The hottest topic in Europe yet....

[lindal1000]

[quote user="DerekJ"]If the conditions in Calais and Dunkirk are not acceptable that is down to France to resolve. If there are unaccompanied children then, again, it is up to France to take the appropriate action. It is not down to the UK to sort this out. So far, we haven't been foolish enough to allow this mass movement of people into the country and long may that remain so.

Just because many may want to come to the UK doesn't mean anything. We are told they wanted to escape danger. Well, they've done that.

[/quote]

I used to think that at first.. when the camp had 500 or so people..fairly consistent numbers..some would probably make the illegal crossing and disappear, others would wander off to other parts of Europe, maybe returning to Calais in the summer. This situation is very different though.. 5000 people between the two camps.. I don't know how one country can deal with that..anymore than a country such as Greece can deal with people washing up on their shores or the landlocked countries can cope with people just walking over the border out of sight of the border control. Although there are a few that would be happy to see this all ending in bloodshed most people would be horrified to witness the deliberate harming of unarmed people by our own security forces. (Indeed most of the military themselves would not see that as their role). I see this as an Eu problem that needs a coordinated EU approach.

[DerekJ]

The French should never have allowed the camps to be established and to grow to the size they are now. They are only situated in the Calais area as the migrants want to cross over to the UK.

Are the camps legal? I doubt it. Have the migrants continued to commit illegal acts in order to try and cross into the UK?  Certainly and continually.

The French should have removed these camps well away from this area years ago. By force if necessary.

I presume that the only reason they have allowed them to remain in the general area they are now is the wish that the UK will give in and open the doors to them, thereby removing the problem from France.

[Chancer]

[quote user="ebaynut"]

why don't you house a couple of them back at your place, you clearly have enough rooms for them!!

 

[/quote]

 

Its already set up and waiting to happen, all the communes across France were told to put into place action plans for accepting a number of refugee families, the Maire who is not my greatest fan thought he would be sticking it to me by telling me that I would be their choice of hebergeur, it backfired when I said it would be an honour and wrote up a contract aided by the première adjoint who has always been my ally.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3419059/The-asylum-seeker-studio-flat-costing-taxpayers-5-600-MONTH-greedy-landlords-exploit-Sweden-migrant-crisis-hike-rent-refugees-1-450-CENT.html

[lindal1000]

Well they already go in and destroy their possessions, rip up their asylum applications, remove their shoes, and have used tear gas and rubber bullets. It's easy to say they should have done it before.. perhaps they should have , but I think you can say that everyone, including the UK was just hoping the problem would go away eventually.

I don't think there are any options now for removing the camps that would not involve great humanitarian issues and now the camps have been brought to the attention of MSF, amnesty and the United Nations, I think the people there have a certain degree of protection from unofficial action.

(Along with Chancer, Medicins Sans Frontier are also providing aid to the camp so he is not alone in his illegal activities) France does not have the detention centres to house more than 5000 people, including women and children, any attempt to move people on begs the question of how and where.. do you march them across Europe? The Dutch have suggested that those in Holland are shipped to Turkey as a holding area but that is not that straightforward. It is not just the UK and France that have these difficulties. The UK is only the third favourite destination after Sweden and Germany. This is why I think it is a European problem and last time I looked the UK was part of Europe and should be part of the solution. I mean how else do you see it ending? One child washes up on a beach and finally people wake up and see what is going on.. what do you think will happen if those scenes are repeated on a massive scale all over Europe? Do you think people will really think that it is okay and just 'collateral damage'.

[mint]

[quote user="idun"]

Now, these people have as many 'rights' to apply for whatever in France as they have in the UK. So why didn't they?

Andy Burham did not give an opinion on what France should be doing, which was a pity, because, at the moment, these people are in France and France should be doing something about them.

I make no apology for my point of view. This is quite different from WW11.

[/quote]

I have read (alas can't remember the source as we are flooded with information and misinformation on a daily basis) that the migrants in Calais do have the right to apply for asylum in France and be distributed around the country.  This is allegedly always been on offer but, as Betty has pointed out, applying in France seems not to be the choice of the migrants themselves.

Indeed, only recently, France spent a considerable amount of money, equiping and adapting some shipping-type containers with heating, bedding, toilets, etc for the people from the jungle to move into.  And, guess what, they didn't want to move (supposedly because they didn't want to be finger-printed and processed in France) and British charity workers then came with trailers and so on and helped the migrants to move their sheds, tents and possessions into another part of the Jungle that was out of the way of the bulldozers.

As to why only the UK or Germany or Sweden will do, I am as puzzled as Betty.  If they were flexible and smart enough to accept what is on offer, they might get another opportunity later on to end up in the country of their choice.  But alas, some people (and here I am not talking solely about migrants[:D] cannot wait to achieve their objectives; they want it "right here, right now"!

