"Britain has always been shaped by immigration, but never at this pace or scale."
Has it? Really? I don't think a few Hugenots shaped very much. Post war Britain has seen immigration that has been changing things but my grandmother (born 1893, died 1975) grew up in a pretty unchanged world of white natives who generally didn't move more than a few miles and married locally. My father grew up in Plumstead in south London (his parents lived in south London from the time of the first war until they died) - it was 100% white natives, most of whom had been there for generations. I doubt there are more than a handful of locals still living in Plumstead now - it appears to be mostly immigrants from the sub-continent who haven't even tried to assimilate. So, I would disagree that Britain has always been shaped by immigration - it has simply been flooded with immigrants since the 1950s at an ever increasing rate and those immigrants have no real need or desire to become British so have turned whole areas into ghettos or enclaves. South London has very few areas left where native populations are the majority - this is not progress but simply destruction.
"Britain has always been shaped by immigration, but never at this pace or scale."
Has it? Really? I don't think a few Hugenots shaped very much. Post war Britain has seen immigration that has been changing things but my grandmother (born 1893, died 1975) grew up in a pretty unchanged world of white natives who generally didn't move more than a few miles and married locally. My father grew up in Plumstead in south London (his parents lived in south London from the time of the first war until they died) - it was 100% white natives, most of whom had been there for generations. I doubt there are more than a handful of locals still living in Plumstead now - it appears to be mostly immigrants from the sub-continent who haven't even tried to assimilate. So, I would disagree that Britain has always been shaped by immigration - it has simply been flooded with immigrants since the 1950s at an ever increasing rate and those immigrants have no real need or desire to become British so have turned whole areas into ghettos or enclaves. South London has very few areas left where native populations are the majority - this is not progress but simply destruction.