With endless bad news filling our newspapers and hour upon hour of TV, radio and web-cast, reporting all manner of horror, it is a wonder how we carry on functioning at all.

Whether it be the latest updates on the never-ending oil wars or the constant stream of gloom closer to home, life, it seems, just gets harder.

No sooner than the green shoots of economic recovery are announced, we are told that our European partners, on whom a large percentage of our export business relies, are faltering on the precipice and are likely to fall back into recession. If that is the case, the UK will surely follow suit.

Does that not in itself present us with an on-going dichotomy, in that we and Europe are so interdependent that the thought of a proposed separation is potentially suicidal?

On what terms, I wonder, would the rest of Europe allow the UK to benefit from free trade, without the full commitment and participation on other binding issues such as free movement of labour?

I doubt that our European partners will lose as much sleep as the countless British businesses that currently depend on the European market to survive if the UK were to opt for isolation and leave the EU.

It appears the conditions for the wrong-thinking right wing are near perfect. With centre-ground politics merging into mixed shades of mediocrity and no credible challenge from politicians who purport to represent the vast majority, single-issue charlatans who don’t have the collective interest at heart have seized upon the initiative.

It would appear that the surest way to garner support from a disillusioned, disenfranchised, disinterested electorate is to convince them that all their problems will somehow disappear if, on the one hand, we opt for European isolation and, on the other, we limit the numbers of immigrants to those who are highly qualified. Who, I wonder, will do the countless jobs, which the current UK population appear not to want to do?

I speak as the proud son of Irish economic migrants, who worked and paid their way as soon as they stepped foot on this hallowed soil.

My father refused to apply for any additional support beyond child benefit, even though with ten children he was entitled to claim for free school meals and uniforms.

He was a hard-working proud man and, like the vast majority of migrants, would never have left his homeland had he been able to provide for his family there. Even with three jobs in Ireland, he had to make the desperate decision to move in order to best provide for his children.

In a time when signs in B&Bs would unashamedly read: “No Irish, No Blacks and No Dogs”, it was a desperate decision indeed.

It might help the understanding of those of us who are confused and hoodwinked by those who wish to lead, to see the argument in more simple terms. There are no real borders. There is merely sea and dry land.

Capitalists do not categorise people by their race, religion or sexual preference, they merely see an able and available workforce, who will work for the lowest price.

They do not care for sentimentality or jingoistic patriotism, for jellied eels or Morris Dance, it is all about the bottom line.

If all the immigrants left tomorrow morning, the country would be bankrupt by tea-time.

Immigration is not the root cause of our national problems but greed, exploitation and the erosion of empathy are. Capitalism is failing fast.

The new system must have humility and humanity at its heart. The divide between the haves and the have-nots is growing daily.

The sooner we all wise up and insist on a more humane civility, the sooner hope may be restored.