You may have seen that the village of Piddington, in Oxfordshire, took a symbolic vote to cede from the UK. The vote was prompted by government plans to house 1000 asylum seekers at a converted Ministry of Defence site in the town of Bicester. Here, in no particular order, are some thoughts about that.

First, it is worth noting that Piddington has a Liberal Democrat MP. Whilst that doesn’t tell you everything, it does tell you something. Specifically, it tells you that these folks are quite happy with high migration levels (the Lib Dems are not exactly against it) when all the migration they benefit from does not affect them. Now that asylum seekers being housed in their area have been proposed, they are up in arms.

Second, it is deeply frustrating that when places like Oldham or Rochdale raise any concerns about mass immigration, the best they can hope for is that nobody cares. More likely, they will be barracked with hollers of racism. But when white middle-class villages in Oxfordshire suddenly face the prospect of living with the problems that come from immigration rather than farming those issues out elsewhere so they can enjoy the benefits migration brings without any of the mess, suddenly the whole country must sit up and take notice. It is entitlement on another scale and it is particularly irritating.

Third, the symbolic vote to cede from the UK is utterly stupid for a host of reasons. The only reason it garnered so much support is because everybody voting knew there was no realistic possibility of it actually happening. Which doesn’t actually tell you very much at all. It also doesn’t take a genius to see that it would be entirely unworkable if it was enacted. I would personally welcome the government accepting the result and turning off all national infrastructure to the village until they can work out a suitable remuneration. If they are not willing to receive asylum seekers near them but are happy to let others foot the bill, we should perhaps take the same position on all national infrastructure that they currently enjoy.

Fourth, this is symptomatic of a wider issue. What is being proposed is entirely fair. Some places, like Rochdale and Oldham, take a disproportionate number of asylum seekers. Other places have precisely none. What the government is proposing is a fairer dispersal system. Yet, people who have taken no asylum seekers ever before are suddenly up in arms that they might have to house any. Nobody is suggested all, or most, or even a vast number. But this happens a lot. People who have benefited from the status quo without anything asked of them are often very vocal when those carrying a much larger burden ask then to give up a small amount of that benefit. This is just the latest example of that.

Fifth, unless your position is that we should accept no asylum seekers, they must be housed somewhere. The cycle of HMOs being deemed to block up housing for indigenous people, hotels that are deemed extortionate and former public buildings being either too expensive to make habitable or being too near to places that have the ability to kick off continues on. Nobody wants asylum seekers near them, but if you accept any at all, you have to house them somewhere. Few are prepared to offer any constructive answers; most are just into nimbyism.

Sixth, addressing these issues defies simple answers. Some insist all are bogus, or mainly bogus, so we shouldn’t accept any at all. The problem here is that we do not know who is or isn’t bogus until we have heard their case and we cannot hear their case until they are here. Others suggest we should just welcome everyone come what may. But, again, we don’t know who is a genuine asylum seekers and who is just queue jumping economic migrant routes until we have heard a case, which involves them first being here. Some want us to setup routes whereby applications can be taken from home countries, which sounds excellent until that involves regimes that people are fleeing and who must be involved in such a system. We cannot expect people to sit tight while we process an application if imprisonment, torture or death await, and the ability to do so would suggest they are not in much need. Others say things like ‘just send them back to France [or, insert some other random country]’. But unless those countries want them (which they typically don’t) and unless we are global dictators able to enforce our will on the world (which we are not and shouldn’t be), ‘just send them to…’ doesn’t actually work and is nothing more than a worldwide version of the Piddington nimbyism currently on display. All of which is to say, anybody peddling simple and easy answers either do not understand the issues at play or are lying.

Seventh, it is painfully clear that some people are unwilling to name the specific issue they are concerned about. It is not racist to recognise that largely numbers of people from a foreign culture landing at the same time will bring issues to a local area nor to name what some of those issues are. It is racist, however, to simply be irrationally scared and prejudiced because people with different colour skin or speaking another language are near us. Few ever name what their problem actually is, which leads me to believe they know the reason is not kosher. Some who name an issue often cite being intimidated and scared by large numbers of foreign men. But other than their foreigness, it isn’t clear what they are intimidated by and if that is the only matter of intimidation, it is difficult to reckon that to be anything other than prejudice and racism.