There’s something a little tasteless about Go Back To Where You Came From.
But then the level of immigration to the UK is a live political issue and it’s right that the arguments for and against are explored by the media.
However, Channel 4 has been criticised for the game show-type treatment, given it’s such a divisive issue.
The broadcaster took six people – two in favour of welcoming refugees to the UK and four strongly opposed – and sent them to two of the worst places in the world.
Mathilda has worked in refugee camps and wants to welcome all comers to the UK. The problem, she said, is caused by politicians and the right-wing media stirring things up.
Pro-immigration Bushra is angrier, and dismissive of any concerns about immigration from Muslim countries.
Many British people are “as thick as s**t… (and) ignorant,” she says. She’s also firmly of the camp that anyone who is against immigration is racist.
On the other side of the argument is Dave, who’s no less belligerent.
He thinks it would be a good idea to line the coast with landmines to blow up the boats coming from France and compares illegal immigrants to vermin.
“It’s like rats. Leave food out and they’ll keep coming.”
Nathan, who owns a haulage company and faces large fines if an immigrant is found in the rear of one of his containers, has equally strong views. He thinks Britain is set to become a Muslim country and his children will go to work on “a camel”.
Chloe is of the ‘Britain is full’ view and says her opinions are widely shared because they are “common sense”.
Finally, Jess, “the only gay in the village”, is angry that a hotel at the back of her house has been converted into a refugee welcome centre and she suspects that some are “rapists and paedophiles”.
I imagine you’ve spotted it already, but none of the participants are unsure, open to persuasion, or accept that it’s a complex issue without an easy solution.
But then those kinds of people don’t make for confrontational television.
However, British people in body armour in Mogadishu and Raqqa must have sounded good in the show plans.
Split into two groups, our advocates travel to two post-war zones.
Mogadishu is the lawless capital of the failed state of Somalia, from where we’re told 100,000 refugees have left for the UK.
Nathan, Jess and Mathilda are gobsmacked that some people have to live like this.
They ride around in an armoured car, protected by a heavily armed militia while wearing bulletproof vests.
Their chief of security says they would be kidnapped within five minutes if they walked outside on their own.
Nathan’s main complaint is how dirty the place is and asked a stall owner in a market why they don’t tidy it up a bit.
To the north west the other group are exploring bombed out Raqqa, the former Isis capital in northern Syria.
In 2017 the Islamic State was driven out of the city with a UN estimate that 270,000 civilians fled their homes. Many came to Britain.
Dave is so moved when he meets a family living in a bombed-out house with a missile-sized hole in the roof and puddles on the floor that he cries.
And he decides to do what he knows best. He’s a chef so he goes to the market and buys food and cooks them a meal. The family hadn’t tasted meat in years and were overwhelmed.
But thus far at least (next week our travellers try and get back into Britain on an illegal boat from France) no minds have been changed.
Those against immigrants say the desperate people in Syria and Somalia should be helped in their own countries, while the others says the UK can take in more.
