In 1965, the journalist Paul Foot considered the state of immigration debate in Britain, and a new book from the Institute of Race Relations that surveyed six “immigrant areas” as political case studies. In the nine months since the general election, Commonwealth immigration has become a central political issue. Party spokesmen constantly refer to their party’s plans for new restrictions. News editors and columnists have discovered that almost anything connected with the “colour problem” makes “good copy”. This has been a remarkably sudden process. In 1963, when the Institute of Race Relations set up a special survey into race relations in Britain under Mr Jim Rose and Mr Nicholas Deakin, politicians were embarrassed by immigration, and the matter was raised in parliament or the constituencies only by extremists. The principles which had inspired the Parliamentary Labour Party violently to oppose the Commonwealth Immigration Bill of 1961 and 1962 had given way to “realism” – the prospect of power.…