Jeremy Irons: ‘Pakistanis, you know, thank God for them...’

In an exclusive video interview with The Irish Times, British actor Jeremy Irons holds forth on the UK's referendum on leaving or remaining in the European Union. Here are nine of his observations:

1. I will vote to stay in Europe. Much as I see a lot wrong with Europe. But I see a lot wrong with our government. I see a lot wrong with the Irish Government. But I think to pull up the drawbridge and think that's going to make any difference, make it better, I think would be a very regressive step;
2. But I do think we have to, in this modern world, we have to unify and not isolate ourselves, and look back to some past you know England has always been part of somewhere;
3. Immigration is something we've always had - yes, we maybe don't police it terribly well. Yes there's free flow of workers within Europe but there's also free flow for us. We can go out, we can go and work in Italy, in Spain, in France and many companies do they have, they have other branches there;
4. The British building industry would fall apart without the Poles;
5. We have a history of immigration. We are made up of Anglo Saxons, Normans, Celts, Vikings, West Indians, Pakistanis, you know, thank God for them - you can get a pint of milk at eleven o'clock at night most places;
6. And I think that, you know I breed dogs and my favourite dog are mongrels, crossbreeds where you get a bit of this, a bit of this, a bit of that and I think the great thing about England is that we have always accepted, sometimes with a little gritting of the teeth, but we've nevertheless, we've accepted immigrants and welcomed them - and I wish that to continue;
7. The scaremongering that we're going to have millions of Turks pouring over our borders - I mean, why on earth would they? Have you been to Turkey? It's quite nice. Why on earth would they want to come here where it rains all the time?;
8. Well I've seen Ireland change a huge amount in the 20 years since I've been living there. Selfishly, I've not enjoyed some of the money that's been poured into the roads. I like being able to get from West Cork to Dublin easily, but I feel West Cork has lost a little bit of its independence in that it's now very easy to get there;
9. I'm not proud of our dirty washing being hung out as it is around the world for people to see. England is a very small country. It has as you say survived by people coming in and working very hard. Maybe sending their money home. Maybe not. Maybe becoming part of the society. The Irish certainly have. The West Indians certainly did in the fifties and sixties.