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Meeting the Participants

Steve, sixty-four, Canvey Island

Occupation: Former underwriter

Voting record: Typically Tory, apart from when he resided in “the socialist republic of south Hackney” and supported the Social Democratic Party

Interesting fact: His specialty in underwriting was kidnap and ransom: People often claim that insurance is boring, but it’s far from it when you’re planning rescuing people from the Korean peninsula because the North Koreans have opened the weapon systems”

Evie, 25, the capital

Profession: Graduate in psychology

Political history: In her native land, New Zealand, she supported both progressive parties

Interesting fact: Eva has been employed as a singer on cruise ships; her longest trip was six months, which is a long time to be at sea

Initial impressions

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

Steve: She came across as a very bright, well-spoken, pleasant person

She: I had a tomato and mozzarella dish, pasta with fungi, and a rich sweet treat, it was very good

Key disagreement

She: He was definitely on the side of immigration being reduced. He believes that British people who are native to the area, not just Caucasian Britons, don’t have as much access to the essential services, because more and more people are arriving. Whereas I just disagree that the numbers are that bad

Steve: I’m for qualified migrants, I don’t want to live in a white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant country with tepid ale. But I believe that governments have exploited immigration to occupy positions they struggle to staff without raising wages. Wages are suppressed, so taxes have to be minimized, so we are unable to improve services – spend more money on child support, on education, on technology

Eva: I am not deeply informed of Brexit, because I was sixteen and abroad when it occurred. He clarified it to me in a new light. He told me about “posted workers” – candidates could come here and receive solely the wage of the country they came from

Steve: The French president spent two years getting the EU to do away with the system; it was reformed in two thousand eighteen. Before that, posted workers coming in were undercutting local employees. Under Gordon Brown, it was oil workers that were brought in; since then it’s been hospitality, farms. She understood that, because she’d worked on a cruise ship and said she was earning significantly higher than workers from other countries

Sharing plate

He: It would be ideal to have a alternative power, come off of oil. 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 the Scandinavian nation?” Their energy revenues soared after Ukraine started, they used that money to develop green infrastructure

She: So we’re using their oil. You can see that’s an unfavorable approach to proceed. He was supportive of continuing our own oil exploration for the small amount we’ll require in the coming years. I partially concur with him. We’re still going to use planes. We both think we should be advancing to greener solutions, windfarms and water power

Dessert topics

Eva: We briefly discussed anti-Muslim sentiment, though we avoided labeling it. He seemed concerned about radical ideologies entering – he did mention that a lot of the people in Middle Eastern countries were extremist, which I didn’t think fair. I think it’s prejudiced to make judgments based on faith

He: I come from the eastern part of London. I asked her if she’d been to that district, and she said it had been modernized. Obviously, I would say that: populated by professionals. But when I go down Chrisp Street market, I look like a foreigner. People gaze at me because it’s become predominantly Islamic. She had a little look at me about that. I used the word segregated area. Eva’s got Polish-Jewish ancestry – she objects to the term, to her it implies deprivation. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes their own.” I consented to substitute a alternative term – maybe community?

She: I feel like followers of Islam are really overrepresented in the news outlets as doing things wrong. It seems a somewhat racist, or xenophobic

Conclusion

He: I think we separated amicably. We had a embrace at the station

Eva: We both said that we’d had a wonderful evening