In Sweden itself, they have now found that 50% of their own immigrants should not be there and there are plans to deport them.

[DerekJ]

[quote user="lindal1000"] This is why I think it is a European problem and last time I looked the UK was part of Europe and should be part of the solution. [/quote]

Well, clearly it is a European problem. However, the UK had the good sense (for a change) not to sign up for Schengen.

[lindal1000]

Not quite true re the shipping containers. In fact there was only space for 1600 so the volunteers helped move the rest. There is a degree of not unfounded mistrust from those camped out there and the Gendarmes so that was one of the reasons. Another was that the rules for the containers were that they were only for sleeping. At least in a tent if you are sick, cold and wet during the day you can get some protection from the elements rather than wander round in the mud. Nevertheless the 1600 places in the shipping containers were filled .

The volunteers have been working with many of the people in the camps to apply for Asylum in France and many have begun the task. Hence Chancer may well be seeing the benefit of secure tenants in his apartment sooner rather than later.

Another problem the volunteers have in persuading people to apply for Asylum in France is the power that the people traffickers have in creating and continuing the belief that they will be better off in the UK. The reality is the benefits system is more generous towards them in France than UK, as Chancer will no doubt find out when he receives his regular cheques for their accommodation.

[Chancer]

All the shipping container accomodations are fully occupied Mint, from what I have seen uniquely by the young men who make up the  majority of the camp, I think that the women and children and families that there are are the ones not wanting to use them for fear of being assaulted and also for privacy, lets not forget this is a different culture where privacy and intimacy, even as little as a tarpaulin shelter can offer may be more important than warmth, light and electricity.

 

Its easy to get a distorted view from the media pictures, thats not to say that they are misrepresented, at the best of times you have to look very hard to find the vulnerable amongst the young men that look no different to those at Sangatte 15 years ago, but they are there and there are far too many of them living in fear, I passed the jungle while there was a mass demonstration going on, it was a diversion tactic whilst the tunnel was invaded, there was not one white face, not one female or child, not one person outside the ages of 20-30 and there were thousands of them, far more than the camp looked like it could shelter at that time, Ive just checked and it was mid October.

[andyh4]

Chancer

Thanks for your postings. It is good to get a view from someone with first hand experience.

As to why they want to end up in Sweden, Germany and the UK, from the few interviews I have seen where the question of where do you want to go is then followed up by why there, the answers broadly seem to come into two categories:

1. They already have family members there, and/or

2. To get a job.

It has to be said that these comments are restricted to Syrian refugees and may not be applicable to other groups.

If you consider that many of these people are (were to be more accurate) what we would consider to be professional classes, getting a job* makes real sense.

*Getting a job is only possible in the UK once their refugee status has been confirmed. Whether that is the case in France, Germany, Sweden etc. I do not know. What I do know is that they are generally forbidden from getting a job in Turkey and Jordan - which J is a very good reason to not declare yourself a refugee in those countries.

So why don't they stay in France and get good benefits? Because they are not interested in living on benefits. These are engineers, doctors, lecturers, teachers - which is why they have had the resources to pay the traffickers to get as far as they have got.

Why don't they get that job in France? Well we all know how hard that can be - even for the French. Their French may not be up to a standard to make their skills transferable. The same comments apply to any of the southern countries - high unemployment levels mean little chance of getting a job.

So I think that explains why there is a tendency to head for Germany (who stated openly that they wanted to take them), Sweden and the UK.

Add in the family ties - which as well as the obvious attraction means that when you arrive you will have a mentor to help you through the hurdles of living in a strange land.

[Cendrillon]

I have been told that migrants settling in Sweden have to wait six years before their family members are allowed to join them.

AFAIK these waiting times are much shorter in UK.

[lindal1000]

From the Uk government website

You can apply after 5 years in the UK as either:

a refugee

someone with humanitarian protection

So a little shorter but I wouldn't say considerably.

[andyh4]

I should perhaps clarify that when I said family member, these may be beyond the rules of automatic admission after x years - so brothers, sisters, uncles and cousins are often cited.

[idun]

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have read this thread carefully and frankly could scream as so much has been said that has angered me even more.

 They want to live in that camp rather than stay in France properly........ let 'em! And if the french do something about the camp, well tant pis pour eux!

[woolybanana]

There is an underlying irony to all this, guys, which makes me draw breath and think; much of what has been said on this thread has been motivated by racism in one form or another, but yet, the West needs these people. Since our ladies stopped being heavy breeders, we have a demographic problem. So, either we import workers, ironically, workers in this case who do not want ladies to work but to breed, but whom we dislike because they are not of the right religion or culture or colour, or we get our ladies to have babies again, or we invent robots, or we get our welfare junkies to work ( a short term solution) or our society dies.

