Letters: no wonder Gen Z-ers don’t want to fight

The many not the few

Sir: Your leading article (‘The people problem’, 3 February) fails to get to the heart of this issue. Yes, more needs to be done to reform welfare to encourage people back to work. But nowhere do you mention the need for employers to be more open-minded in their recruitment. There is a large pool of ‘underemployed’ – particularly among the over-fifties – who find it very difficult to get any job at all, many of whom are perfectly familiar with the discipline of regular employment.

Polling suggests that more than 60 per cent of nearly all ages, social classes and regions think the country is already overcrowded. A greater percentage think the government should consider how to address the resulting challenges. To suggest blithely that we can absorb more than half a million people per annum is failing to face reality.

As is so often the case, you see the issue only in economic terms. Our settled population (18 per cent of whom are now ethnic minorities) have a more nuanced response. They are concerned about the impact of population growth on our ecology, our environment, the amount of open space that is being lost and concreted over, the threats to our food and water security, access to public services and challenges to social cohesion.

We need to provide a way to balance these issues in a manner that commands public confidence. That was the reason for proposing an Office for Demographic Change – constituted along the lines of the Office for Budget Responsibility – which was the subject of my private members’ bill introduced in the House of Lords.

Robin Hodgson

House of Lords, London SW1