The centenary of the Great War in 2014 could provide the next major national moment to bring people together – and to ensure that we know the shared history of modern Britain, British Future director Sunder Katwala will tell a fringe meeting at Conservative Party conference.

The troubled political terrain that is immigration policy is not going away, writes Max Wind-Cowie, head of the Progressive Conservatism Project at Demos.

A “coalition of the rational” could unite politicians across the major parties and secure public support for the types of immigration that most people think is in Britain’s interests, shadow immigration minister Chris Bryant told a Progress and British Future fringe event at the Labour party conference in Manchester.

“There is no excuse for weak controls on illegal immigration,” said David Ward MP at a fringe at Liberal Democrat conference, adding this was an issue on which he said his party could tend to be a bit “wishy-washy liberal”.

Separating out student immigration from net migration figures would be entirely compatible with what the two parties of government signed up to in the Coalition Agreement, Liberal Democrat deputy leader Simon Hughes told a British Future and CentreForum fringe meeting at his party’s conference in Brighton.

Young Britons struggling to find work in austerity Britain find themselves at the sharp end of immigrant competition, so you might expect them to be tougher on this issue than their parents, says one of the author’s of the new BSA report Rob Ford.

Back in the Balkans and tuning in on television, Londoner Almir Koldzic was surprised to find his Serbian family understand the story and celebrate Britain after watching Danny Boyle’s Olympic ceremony.

The British public see skill and education levels as more important than cultural background in thinking about which migrants will contribute positively to the UK, a major new British Social Attitudes study shows today.

British Future’s latest publication TeamGB report: How 2012 Should Boost Britain shows that most people want the spirit of 2012 to last – and asks what we can do to bring about a positive change.