A SMALL, dark-eyed man blows on his hands and contemplates another long night. He is Romanian—let us call him Andrei—and he works in New Covent Garden Market on the south bank of the Thames, hauling sacks of vegetables destined for the capital’s restaurants. Andrei earns £55 ($87) for an 11 or 12 hour shift—a criminally low wage. But he is, of course, illegal: Romanians, with Bulgarians the newest members of the European Union, will not get free access to its labour market until the end of the year. So, most likely, are his Iraqi and Pakistani co-workers—fellow low-paid bottom-feeders of the British economy.

Andrei is willing to talk. There is an understanding, almost trust, between those who meet by night in the market; and, at the age of 29, he is battle-hardened. Since leaving Romania nine years ago, Andrei has schlepped and skivvied in Italy, Spain, France, Belgium and the Netherlands. He came to London last year, joining some 94,000 Romanians working or studying in the country legally and thousands more who are thought to be working illegally. This makes him as qualified as anyone to answer what is, suddenly, a big question in British politics: how many Romanians and Bulgarians will come to Britain next year?

Not many, the Conservative-led coalition government hopes. Curbing the “uncontrolled mass immigration” allowed by its Labour predecessor (in the words of Theresa May, the Tory home secretary) was one of the government’s big promises. On coming to power in 2010 it vowed to bring annual net immigration—then running at a record high of 255,000—below 100,000 by 2015. It has tightened visa controls across the board, making it harder to study, work and join relatives in Britain. Net immigration has fallen by a quarter. But delivering the promised cap looks hard; if many Romanians and Bulgarians come it will be impossible. Though it is not certain that they will—Romanians have less cultural affinity with Britain than Poles, over a quarter of a million of whom settled in Britain between 2004 and 2006, after their country joined the EU—the government is worried.

It is right to be. Though rarely racist, Britons are exceptionally hostile to immigration—more so than Germans, French or the Dutch. According to recent polling by YouGov, 80% backed the government’s cap and 69% want zero net immigration. A combination of recession and a decade of high immigration rates have exacerbated this antipathy, which is common to all colours and classes. In recent weeks Bagehot has heard anti-immigrant griping from a senior officer of the guards and a Pakistani newspaper seller. Yet the hostility is also long-standing. When in 1968 Enoch Powell, a Tory MP of eccentric brilliance, accurately predicted that immigration was on course to turn 10% of the population non-white by the end of the century and, further, warned that this could cause social unrest, he was sacked from the shadow cabinet and vilified by the polite press. Still, 74% of Britons told pollsters they agreed with him; only 15% disagreed.

This constitutes a state of national unhappiness and the government is right to tackle it. A justified sense that politicians ignore concerns about immigration—because they are too liberal, too complacent or too captured by the pro-immigration business lobby—has long magnified these worries. The Tories also came to government with a rare opportunity to win support on the issue. Labour, which famously expected no more than 13,000 Poles a year, was discredited. And in a slowing economy, the high rates of economic migration it had overseen were anyway bound to subside. Yet the Tories are blowing their chance.

British hostility to immigration has roots in real concerns—including over its possible effects on social cohesion and an asylum system that was, formerly at least, incompetent and rotten with fraud. The magnitude of these problems is often exaggerated, however, and the cultural and economic benefits of immigration downplayed—evidence, perhaps, that the antipathy owes more to irrational anxieties, over globalisation, cultural change and Britain’s shrinking prestige, than to more concrete worries. Labour’s big error was to accentuate the positives of immigration and downplay the negatives. The Tories, while admirably attacking abuses in the system, have done the opposite. Thus, last December, Ms May made a thunderous speech on immigration that included alarming claims about the extent to which it suppresses wages. If this is really a problem, which is contested by economists, the effect is probably more modest than she suggested.

Enoch was partly right

The government’s net migration cap has done worse damage. It has led to a clampdown on the visa-seekers most easily deterred—notably foreign students—who are also the migrants Britain needs most. The cap has also created an expectation that the government will struggle to satisfy. Indeed, public disillusionment has already set in. According to YouGov, 77% of people think the government will miss its target; only 15% think it will succeed. United as they are against immigration, Britons are equally sceptical of politicians vowing to get tough on it.

No wonder the prospect of a Bulgarian-Romanian influx is causing such concern. Some right-wing Tories say the government should simply deny work permits to such arrivals, in defiance of EU rules. The coalition is, less drastically, looking to discourage them from coming by making it harder for new settlers to claim benefits and use some public services. It has even considered launching an advertising campaign in Romania and Bulgaria to spread the word that drizzly austerity Britain is not all beer and skittles.

Good luck with that. Andrei’s nightly pay is around 25% below Britain’s legal minimum wage, but still over five times the Romanian equivalent. Asked whether he thinks many more Romanians will follow him to Britain, he shrugs. “Romania is no good,” he says. “Wherever there are jobs, Romanians will go.”

Economist.com/blogs/bagehot