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Meeting the Individuals

Stephen, 64, Canvey Island

Profession: Retired insurance professional

Voting record: Usually Tory, apart from when he lived in a left-leaning London borough and voted for the Social Democratic Party

Amuse bouche: His specialty in underwriting was hostage situations: “Everyone always says that insurance is dull, but it’s far from it when you’re discussing rescuing people from the Korean peninsula because the North Koreans have opened the weapon systems”

Eva, 25, the capital

Profession: Graduate in psychology

Political history: In her home country, New Zealand, she supported both progressive parties

Amuse bouche: Eva has been employed as a singer on ocean liners; her longest trip was six months, which is a significant duration to be at sea

For starters

Eva: Steve seemed focused on enjoying the meal, to be open

Steve: She seemed like a very bright, articulate, 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 white British, face limited access to the things that they need, because increasing numbers are arriving. However I just disagree that the figures are that bad

He: I’m for qualified migrants, I have no desire to reside in a white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant country with warm beer. But I maintain that governments have used immigration to occupy positions they can’t get people to do without increasing salaries. Wages are suppressed, so taxes have to be minimized, so we are unable to improve services – allocate additional funds on child support, on schooling, on innovation

She: I am not deeply informed of Brexit, because I was 16 and abroad when it occurred. He clarified it to me in a different perspective. He told me about “posted workers” – candidates could arrive in the UK and receive solely the wage of the their nation of origin

He: The French president spent 24 months getting the EU to abolish the scheme; it was revised in 2018. Previously, migrant laborers coming in were undermining local employees. Under the former PM, it was petroleum staff that were brought in; since then it’s been service industry, agriculture. She understood 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 great to have a alternative power, transition from fossil fuels. I disapprove of environmental harm, I love the clean air, I appreciate rural areas. We found consensus on a lot of that. But I said, “What do you think of Norway?” Their energy revenues soared after the conflict began, they used that money to build green infrastructure

She: So we’re dependent on their petroleum. You can see that’s an unfavorable approach to go about things. He was in favour of continuing our own oil exploration for the limited quantity we’ll require in the future. I kind of agree with him. We’re still going to use planes. We both think we should be moving towards greener solutions, turbine fields and hydro

For afters

Eva: We touched on Islamophobia, though we avoided labeling it. He seemed concerned about radical ideologies entering – he did mention that a many individuals in Middle Eastern countries were radical, which I didn’t think fair. I think it’s discriminatory to form opinions based on religion

Steve: I come from the eastern part of London. 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 that local market, I appear out of place. People stare at me because it’s become predominantly Islamic. She gave a slight glance at me about that. I used the word “ghetto”. Eva’s got Polish-Jewish ancestry – she objects to the term, to her it implies poverty. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes theirs.” I agreed to use a alternative term – maybe enclave?

Eva: I feel like Muslim people are really overrepresented in the media as engaging in misconduct. It seems a somewhat discriminatory, or prejudiced against foreigners

Conclusion

He: I think we parted on good terms. We had a embrace at the station

She: We both said that we’d had a lovely time