Yorkshire Conservative councillor blames environmental damage on immigration

Coun Mark Crane, a Conservative who represents Brayton & Barlow and who is also the former leader of Selby District Council, made the comments during a debate in Northallerton today about how the council can improve water quality across the county.

At the meeting, Coun Crane, suggested the problem is partly caused by the environment and infrastructure being unable to cope with the number of people now living in the country from overseas.

Coun Crane said: “We don’t ever talk about this when we’re talking about the environment, the reason we’ve got so many problems is the number of people [in the UK] in my lifetime has tripled. Until somebody starts to deal with that issue, I’m talking both about number of children we have and number of people we allow into the country, we’ll never sort out the environment.

“We cannot continue to increase the number of people living in this country and the world and have the environment that we’ve got.”

According to the Office for National Statistics, (ONS) the number of babies born in England and Wales has been steadily decreasing for the past decade. In 2022, it dropped to its lowest level in two decades.

The ONS says net migration, which is the additional number of people entering the country, was 606,000 people in 2022. It put the high number down to refugees entering from Ukraine and Hong Kong.

At the meeting this morning, councillors including Coun Crane backed a motion from Arnold Warneken, Green Party councillor for Ouseburn, which put forward several things he said North Yorkshire Council should be doing to tackle poor water quality.

His list included factoring in the potential for pollution when determining planning applications and for a meeting to take place between relevant parties including North Yorkshire Council, Yorkshire Water and the Environment Agency to discuss the problem.

Coun Warneken said: “We all have to get behind something for this authority to take action. We’ve been reactive rather than proactive.”