Giving evidence about her review into integration, Dame Louise Casey told MPs yesterday that Eastern European migrants need to start making more of an effort to fit in.
She said that after speaking with members of Eastern European communities, in many cases no one had spoken to them about the British way of life, including the importance of queuing and being “nice”.
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It was interesting to go round the country and hear that nobody had talked to them about our way of life here and when to put out the rubbish; nobody had told them when to queue or be nice. As part of the package, that would be no bad thing
Dame Louise, who was formerly deputy director of Shelter, said it was important for migrants to learn the “rules of the game”.
She said: “It was interesting to go round the country and hear that nobody had talked to them about our way of life here and when to put out the rubbish; nobody had told them when to queue or be nice. As part of the package, that would be no bad thing.”
Dame Louise added: “Integration is like you have a big motorway and you have a sliproad of people coming in from the outside.
“People in the middle of the motorway need to accommodate and be gentle and kind to people coming in from the outsidelane but . . .we’re all heading the same direction.”
Commenting on the rise of religious extremism, Dame Louise said authorities and police were more comfortable taking on far-right extremism than Islamic extremists due to fears of being labelled racist.
Dame Louise said: “Everybody is frightened of being branded a racist - there are some nasty people on the right who clearly aren't - but most normal people are frightened of being branded a racist.
“The very genuine fear in all of this is we have two extremists alive in our communities. We do have the extreme right wing which is milking all of this for its worth.
Dame Louise Casey: We need to educate Muslim men
“We have extreme right wing in our country which we are all utterly appalled by.
“But we also have Islamist extremism at play and I have felt at points it has been easier to talk about one than it is to talk about the other.
“It is a disservice to thousands of people caught up in actually being on the receiving end of not having the start in life they should have in the UK.”