The capitalist class win in a range of ways from today's unimpeded labour movement. It was of course an absolutely central( but obviously undeclared) plank of the Blair/Brown era economic strategy, and remains so for the Coalition today. And is an absolutely central policy plank of the EU . It ensure that the traditional economistic Trades Union "limitation of supply " strategy to defending working class wage levels and conditions is significantly undermined by an almost limitless supply of fresh labour. A labour supply of course which has cost the UK capitalist class absolutely nothing to reproduce or educate ! And a labour supply which is generally, younger, fitter, and keener to work crap hours and conditions and for lower wages than the indigenous workforce. Whats not to like for capitalism ! Then the capitalist class can also pull the ancient old "divide and rule" trick via their popular press, stoking up fears and hatreds against the very incomer workers they have imported ! --- distracting the indigenous working class from who is really responsible for shitty housing, the economic crisis, and the imminent destruction of the Welfare State. The capitalist class of course has no intention whatsoever of ending unimpeded labour supply, they will fight tooth and nail to continue it -- but they are quite happy for the vacuous bullshitters of UKIP to sow petty nationalist illusions and divisive anti immigrant hysteria amongst the rest of the population - confident that UKIP are just a bunch of con-artist saloon bar , in it for the big lunches, braggarts who will deliver absolutely none of their big promises. The capitalist ruling class would actually be much more nervous about a neo fascist party doing well on the same agenda, because the fairytale national autarkist "solutions" , anti immigrant ,and anti finance prejudices of fascism are much less easily controllable than the paper tigers of UKIP.
The danger for the radical Left is to be sucked into policy and ideological/terminological accommodations with the widespread anti migrant worker , and anti settled "immigrant" community, hysteria - as the Left periodically did to the anti semitism of the Nazis in Germany in the early 30's - wth lots of "nod and a wink" euphemisms to the Nazis working class support base about "of course we all hate Finance Capitalists" , when this was actually a universal code word for "Jewish Finance Capital". Concessions to racism and petty nationalism simply don't work - the Left not only shouldn't but CAN'T "out bigot" the Right - without becoming just a radical "anti capitalist" Left wing of the Right - "Strasserism" as it is usually called. Instead the radical Socialist Left has to simply grit its collective teeth in the face of a mass media created anti immigrant shitstorm and campaign relentlessly against the austerity offensive without scapegoating the other , immigrant, working class VICTIMS of the capitalist system. Our propaganda has to always take pains to pin the real blame on capitalism for poverty, low wages, the cuts. We need to try and draw people from across communities into these campaigns and struggles. And in the area of unfettered labour supply; ending free movement of , particularly EU, labour ? It simply aint going to happen under contemporary capitalism. So the struggle for better wages and conditions has to become much more straightforwardly political - rather than depending on traditional Trades Union "restriction of supply" nostrums. The struggle has to be also a national, electoral one,building a new radical socialist party and fighting for a planned egalitarian socialist society, with an internationalist perspective, but which does promise reindustrialisation and regional policy and a Welfare State, to ensure good skilled "jobs for all" and a good life for all. Obviously it would be up to a democratic socialist workers state what the policy was on the entry of external workers at any one time, in the rapidly changing circumstances of the time. But in that transformed socio/economic situation the international and domestic context would be completely different.
