Accession

If I was a Bulgarian or a Romanian right now I'd be a little pissed that...

• Cyprus
• Czech Republic
• Estonia
• Hungary
• Latvia
• Lithuania
• Malta
• Poland
• Slovakia
• Slovenia

...Were allowed to join with no major blocks, but that now that it's time for their ascension their European integration is being 'carefully managed', read with lots more controls than last time round. I'd also be quite annoyed that every time Bulgaria is shown on the news they go to some small rural village and film the horses and carts rumbling past, rather than more picturesque, increasingly cosmopolitain capital.

Granted the UK Home Office underestimated the Eastern European 'influx' last time round (some 100k vs. an actual 500k); the ignorant rent-a-quotes on the street keeps pressing that they're essentially "coming over here and stealing our jobs". Bollocks. Statistically migrant workers are coming over here and doing the jobs that we don't want to do. They live here, they pay tax. Ask your average work-shy layabout (come-on - every community has them), if they'd fancy doing relatively manual low-paid work such as vegetable packing and sorting and I think you know what the answer would be.

I, for one, have absolutely no problem with people coming over here to do work. If they're more competitive in the job market, so bit it.

Wake up; it's a globalised world whether you like it or not.