00:00A snapshot of Britain in the 80s, beachgoers in the seaside town of Bournemouth, a place
00:06which has always been a magnet for holidaymakers and seasonal workers.
00:12Fast forward to the final days of this summer and the change is undeniable.
00:17In the Bournemouth area between the 2011 and 2021 censuses, the non-British-born population
00:24went up by 47% and immigration everywhere has risen significantly since then.
00:31On the seafront, we find immigration is something white British people want to talk about, but
00:36not openly and not on camera.
00:40The whole atmosphere of the place has changed and it's strange to hear foreign languages
00:45spoken so frequently in our country.
00:48Does that make you feel uncomfortable?
00:50It does.
00:51Is it the number of migrants that's coming?
00:53What is it that...
00:54Reportedly so.
00:56And visually, that seems to be the case.
00:59I mean, we all look at, we see what we see.
01:02What do you see?
01:03I don't see many, I suppose, white British people around.
01:08Why does that trouble you?
01:12Sorry, I actually can't answer that question.
01:15The woman we're talking to asks for a minute to gather her thoughts.
01:18It's a question at the heart of Britain's tortured relationship with migration and for
01:23some can be uncomfortable to consider.
01:25It's like a sensitive, emotional...
01:28I remember how it was.
01:30I remember the community.
01:31I'm worrying that our society as Brits is being undermined by the people who are coming in.
01:37For decades, Britain has wrestled with the thorny issue of migration, who should be allowed into
01:44the country and from where.
01:45Migration to the UK has changed since Brexit, but not in the way people who voted to leave
01:53Europe might have expected.
01:55Nine years ago, I visited Bournemouth to talk to people about migration ahead of the referendum.
02:02We've come back to the Cumberland Hotel.
02:05The EU flag no longer flies.
02:08It's a hotel where, a decade ago, the majority of the workforce were non-British EU citizens,
02:14many from Eastern Europe.
02:17Sean Nell is the general manager and has worked at the hotel since before Brexit.
02:22A lot of our workforce were EU nationals, and obviously Brexit, a lot of them have left.
02:29They find out the work other than the hospitality.
02:32A lot of our workforce we see now that we can recruit from is probably South Asia.
02:38The staff gathered together for their own breakfast after the morning service tells the
02:42story of where most of the new recruits now are coming from.
02:48Twenty-eight-year-old Shardul Thomas is from Delhi and works part-time at the Cumberland
02:53behind the bar.
02:54He did a master's in sports management and, like many others, came to the UK on a student
03:00visa.
03:01He says post-Brexit trade agreements with India opened up new opportunities for South Asians.
03:07After Brexit, the Europeans were less, so we were able to get good jobs.
03:14It's good about, like, people coming for good life, getting good life, upgrading their
03:21life.
03:22When I first came to the Cumberland Hotel, Margaret Kubik from Poland was the assistant restaurant
03:28manager.
03:29Can we enjoy breakfast, ladies?
03:30Nine years later, we tracked her down.
03:33So the first roundabout, we do nice and easy, left first exit.
03:37We discovered she's left the hospitality industry to work as a self-employed driving instructor.
03:44When we meet nine years ago, we, as the Polish people, we were very much accused of taking
03:50the jobs from English people, yes.
03:53And then now we are replaced by the South Asian people.
03:56Now they start at the bottom.
03:59In Bournemouth, just like many other towns in the UK, protests have sprung up outside
04:04hotels housing asylum seekers.
04:07The hotels have almost become a focal point for wider concerns about migration.
04:13We find the subject isn't as difficult to discuss amongst a crowd of like-minded people.
04:18We don't know who they are.
04:21We don't know who these people are.
04:23Who are they?
04:24It makes you feel it's not England anymore.
04:29Refugees are welcome here!
04:31The asylum hotel protests are generally countered by groups who are more sympathetic towards
04:36migrants.
04:37Do you feel the fabric of your town, if you were born here, has changed significantly because
04:42of migration?
04:43No, because there's always been a place where foreign language students visit.
04:49I think this lot down the road, they need somebody to hate.
04:54Now it's the Muslims.
04:55Now it's the refugees.
04:56Ten years ago it was the Poles, the Eastern Europeans.
05:00With more councils vowing to launch legal challenges over the government's use of asylum hotels, the
05:05immigration protest movement shows no sign of abating.
05:10And Bournemouth, like so many other places, continues to wrestle with its identity.
05:16Lisa Holland, Sky News, Bournemouth.
