🔗 Share this article

Introducing the Individuals

Stephen, sixty-four, Canvey Island

Occupation: Former insurance professional

Voting record: Usually Conservative, apart from when he resided in “the socialist republic of south Hackney” and voted for the Social Democratic Party

Interesting fact: His specialty in underwriting was hostage situations: People often claim that insurance is boring, but it’s not when you’re discussing evacuating people from the Korean peninsula because the DPRK have opened the weapon systems”

Eva, twenty-five, the capital

Profession: Graduate in psychology

Voting record: In her native land, Aotearoa, she voted a combination of Labour and Green

Interesting fact: Eva has worked as a singer on cruise ships; her longest trip was six months, which is a significant duration to be on a boat

Initial impressions

Eva: Steve seemed there to have a nice time, to be open

Steve: She seemed like a very bright, articulate, nice person

She: I had a caprese salad, mushroom pasta, and a creamy dessert thing, it was very good

The big beef

Eva: He was certainly on the side of immigration being curtailed. He believes that UK residents who are native to the area, not just white British, don’t have as much access to the essential services, because more and more people are arriving. Whereas I just disagree that the figures are that bad

He: I’m for qualified migrants, I have no desire to reside in a white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant country with warm beer. But I believe that governments have exploited immigration to occupy positions they can’t get people to do without increasing salaries. Wages are suppressed, so taxes have to be minimized, so we can’t do things better – spend more money on childcare, on schooling, on technology

Eva: I am not deeply informed of the EU referendum, because I was 16 and not living here when it occurred. He clarified it to me in a different perspective. He informed me about “posted workers” – people could arrive in the UK and only be paid the salary of the country they came from

He: Macron spent two years getting the EU to do away with the system; it was reformed in 2018. Before that, posted workers coming in were undercutting British workers. Under the former PM, it was petroleum staff that were brought in; later it’s been hospitality, agriculture. She understood that, because she’d worked on a passenger vessel and said she was earning significantly higher than workers from other countries

Common ground

He: It would be ideal to have a alternative power, come off of oil. I don’t like pollution, I love the clean air, I love the countryside. We agreed on a lot of that. But I said, “What do you think of the Scandinavian nation?” Their oil and gas profits skyrocketed after the conflict began, they allocated those funds to build eco-friendly systems

She: So we’re using their oil. You can see that’s not a good way to go about things. He was supportive of maintaining domestic drilling for the small amount we’ll require in the future. I kind of agree with him. We’re still going to rely on air travel. We both think we should be moving towards environmentally friendly options, windfarms and water power

Dessert topics

Eva: We briefly discussed anti-Muslim sentiment, though we avoided labeling it. He seemed concerned about extremism coming here – he did note that a lot of the people in Middle Eastern countries were radical, which I didn’t think accurate. I think it’s discriminatory to form opinions based on religion

He: I come from the East End. I asked her if she’d been to that district, and she said it had been gentrified. Naturally, I would say that: full of yuppies. But when I go down that local market, I appear out of place. People gaze at me because it’s become very Muslim. She gave a slight glance at me about that. I used the word segregated area. Eva’s got Eastern European roots – she doesn’t like that word, to her it implies deprivation. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes theirs.” I consented to substitute a alternative term – maybe enclave?

She: I believe that Muslim people are really disproportionately shown in the news outlets as doing things wrong. It seems a somewhat discriminatory, or prejudiced against foreigners

Conclusion

Steve: I think we parted on good terms. We had a hug at the train stop

She: We both said that we’d had a wonderful evening