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Meeting the Individuals

Stephen, 64, Essex

Occupation: Former underwriter

Political history: Typically Tory, apart from when he resided in “the socialist republic of south Hackney” and voted for the SDP

Amuse bouche: His specialty in underwriting was hostage situations: “Everyone always says that insurance is dull, but it’s not when you’re discussing evacuating people from the Korean peninsula because the North Koreans have activated the weapon systems”

Eva, 25, the capital

Occupation: Psychology graduate

Political history: In her native land, Aotearoa, she voted a combination of progressive parties

Amuse bouche: Eva has worked as a singer on cruise ships; her longest trip was six months, which is a long time to be on a boat

Initial impressions

Eva: Steve appeared there to have a nice time, to be receptive

He: She came across as a very intelligent, well-spoken, nice person

Eva: I had a tomato and mozzarella dish, mushroom pasta, and a rich sweet treat, it was delicious

The big beef

Eva: He was certainly on the side of immigration being reduced. He believes that British people who are native to the area, not just Caucasian Britons, face limited access to the essential services, because more and more people are entering. Whereas I just don’t think the figures are so problematic

Steve: I’m for qualified migrants, I don’t want to live in a homogeneous, WASP country with warm beer. But I maintain that governments have exploited immigration to occupy positions they can’t get people to do without raising wages. Wages are suppressed, so taxes have to be kept low, so we are unable to improve services – allocate additional funds on childcare, on education, on innovation

She: I am not deeply informed of the EU referendum, because I was 16 and abroad when it occurred. He explained it to me in a new light. He informed me about EU labor migrants – people could come here and only be paid the salary of the country they came from

Steve: The French president spent 24 months getting the EU to abolish the scheme; it was reformed in 2018. Previously, migrant laborers coming in were undermining local employees. Under the former PM, it was oil workers that were imported; later it’s been service industry, farms. She grasped that, because she’d worked on a cruise ship and said she was paid a lot more than international colleagues

Common ground

Steve: It would be ideal to have a alternative power, come off of oil. 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 oil and gas profits soared after Ukraine started, they allocated those funds to develop eco-friendly systems

Eva: So we’re dependent on their petroleum. You can see that’s not a good way to go about things. He was in favour of continuing our own oil exploration for the small amount we’ll need in the coming years. I kind of agree with him. We’re still going to rely on air travel. We both think we should be advancing to greener solutions, turbine fields and water power

For afters

She: We briefly discussed Islamophobia, though we didn’t call it that. He seemed worried by radical ideologies entering – he did mention that a many individuals in the Arab world were radical, which I felt was not accurate. I think it’s discriminatory to make judgments based on faith

He: I hail from the East End. I asked her if she’d been to Whitechapel, and she said it had been modernized. Naturally, I would say that: populated by professionals. But when I go down Chrisp Street market, I look like a foreigner. People gaze at me because it’s become predominantly Islamic. She had a little look at me about that. I used the word “ghetto”. Eva’s got Eastern European roots – she objects to the term, to her it implies deprivation. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes theirs.” I consented to substitute a different word – maybe enclave?

Eva: I feel like Muslim people are really overrepresented in the media as engaging in misconduct. It appears a somewhat racist, or xenophobic

Takeaway

He: I think we separated amicably. We had a embrace at the station

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