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Wisbech is a strange little town, to be sure. Always on the back foot, struggling for political and educational scraps, with one of the highest deprivation levels in the country. In local elections the voter turnout is pathetic. The local Conservative Party have a very effective campaign strategy which pretty much cements their candidates into place, despite frequent – albeit petty – scandals involving abuse of social media, nepotism and accusations of incompetence. The Labour Party is as close to non-existent as makes no difference, despite widespread poverty of opportunity, prosperity and aspiration in the town..


Pro EU activists know that Wisbech is one of the strongholds of Brexit and are well rehearsed in their “can’t hear you…” chorus when faced with widespread and genuine discontent about what Freedom of Movement has meant for the town. The huge influx of people from Eastern Europe has, of course, been manna from heaven to some. At the legal end of the spectrum there has been an unending supply of adults – many who are ridiculously over-educated for the task – who will bag potatoes, grade carrots, clip roses and harvest cauliflowers. Over on the dark side are the people who own modest properties which they rent out to house double-figure occupants: employment agencies who trade on the desperation of migrants from broken economies.


But surely, immigration and diversity bring new life, vibrance and a fresh dawn to tired and stale communities? Well, yes, or so we are told. For every decent working family from Poland, Bulgaria or the Baltic States, there is a broken and desperate man – and it usually is a man – who is rarely in work, probably has had his passport confiscated by some gangster and, because he shares a bedroom with four other people, spends the daylight hours drinking cheap lager and debasing himself in some public place in Wisbech’s town centre.


All gloom and doom? Not a bit of it! Wisbech’s demise has provided a rainbow of opportunities for some. There are always predators who feast on a corpse. The vultures circle, and smaller slimy slithering things burrow into dead flesh. Away from the metaphor for a moment, I am talking about those who have made a tidy living offering various shades of redemption to Wisbech people. With local politicians nicely embedded within the deception, we have consultants and advisors assuring the gullible that there will soon be a railway link between Wisbech and March; a new secondary school is only two strokes of the pen away from fruition; our virtually derelict High Street is about to be rejuvinated with (wait for it) the construction of a viewing platform that will enable thousands of tourists to have a birds’- eye view of …. the rest of the derelict town.


 I am glad that Wisbech provides a decent living for some people, even though they may be small in number. Fraudulent politicians, dodgy landlords, rapacious gangmasters, peddlers of illegal smokes and knock-off booze. Thank you for your hard work. Bless you for your faith in our little town. God send you a fair wind and a favourable tide for your next endeavour.


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