from James D. Young
There have been two debates : on the question of immigration policy at Strathclyde University this month. On November 11th there was a parlianentary=-type debate in the Union, The: Labour Government putting forward a motion defending the open door policy (I disassociated it from the Government in Westminster), This motion was carried by a decent majority, In the debate I laid the blame for housing and other social problems at the door of the Liberal and Tory parties and their system of capitalist ownershipe I also called on the labour soe mem ยง to return to its own best working class traditions, The other debate took place at the University Labour Club on November 5th. This proved to be the best meeting the club has held this session, Mr. Treble, of the Economic History Depirtment, addressed the meeting on the Government's White Paper on Immigration, In a few pungent and pithy sentences Mr, Treble exposed and demolished the facile and fallacious reasoning behind the Government's policy. He began by making a strong moral condemnation of the racial discrimination implicit in the White Paper, He then subjected it to a thorough-going economic analysis, and called upon the Labour Party to take up a principled stand against controlled immisration and racialism before it was too late, He also criticised the Labour Government for getting inveigled in consumer policies by pandering to racial prejudice. Mr. Treble covered many aspects of the problems the fact that the White Paper pandered to the xenophobic propaganda of racialist organisations; the arguments of Sir Cyril Osborne that the immigrants were lazy and sponged on the welfare statez he contrasted Mr, Gaitskell's stand with present policiess he pointed out the contradictions in Government policies on the question of Britain's labour shortage; he demolished the arguments of Mr. Pannell; and summed up by saying "There is still time for a change of opinion, But the Government had to take the lead in moulding public opinion, not following it."