos”

Eva, 25, the capital

Occupation: Psychology graduate

Political history: In her home country, New Zealand, she voted a combination of Labour and Green

Amuse bouche: Eva has been employed as a singer on cruise ships; her most extended voyage was six months, which is a long time to be at sea

Initial impressions

She: Steve appeared there to have a nice time, to be open

Steve: She seemed like a very intelligent, well-spoken, pleasant person

She: I had a caprese salad, pasta with fungi, and a creamy dessert thing, it was delicious

The big beef

She: He was definitely on the side of immigration being curtailed. He believes that UK residents who are native to the area, including non-white Caucasian Britons, face limited access to the things that they need, because increasing numbers are entering. However I just don’t think the figures are so problematic

He: I’m for qualified migrants, I have no desire to reside in a homogeneous, WASP country with tepid ale. But I believe that authorities have used immigration to occupy positions they struggle to staff without raising wages. Pay are kept low, so taxes have to be kept low, so we are unable to improve services – spend more money on child support, on schooling, on technology

She: I don’t have that much knowledge of Brexit, because I was sixteen and not living here when it happened. He clarified it to me in a new light. He informed me about EU labor migrants – candidates could come here and receive solely the wage of the their nation of origin

He: The French president spent two years getting the EU to do away with the scheme; it was reformed in two thousand eighteen. Previously, migrant laborers coming in were undercutting local employees. Under the former PM, it was oil workers that were imported; since then it’s been hospitality, agriculture. She grasped 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 alternative power, come off of oil. I disapprove of environmental harm, I value fresh atmosphere, I appreciate rural areas. We found consensus on a lot of that. But I said, “What do you think of Norway?” Their energy revenues soared after the conflict began, they allocated those funds to build green infrastructure

Eva: So we’re dependent on their petroleum. You can see that’s an unfavorable approach to go about things. He was in favour of maintaining domestic drilling for the limited quantity we’ll need in the coming years. I kind of agree with him. We’re still going to rely on air travel. We both think we should be advancing to greener solutions, turbine fields and hydro

Dessert topics

She: We briefly discussed Islamophobia, though we avoided labeling it. He seemed concerned about radical ideologies entering – he did note that a lot of the people in Middle Eastern countries were extremist, which I felt was not accurate. I think it’s discriminatory to form opinions based on religion

Steve: I hail from the eastern part of London. I asked her if she’d been to Whitechapel, and she said it had been gentrified. Obviously, I would say that: full of yuppies. But when I go down that local market, I look like a foreigner. 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 Eastern European roots – she objects to the term, to her it implies poverty. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes their own.” I consented to substitute a different word – maybe enclave?

Eva: I believe that Muslim people are really overrepresented in the news outlets as doing things wrong. It appears a little bit racist, 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 wonderful evening