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Introducing the Participants

Stephen, 64, Essex

Occupation: Former insurance professional

Voting record: Typically Conservative, except when he resided in a left-leaning London borough and voted for the Social Democratic Party

Interesting fact: His specialty in underwriting was kidnap and ransom: People often claim that insurance is dull, but it’s far from it when you’re discussing evacuating people from the Korean peninsula because the North Koreans have opened the missile silos”

Evie, twenty-five, London

Occupation: Psychology graduate

Voting record: In her home country, New Zealand, she supported both progressive parties

Amuse bouche: Eva has worked as a singer on cruise ships; her most extended voyage was half a year, which is a long time to be at sea

For starters

She: Steve appeared there to have a nice time, to be open

Steve: She came across as a very bright, articulate, pleasant person

She: I had a tomato and mozzarella dish, mushroom pasta, and a rich sweet treat, it was very good

The big beef

Eva: He was certainly on the side of immigration being curtailed. He believes that British people who already live here, not just Caucasian Britons, don’t have as much access to the essential services, because increasing numbers are arriving. However I just disagree that the numbers are that bad

He: I’m for skilled immigration, I have no desire to reside in a white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant country with tepid ale. But I believe that governments have exploited immigration to fill the jobs they struggle to staff without increasing salaries. Wages are kept low, so taxes have to be minimized, so we are unable to improve services – spend more money on child support, on schooling, on innovation

She: I don’t have that much knowledge of Brexit, because I was 16 and not living here when it occurred. He explained it to me in a new light. He informed me about “posted workers” – people could come here and receive solely the salary of the their nation of origin

He: The French president spent 24 months getting the EU to do away with the scheme; it was revised in two thousand eighteen. Before that, posted workers coming in were undercutting British workers. Under the former PM, it was oil workers that were imported; later it’s been hospitality, farms. She understood that, because she’d worked on a cruise ship and said she was earning significantly higher than international colleagues

Common ground

He: It would be ideal to have a different energy source, transition from fossil fuels. I disapprove of environmental harm, I value fresh atmosphere, I love the countryside. We agreed on a lot of that. But I said, “What do you think of Norway?” Their energy revenues skyrocketed after the conflict began, they allocated those funds to develop eco-friendly systems

Eva: So we’re dependent on their petroleum. You can see that’s an unfavorable approach to proceed. He was in favour of continuing our own oil exploration for the small amount we’ll require in the future. I partially concur with him. We’re still going to use planes. We both think we should be moving towards greener solutions, turbine fields and hydro

Dessert topics

She: We briefly discussed anti-Muslim sentiment, though we avoided labeling it. He seemed concerned about extremism coming here – he did mention that a lot of the people in the Arab world were radical, which I felt was not fair. I think it’s discriminatory to make judgments based on religion

He: I come from the eastern part of London. I asked her if she’d been to that district, and she said it had been modernized. Naturally, I would say that: populated by professionals. But when I go down that local market, I appear out of place. People stare at me because it’s become predominantly Islamic. She gave a slight glance at me about that. I used the word segregated area. Eva’s got Polish-Jewish ancestry – she objects to the term, to her it denotes deprivation. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes theirs.” I consented to substitute a different word – maybe community?

Eva: I believe that Muslim people are really overrepresented in the news outlets as doing things wrong. It appears a somewhat discriminatory, or prejudiced against foreigners

Conclusion

He: I think we parted on good terms. We had a hug at the station

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