In a sane world, billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s recent comments about Britain being “colonised” by immigrants would have triggered an interesting - and perhaps even impassioned - debate.

Sadly, public discourse in Britain today appears to be anything but sane, so they haven’t.

Let’s look first at what Sir Jim said.

In a wide-ranging interview with Sky (in which, amongst other things, he appeared to praise – or at least sympathise with – Keir Starmer), the part-owner of Manchester United said, "You can't have an economy with nine million people on benefits and huge levels of immigrants coming in. I mean, the UK has been colonised. It's costing too much money. The UK has been colonised by immigrants, really, hasn't it? I mean, the population of the UK was 58 million in 2020, now it's 70 million. That's 12 million people."

Now, there are a number of errors (or missteps) in these comments.

First, many more than nine million people are on benefits. Including the state pension, 51% of British households receive some form of state support. Perhaps Sir Jim was referring to people of working age – in which case his figure seems about right.

Second, he clearly misspoke in terms of the UK’s historic population. When he said there were 58 million people in these islands in 2020, he presumably meant 2000. So, population hasn’t accelerated at the pace he claimed but has nevertheless increased by around 20% since the turn of the millennium (in contrast, the total population of the rest of Europe has increased by a mere few percent).

Third, a potential misstep here rather than an error (you be the judge!) he used the word “colonised”. This then becomes the nub of the whole story, rather than discussion of the wider, broader content of what Sir Jim Ratcliffe was saying.

Ed Conway, the seasoned Sky correspondent, who was conducting the interview, instantly recognised the likely mainstream media reaction to the word “colonised” and encouraged Ratcliffe to repeat it. He then went on to seek confirmation as to whether Sir Jim had recently had lunch with Nigel Farage. Not only had he done so, but he was impressed with Farage and enjoyed his company. By now, the crimes against Sir Jim Ratcliffe in the eyes of the metropolitan liberal elite were mounting up enormously.

The Prime Minister, seeing an opportunity to deflect from the drama around his protracted departure from Downing Street, leapt on the issue. Starmer insisted that Sir Jim’s comments were offensive and wrong and that he must apologise.

He didn’t spell out exactly why they were offensive or which aspects were wrong, but that didn’t really matter – the key takeaway was that Ratcliffe must atone for his sins, not to specify what these sins were.

The entire “outrage industry” followed the prime minister’s lead – all professing to be in a state of apoplexy and clinical shock about Sir Jim’s words.

It might well be the case that “colonised” was not the best word to use to describe some of the negative impacts of immigration (although I have yet to see a compelling etymological explanation as to why this is really the case – is the idea that only white people are capable of colonising other territories?).

Also, although Ratcliffe’s remarks were not scripted, he could have benefitted from being a bit less vague in expressing his concerns. I inferred that he was concerned about some areas of the country which have not assimilated in any meaningful way and, one could argue, are problematic for our social fabric. Tower Hamlets in London would be one obvious example – where a corruption inquiry found that money was being disproportionately filtered to the Bangladeshi community and at least one member of the council has even been pursuing a parliamentary career in Bangladesh itself. Are these difficult topics now beyond the realm of public debate? That seems to be the case.

Rachel Reeves emerged from whichever cave she has been inhabiting in recent weeks to declare that “diversity is our greatest strength”. This well-worn cliché sits alongside Sadiq Khan’s ridiculous claim that, “Immigrants built London” as a simple untruth.

You can call out these “noble lies” without disliking diversity. Nor is there any need to suggest that immigrants have made no contribution at all to our capital city in dismissing the London mayor’s idiotic claim.

I personally like a very good number of things that immigrants have brought to our country. But where is the evidence that diversity is our nation’s greatest strength? I also like marmalade – but I wouldn’t claim it is the nation’s greatest food.

The political elite in Britain (including much of the mainstream media) are simply unwilling to discuss the downsides, culturally or economically, of globalisation and mass migration. The wider electorate, however, is not merely attuned to this debate and concerned about where the country is heading but are placing this as a high priority.

The response of the elite is to head straight to the lower echelons of Paul Graham’s hierarchy of argumentation (eschewing logic and counter-argument in favour of simple name-calling and ad hominem attacks).

I suspect this means that the electorate will deliver ever greater shocks to the ruling class at the ballot box in the coming weeks, months and years.

Sir Jim has now issued a sort of half-apology (I wish he hadn’t). Ultimately, the "half-apology" extracted from Sir Jim Ratcliffe solves nothing. It merely reinforces the wall of silence surrounding the genuine anxieties of the British public. By choosing moral condemnation over meaningful engagement, the political class continues to ignore the growing divide between the governed and the governors.

Until we can discuss the impacts of mass migration without the immediate resort to character assassination, the "shocks" at the ballot box will only become more frequent—and more profound.

Keep the flag of freedom flying!