How immigration became Britain’s most toxic political issue

Over 20 years, the debate about freedom of movement has become skewed by a hostile narrative. By Rachel ShabiFew chance encounters have had a greater political impact than Gordon Brown’s fateful meeting with Gillian Duffy on an April morning in Rochdale in 2010. When the then prime minister was caught on a hot mic calling the Labour-voting pensioner a “bigoted woman” – after she cornered him with complaints about immigrants “flocking” into Britain – it d