We were given a taste this week of what lies ahead as the United Kingdom careers towards a future outside the European Union. In Theresa May’s speech on the government’s Brexit plan, she stated: “In the last decade or so, we have seen record levels of net migration in Britain, and that sheer volume has put pressure on public services, like schools, stretched our infrastructure, especially housing.” This would be of great concern if it were true.

The NHS, already overstretched and at crisis point, would have collapsed long ago without migrants making up a sizeable chunk of the workforce: we are simply not training enough doctors and nurses in the UK, and failing to keep those we do train, thanks to Jeremy Hunt’s best efforts.

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In housing, May opts for dog-whistle racism that plays on a simplistic, but flawed, belief: if net migration has increased, this has surely caused the housing crisis, filling properties and increasing demand? Alas, for tabloid xenophobes, life is more complicated: the housing crisis is about far more than simple supply and demand, but about a shift in tenure with the collapse of social housing and ownership levels, and rise in private renting; a problem of economic geographies in the UK, where many areas have a surplus of homes and others a deficit; and low pay, because the cost of living has ballooned while wages have stagnated.

Academic research shows that in many areas, migration has lowered prices, and that migrants and settled local populations don’t “compete” for housing, but choose very different tenures and household arrangements. This is before you even get to the question of who, precisely, is building homes across the country. Post-recession, many building firms closed, so when the country needed to build again – surprise, surprise – the skillsets weren’t abundant and migrants stepped in to fill the gap and actually lay the foundations.

But that matters little. For now, May and the Conservatives need a scapegoat. Brexit will be an economic disaster for the UK, and with the Stormont assembly elections looming, it is likely to be a social disaster, too. The culprits are within the Conservative party, and May has been tasked with forcing through the deal after her predecessor foolishly risked everything on a high-stakes referendum and lost. To survive politically, truth is thrown to the wind, and the only route to secure May’s survival and that of the Conservative party is by stoking up xenophobic sentiment and scapegoating migrants.

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This belief that truth is expendable and politically inconvenient shows contempt for the public, but the attitude that it reflects will become commonplace: at no point in the process will politicians admit they were wrong. This week no prominent Leave campaigners would comment on the fact that their claims Britain could stay in the single market were patent lies told to secure votes. Instead, all of society’s ills, many of which can be traced directly to government policies and cuts, will be blamed on the poor, the vulnerable, migrants and the unemployed.

May’s lies on housing and immigration are abhorrent, and designed to fan the flames of racism in the UK – but they are just a taste of things to come. Like a child stood next to a broken vase, insisting against all evidence that a dog appeared and broke it, May and the Brexiters will refuse to accept – or offer the public – facts, and will continue scapegoating migrants while trashing our economic future.

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