Hmmm, choice are interesting really.

On the other hand, Britain is still suffering from the invasion caused by BLiar's open door policy and we have created an irreversible pressure cooker which will eventually explode in a very nasty racist war, in which the communities now enclosed in the so called multicultural syndrome (for which read apartheid) will burst out and distinctly upset the wealthy widows of Henley on Thames and others.

Which could happen in France.

Solutions?

[powerdesal]

One of the main reasons for justifying an invasion of immigrants is said to be a need for workers to support our ageing population.

No one seems to realise that those new workers will also get old and hence will need further new workers to support them - and on and on ad infinitum.

A second point seems to be an assumption that the immigrants have the required skills and educational achievement to be productive workers, this does not seem to be the case. Whilst some are no doubt Engineers, Doctors, Rocket scientists etc I suggest that very very few fit that description.

How many jobs are vacant for the majority unskilled new workers ?

[ebaynut]

Chancer wrote,

Its already set up and waiting to happen, all the communes across France

were told to put into place action plans for accepting a number of

refugee families, the Maire who is not my greatest fan thought he would

be sticking it to me by telling me that I would be their choice of

hebergeur, it backfired when I said it would be an honour and wrote up a

contract aided by the première adjoint who has always been my ally.

WOW!!!!!

Good luck with that one. It would be interesting to

get your views, say in six months time to see if your opinion is still the

same.

After reading your tales of the area and the people where you live plus your

descriptions of them, it seems like your new guests will fit in

nicely there.

Will you be leaving the instructions as to how a WC works in each room ??

[ebaynut]

Powerdesal wrote,

One of the main reasons for justifying an invasion of immigrants is said

to be a need for workers to support our ageing population.

No one seems to realise that those new workers will also get old and

hence will need further new workers to support them - and on and on ad

infinitum.

A second point seems to be an assumption that the immigrants have

the required skills and educational achievement to be productive

workers, this does not seem to be the case. Whilst some are no doubt

Engineers, Doctors, Rocket scientists etc I suggest that very very few

fit that description.

How many jobs are vacant for the majority unskilled new workers ?

Indeed, many say we need these people to come to the UK to work,

doing the jobs which are beneath the English. Well these people also need the

work, and he who pays the piper, as they say, calls the tune.

 

When the BRexit happens, we in the UK will be able to choose who enters the

UK to work, we will be able to issue work permits to those we want and keep out

the riff.

 

There are more workers than work, so this should be no problem.

[YCCMB]

Wooly, the not thing I'd say to your comment is that if you check out the Guardian link I posted earlier in the thread, it actually implies the opposite of what you said. It would appear that predictions are that population growth in the UK over the next 40-50 years are going to be driven largely by births rather than immigration. And this, based on research that predates the current situation by several years.

[mint]

[quote user="woolybanana"]There is an underlying irony to all this, guys, which makes me draw breath and think; much of what has been said on this thread has been motivated by racism in one form or another, but yet, the West needs these people. [/quote]

I do NOT agree that it's about racism or, at least, not purely by racism.

Difference in religious beliefs and cultural practices I can readily swallow.

Those special bushy beards, head coverings, face coverings......well, yes, they can puzzle, alarm and disconcert.  Is this exclusively because these images are shown so often at scenes of social disturbance, war and carnage that we have come to associate them with all manner of bad things?  No, not exclusively.  As human beings we feel "safer" amongst others like ourselves and feel uncomfortable when we cannot read and understand facial expressions, etc.

OH has read translations of the koran quite intensively in the last several months and he, the most soft-hearted, "wet", left-leaning socialist that you could ever hope (or not!) to meet has said that daesh people really do believe in forming a caliphate because, apparently, it's all there in their holy book.  So, I guess that muslims, by the rigorous practice of their faith, could cause disquiet.

Then, of course, even OH says that if they come to live amongst us, then they should not be allowed to slaughter animals in their prescribed way because "that's not what we do"!!!

I am only repeating what OH says to demonstrate that often with human beings, emotion is much stronger than reason!

If people feel unsafe or really loathe the idea of odd-looking and -behaving strangers coming to be their neighbours, then no amount of persuasion, rational or otherwise, is going to change their opinion.

As for the doctors, engineers, rocket scientists that are supposedly amongst the would-be immigrants, I like to think that they would perhaps wish to stay behind as their skills would be surely be desperately needed in their own countries?

After all, there would be unsafe, damaged buildings for the engineers to do something with, wounded and ill people to treat, and all manner of ways in which they could benefit their own people.

