So another day, another back flip for the government.

Yesterday it was school hubs, today it’s culturally arranged marriage visa rules.

The tough policy it adopted earlier this year, cracking down on couples who hadn’t lived together, upset the Indian community who said that was prejudiced against arranged marriages.

Cue the xenophobia.

Shane Jones leading the way, playing to his NZ First base, playing the ‘immigrants are being too demanding’ card.

Accusing them of being a bit entitled, suggesting if they don’t like “our rules” they could ‘get on the next plane home’. Classy.

So now, as this government is becoming accustomed to do, it’s backflipped on it.

The Indian community has been listened to, Shane Jones has not, (thank goodness).

The PM actually claimed at the get-go that this was never a government thing, remember that?

She said it was an immigration officials thing, it never crossed her desk or indeed made it in front of Cabinet.

So are we to believe Immigration NZ can unilaterally change rules, make big changes to the status quo, affect a whole swathe of our immigrant community with no flags being waved in front of the government at all?

That’s the line we’re being asked to swallow.

The spokesperson from the Indian community I spoke with this morning's not swallowing it.

No one will be less pleased with this u-turn however than Shane Jones.

He dined out on this one for as long as he could, probably for as long as it took the government to shut it down by changing it back.

Or, asking Immigration NZ to change it back, because remember, this had nothing to do with the government at all.

Yeah right.

So to shut Shane up, which clearly can’t happen by just telling him to zip it, and to appease the Indian community and reassure them that we are not the racist country we suddenly looked like, changes had to be made.

Shane Jones may well argue the headway made in rarking up the immigration debate again with NZ First supporters was worth it.

He may think any time spent bagging immigrants is time well spent.

But the danger for this kind of xenophobia is that you run the risk of hurting not just feelings but whole communities.

You run the risk of inciting racism, provoking hate crimes, promoting isolationism.

And I can't understand why on earth we'd want to do that?