There are so many contradictions, paradoxes and complications in the way we were taught to think about these issues.

We were told that the British Empire came to be because the 'natives' attacked our peaceful and legally-established trading posts, mines and plantations and we were forced to conquer them. That the Empire brought better quality of life, better education, healthcare, railways and paid work to primitive peoples. That we had educated the local peoples and given them the means to govern themselves in a democratic way when they became independent. That Black and Brown people were part of our Commonwealth and that we had a responsibility to and for them.

They told us that although both Black and white people had been enslaved on the plantations of the Caribbean, chattel slavery had never been practised in the British Isles. We were taught to distinguish between serfdom, villeinage, indentured service and slavery. That Britain had led the world in abolishing slavery and fighting the slave trade. We were told to visit Wilberforce House in the Old Town, to learn about slavery.

We were informed, quite openly and as literal fact, that the French were treacherous, Italians were cowards, the Germans untrustworthy, the Americans unreliable, the Japanese sadistic and the Russians and Chinese stolid peasants. That the Canadians were pretty much like us, so were the Australians except for having no manners because they were all descended from criminals.

The Right were in favour of immigration because it kept wages down. The Left were anti-immigration for the same reason.

Ordinary people were upset by immigration in the 1960s and 70s because the newcomers wouldn't stay in the dock areas and port cities where they 'belonged' and which have been ethnically diverse since pre-Roman times. These new immigrants moved away from the coasts and wanted jobs in shops, offices and factories. They were seen as a threat to jobs and wages. They were also seen as a further threat to a traditional British working class culture that was already buckling under the strain of a new consumer culture.

It's at once the same problem and a host f different ones.