When will the misrepresentation end?

The immigration debate is becoming hysterical in the chambers of power now, as well as in public 'discourse' (i.e. what the papers spuriously lead the public on with). Last night, the BBC did vox-pops asking what new immigrants should and shouldn't do and a fair few respondents said that immigrants shouldn't "sponge off the state." Hmm, I wonder it they have actually any credible evidence for this or even first-hand anecdotal evidence, rather than just what they have read in the lie-machines that are also known as the tabloids. The only sponges in this debate are their brains, that soak up any cock-and-bull tales about a section of society who they probably have no meaningful interaction with. The average Briton believes that migrants take all the best housing (when in reality, 95% are crammed into the worst), that 20% of the UK's population has recently come in (4% in truth) and that Britain takes in 25% of the world's immigrants (just 2%). The figures are staggering; not regarding immigrants, but what they reveal of the gullibility and incipient xenophobia of the 'British'. In reality, it is the poorest, least well-equipped countries who have to deal with the biggest migration flows e.g, the 4 million Iraqi refugees in Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Yemen. But then, why let facts get in the way of prejudice?
The role of the press is to represent, unless one belongs to the gutter press and then it is to misrepresent and the latter have done a sterling job in that. When discussing the tabloids, it is really hard not to invoke Godwin's Law (the first person to mention the Nazis in comparison loses the argument), but they are bad enough in their own right so it is possible. Xenophobia is xenophobia and racism is racism and on both counts the tabloids (the rabid right-wings ones especially) have racheted up misleading articles that blow the figures out of all proportion. They respond with the typical comeback of a racist "is it racist to discuss important matters?" It is in the manner they do it. There is room for a sensible debate on immigration, but the tabloids sell the most when they generate fear and if fostering racism will bring extra profits then they will continue to do so. Morality for them is anachronistic.
But now the Tories with their vile talk of caps on immigration outside the EU (insignificant cant since most of the migrants come from within the EU) and Labour, with talk of prolonging the granting of citizenship and taxes (tariffs raised for a cash-strapped Treasury?) are reacting to the crisis perpetuated by the press. If one thinks it too bold to accredit the Pied Papers of Wapping with leading the average British person into downright unsavoury views, then why do people always mention the newspapers when evidence for their claims of, for example, 'sponging' is asked for. The inherently anti-foreign spin issuing from these so-called patriotic purveyors of print is leading to a more divided society, but then hypocrisy and fiction have always been their key constituencies. They used to condemn Jews coming into Britain (an island which has always been a hub for migration throughout thousands of years of history), but of course they can't now, otherwise they'd go to prison. So their attention turns to foreigners in general.
As I said, a sensible debate on how to deal with immigration needs to take place, but the politicians are too scared to rebut the newspapers for fear of losing their support (yet more proof of the influence of the papers). At the moment, it is self-defeating xenophobia that allows the immigrants to cross the EU to reach Britain, as the government is terrified of the biased media reaction should it cross one of it's 'red-lines' and sign up to a common EU immigration policy. Until that happens, the EU states further out can play pass the parcel until the foreign unfortunates 'wash-up' on our shores, whereas being part of a common EU policy would stop that, allowing a more even-handed solution to non-EU migration. Politicians may be reviled, but if newspapermen and women ever got a shot at truly running the country, it really would be doomed.
Further, more than 3 million Britons have left over the last fifteen years, citing climate, taxes and house prices, over 1 million of them skilled graduates. The influx of skilled immigrants from other parts of the EU have filled the breach, otherwise there could have been an acute skills gap. Nothing can be done to prevent this, so the two main parties' tough talk on the issue really is just sophistry. Combined with the hyperbolic, choleric papers, they perfectly illustrate the dangers Plato so criticised democracy for - demagogues leading the people in damaging the very society they claim to defend. There is a point at which any society can absorb successfully an influx of migrants. The Celts in the fifth century AD failed when the Angles and Saxons, forebears of the modern English, overran them and much of the island. Perhaps all the English should be given a "Britishness" test and if they fail it, send them to Germany and Denmark where their ancestors came from. Give the people what they want and they'll rapidly find they don't want it. In today's society, the response to immigration must not be rabble-rousing, but measured and wise talk.