Isabel, you chose to leave Britain and move to Dubai. You are of course still perfectly entitled to comment on the country, but sweeping declarations about the British state deserve rather more evidence than this. ⠀ “The British state is no longer working in the interests of the British people” is not a fact. It is a political judgement. ⠀ The state is still collecting taxes, passing and enforcing laws, educating millions of children, treating millions of people through the NHS, paying pensions and benefits, policing communities, defending the country and providing countless other services upon which tens of millions of British people rely every day. ⠀ Are there serious problems? Absolutely. ⠀ Is the asylum system too expensive? Yes. Around £4 billion was spent on asylum accommodation and support last year, and Government should be held accountable for every pound of it. ⠀ Are there legitimate concerns about border control, public safety, integration, housing and pressure on services? Of course there are. ⠀ But acknowledging those problems is rather different from declaring that the entire British state has ceased working for its own people. ⠀ Nor does spending money on one statutory responsibility prove that the same money has simply been “diverted” from another. Government spending on health, education, policing, defence, pensions and other public services continues on an enormously greater scale. ⠀ Likewise, “national security emergency” is an extraordinarily serious description. If you are using it as political rhetoric, say so. Do not present it as though it were an established constitutional fact. ⠀ Britain is not a failed state. ⠀ Its Government continues to function. Parliament continues to legislate. Courts continue to administer justice. Taxes continue to be collected. Schools open each morning. Hospitals treat patients. Police respond to crime. Businesses trade and tens of millions of people simply get on with their lives. ⠀ None of that means everything is fine. ⠀ It means that serious problems should be described proportionately and accurately. ⠀ There is quite enough wrong with British public policy to criticise without pretending that the country itself has ceased to function in the interests of its citizens. ⠀ That sort of rhetoric may be politically useful. ⠀ It is not the same thing as evidence.