I don't know which is worst, to be bombarded with media images and reports day after day about migrants, or not to have any information and be left to imagine what could be happening.  All of the media reports I have come across have left me with more questions than answers.

 

[lindal1000]

Does your OH mind that we let Jewish people slaughter animals to kosher guidelines? The methods of slaughter are actually very similar, ie that the animal should be bled.

I think it's quite hard to stay and be a doctor or an engineer when the hospitals have been destroyed, or the infrastructure is gone.. and add into that ulness you follow Deash prinicipals you will be killed. Once the situation is stable again maybe many will return.

[idun]

As if it is just white people who do things like that. Just look at Iraq or Iran or some of the other middle east states and see how sunnis and shias treat one another and how other people are treat, whether indians or philipinos etc.

We did not invent anything like that, us white folk. We just had our little turn in history of doing very bad things and in general, and historically over rather a short time, ie a couple of hundred years actually saw the error of our ways and are remedying them.

And isn't that the problem, we no longer support people who don't. Who won't treat their women properly or over breed, or simply do not act as we want, because we do not want to see our culture going back after so much was hard fought for, that no longer supports slavery or women being chattels and more or less on a level playing field with men. And as we fought for a better world for 'us', why the hell would we want any little bit of it eroding.

I don't.

But don't call me rascist or anything else for wanting to preserve the good in my life and as a woman, NEVER wanting any woman to be other than considered in every way a human and treat in the same way where education and work is concerned as any man.

AND frankly, since I was little, we gave to charities to make a better world, so why is everything still so horrible when we gave so much for so long?????

As far as I am concerned we still have lots to do in the UK, but I don't need anyone telling me that their religion says XYand Z that as residents or citizens in this country, changing things for the worse, especially for women. We need to move forward, not back.

There again, I only view the world from how women are treat.

And these 'young' men in the camps. I also doubt that they are all highly educated and 'the' men we want. And IF they are such upstanding people, why are they not protecting the women in the camps. And I would hope that it was only a small minority that were actually terrorising the women, HOWEVER, all the others must know and doing nothing is being complicit. And really, why would I want men who have already showed that they were not prepared to fight for their country, or for the women and children and in the camp......here???? I do not.

Never forget, that I am of a generation where when I started work, women's pay was way below mens. That we suffered indignities of being groped and had things said to us that no woman would put up with these days...... and IF it was only a small minority of men who did this, they were still a nightmare for us women..... and the men who didn't do these things  but said nothing, were also complicit in this behaviour. I am so glad that things are so much better.

Let us move forward, never back.

And re the oldies. We are living too old these days. After a certain stage, I wonder if I would call it 'life'. And that is from someone who should be well on her way 'out' by now, horribly ill and daily worse and worse for a number of years  and unable to 'live' without carers, dependant for every last bodily function,  and an early death. As it was, after 'knowing' that this was my fate for too many years, genetic testing arrived and I was in the clear, unlike other family members. I look at quality of life, perhaps very differently to others and Switzerland sounds like a good option if ever I get something awful.

[Chancer]

Its an inevitable part of forum life that some will wish to label others whose opinions they dont agree with, this thread has carried a few accusations of racism and also liberalism.

 

I have tried to not talk of my views on the subject rather my actions after someone asked for first hand reports, as such I hope the only labelling aimed at me would be that of a Humanitarian, for this is for many vulnerable people a humanitarian crisis. 

[NickP]

[quote user="Chancer"]

Its an inevitable part of forum life that some will wish to label others whose opinions they dont agree with, this thread has carried a few accusations of racism and also liberalism.

 

I have tried to not talk of my views on the subject rather my actions after someone asked for first hand reports, as such I hope the only labelling aimed at me would be that of a Humanitarian, for this is for many vulnerable people a humanitarian crisis. 

[/quote]

Good to know Chancer that you wont be charging for your bijou apartments. Well done, everybody loves a humanitarian.[B][B]

[NormanH]

And your actions do you credit.

[mint]

[quote user="lindal1000"]Does your OH mind that we let Jewish people slaughter animals to kosher guidelines? The methods of slaughter are actually very similar, ie that the animal should be bled.

I think it's quite hard to stay and be a doctor or an engineer when the hospitals have been destroyed, or the infrastructure is gone.. and add into that ulness you follow Deash prinicipals you will be killed. Once the situation is stable again maybe many will return.[/quote]

Well, yes, he does!  Not only that, he doesn't eat meat since about 60 years ago when, in the course of his work, he had to do a report on the roof of an abatoir.

We haven't known any Muslims other than as acquaintances but OH has a Jewish daughter in law whose family did escape Germany to make a new life in England.