The immigration debate shows no sign of abating with even the Murdoch papers taking up wildly differing positions on the topic.

The Sun gives the Tories plenty of space to call for restrictions on EU immigrants, particularly if Romania and Bulgaria join in 2007, accompanied (at least online) by a picture of an apparently homeless EU migrant from one of the A-8 countries. This is a fine example of how the right-wing media works when discussing topics like immigration. To look at the picture you would think homelessness is an often-encountered problem for migrants who come to the UK. Yet,those who read the Sun from the day before will know that a mere 453 people out of 447,000 have been given homelessness assistance. So the picture is representative of 00.1% of the migrant population from the A-8 countries, or roughly one in every thousand! Predictably, the Sun fails to include this illuminating statistic alongside its emotive picture.

By contrast, the Times’ leader is stirringly positive about the benefits immigration has brought to the UK. It goes on to advocate extending the Workers Registration Scheme to Bulgarian and Romanian immigrants, as it has been such a success.

The Telegraphs’ David Rennie once again hits the nail on the head when discussing the issue on his blog. He points out that once Romania and Bulgaria join the EU, their citizens, like every other EU citizen, will be free to travel to whichever EU country they like.

What Britain can do is limit the amount of migrants that join the Workers Registration Scheme. As Rennie points out, if the government opts to do this it will simply encourage Romanians and Bulgarians to come here, as is there right, but stay to work illegally.

A black market in labour would encourage wages below the minimum wage and exploitation, something which the Workers Registration Scheme has helped immigrants largely avoid, as well as helping British workers avoid unfair competition.