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Introducing the Participants

Steve, 64, Canvey Island

Occupation: Former insurance professional

Political history: Typically Conservative, apart from when he lived in “the socialist republic of south Hackney” and supported the Social Democratic Party

Interesting fact: His specialty in insurance was hostage situations: People often claim that insurance is boring, but it’s not when you’re planning rescuing people from the Korean peninsula because the North Koreans have opened the weapon systems”

Evie, 25, London

Occupation: Graduate in psychology

Political history: In her home country, New Zealand, she supported both Labour and Green

Interesting fact: Eva has been employed as a singer on ocean liners; her longest trip was six months, which is a significant duration to be on a boat

For starters

She: Steve appeared focused on enjoying the meal, to be receptive

He: She seemed like a very bright, well-spoken, pleasant person

She: I had a tomato and mozzarella dish, pasta with fungi, and a rich sweet treat, it was delicious

The big beef

Eva: He was certainly on the side of immigration being reduced. He believes that British people who are native to the area, including non-white white British, face limited access to the things that they need, because increasing numbers are arriving. However I just don’t think the numbers are that bad

Steve: I’m for skilled immigration, I don’t want to live in a homogeneous, WASP country with warm beer. But I believe that governments have exploited immigration to occupy positions they can’t get people to do without increasing salaries. Wages are kept low, so taxes have to be kept low, so we are unable to improve services – allocate additional funds on child support, on education, on technology

She: I am not deeply informed of Brexit, because I was 16 and not living here when it occurred. He explained it to me in a different perspective. He informed me about EU labor migrants – candidates could arrive in the UK and only be paid the wage of the their nation of origin

He: Macron spent 24 months getting the EU to abolish the system; it was revised in 2018. Before that, migrant laborers coming in were undercutting local employees. Under the former PM, it was petroleum staff that were brought in; later it’s been service industry, agriculture. She grasped that, because she’d worked on a passenger vessel and said she was paid a lot more than workers from other countries

Common ground

He: It would be great to have a alternative power, transition from fossil fuels. I don’t like pollution, I value fresh atmosphere, I appreciate rural areas. We found consensus on a lot of that. But I said, “What do you think of Norway?” Their oil and gas profits soared after the conflict began, they allocated those funds to build eco-friendly systems

She: So we’re dependent on their petroleum. You can see that’s an unfavorable approach to go about things. He was in favour of maintaining domestic drilling for the small amount we’ll require in the future. I kind of agree with him. We’re still going to use planes. We both think we should be advancing to greener solutions, turbine fields and water power

For afters

Eva: We briefly discussed Islamophobia, though we didn’t call it that. He seemed concerned about radical ideologies entering – he did note that a many individuals in Middle Eastern countries were radical, which I felt was not accurate. I think it’s prejudiced to make judgments based on faith

Steve: I come from the eastern part of London. I asked her if she’d been to Whitechapel, and she said it had been gentrified. Obviously, I would say that: populated by professionals. But when I go down Chrisp Street market, I look like a foreigner. People gaze at me because it’s become very Muslim. She had a little look at me about that. I used the word segregated area. Eva’s got Eastern European roots – she doesn’t like that word, to her it denotes poverty. I said, “No, it’s an area that becomes theirs.” I agreed to use a alternative term – maybe enclave?

Eva: I believe that followers of Islam are really disproportionately shown in the news outlets as engaging in misconduct. It seems a somewhat discriminatory, or xenophobic

Takeaway

Steve: I think we parted on good terms. We had a embrace at the train stop

Eva: We both said that we’d had a wonderful evening