This week’s thought is ‘inspired’ by Nigel Farage and Liam Fox. Inspired in the way that a nasty smell might force you to clean out your drains, but nevertheless you’ll see what I mean.

This weekend, Fox argued in a Sunday Telegraph interview that the Tories should stop focussing on what he called the ‘statistical nonsense’ of their immigration policy. I suspect there’ll be plenty of Tories who won’t want to be reminded that their pledge to reduce net migration to ‘tens of thousands’ is drifting away from them as figures published this week demonstrated. I have consistently argued that setting a crude cap that can be met just as easily by increasing emigration or restricting foreign students or highly skilled people who bring a clear benefit to the country is economically and socially bad and politically dishonest. That doesn’t mean the government shouldn’t be held to account for failing in their own terms, however and I hope they will be.

Fox argued that, instead of playing this crude numbers game, the Tories should focus on the impact of immigration, which he implied was a bad thing. Meanwhile, Farage was once again dipping his toe into the dirty waters of prejudice and borderline racism with his anecdotes about how immigration meant that he heard no ‘English’ voices on his train home to Kent from London. Not sure which trains these are as I frequently catch the train from London towards Kent to go home to South London and (to the extent that anybody ever speaks on London public transport) there’s plenty of English being spoken on the Peckham express!

However both of these interventions into the debate highlight an issue that I believe we should grasp more firmly. There are undoubtedly impacts from migration. Much of the impact is positive – no, Nigel not just in terms of ‘jollification’ and better food, but more profound in terms of our cultural richness, economy, labour force and position in the world. However there are also more difficult changes that come, particularly in the short term, from new people coming into neighbourhoods and different demands being placed on local services. Failing to acknowledge that people are concerned about this and focussing only on the macro benefits makes us look like we’re not listening. I’m glad that in recent speeches Ed Miliband has recognised the need to provide a fair deal in the labour market for all so that people can’t make the argument that immigration is undercutting their pay or prospects. I want us to go further in gathering the evidence about the impact of migration on communities rather than being harangued by the anecdotes of those who want to create fear and anger for electoral ends.

When we were in government, we set up a national Migration Impact Forum to consider the evidence about the impact of migration. This was a start, but as I argued last year, we should now go further and be more granular and specific in this work. I’d like to see migration impact forums at a much more local level. Are there any local authorities who have brought people together to try to get a grip on the real impacts locally – to promote the good and mitigate the problematic? I’d be really keen to hear if there are and to think about how others – and a Labour government in the future – could promote this work. That would be a practical and responsible way to prove we’re listening to the people who really count rather than having to respond to Fox and Farage.

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Jacqui Smith is a former home secretary, writes the Monday Politics column for Progress, and tweets @smithjj62

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Photo: Josh McKible