To think that the 'Calais Camp' situation needs to be resolved ASAP!

[Kreacherelf]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3413566/Port-Calais-closed-migrants-storm-harbour-make-Spirit-Britain-ferry-desperate-bid-reach-UK.html

This is just getting ridiculous now. France need to take this problem to the EU and ask for help dealing with it immediately. It has gone on for too long and needs to stop.

I don't know what the answer is. I think the UK should take anyone under 18, and their family members. Other than that, everyone else should have to apply for asylum in France or risk arrest. Not a perfect solution, but the only one I have.

I wonder if those who keep banging on about the Dublin regs would be so keen on it if they were closer to the Mediterranean. Why should the UK not take a share of the arrivals in Europe? The fairest thing would be to distribute fairly rather than just insisting it's only for others to deal with.

I was cheered to hear the Greek islanders are being considered for the Nobel prize.

It is estimated only a seventh of refugees have arrived. Taking direct from the camps will be our share and avoid the dreadful journey having to be undertaken. Though we should take more than the Tory party agreed to take.

Vivienne it is, but it hasn't been enforced for years, not just in connection with Europe- it's honoured more in the breach than the observance. That said, part of the problem is that Britain, along with other countries, has now stopped accepting asylum/refuge applications at its embassies/HCs, with the result that people have to travel further etc

It's a world wide problem. But countries like America and Australia and even the richer middle eastern countries don't seem to want to know. I don't think it's the answer to take a few from the refugee camps. It would be a drop in the ocean. Europe can't take in every person in the world fleeing a warzone.

Minus points OP for using a Daily Fail source.

But that aside, I think we need to take more of a zero tolerance approach to the people who are taking the piss. Yes, there are some genuine asylum seekers from Syria who have family here and a legitimate claim, but anyone found to be making a false declaration or anyone who tries to force entry should be banned from making an application to that country for a long period of time, say 10 years? That should be sufficient deterrent for anyone dishonest. also, I think additional safeguards are needed for the children being exploited by parents sending them over alone in the hope of themselves getting entry later.

hefzi

what an informative post thank you.

Do you have any thoughts/experience for the using of children to get into Britain?

Do you think our current plan, ie taking refugees from the camps near Syria is a good one?

Yes Blue, I also think the only way to help here is by getting tough on those trying to board boats, and using children which is perhaps the most terrifying aspect of all of this.

BlueSmarties - I agree: but the enforcement is the problem - it costs a lot to the state to investigate and prove these things, and sometimes people challenge things using Legal Aid (if they're eligible) and in the end, it all peters out anyway, having cost a stupid amount of money. Plus, the issue of "proving" where someone is actually from - there are cases atm in the UK where the individual has ripped up their passport (common if you're going to lie about your origins, as well as in cases where it's genuinely been lost/stolen on the way) and the UK want to deport them, but the countries they are most likely to be from won't accept them back - because they aren't provably theirs.

So, say, you have a Moroccan pretending to be Syrian - no passport. You investigate, see he doesn't speak Syrian dialect, seems to have little knowledge of life in Syria etc - but he does speak Moroccan dialect with a Casablanca accent. The UK decides to deport him to Morocco, but can't do this without Morocco's consent - Morocco withholds this consent, because there's no documentary proof he's Moroccan. Net result - liar still in the UK.

amercia in spite of media stuff is taking in refugees

hefzi as an aside do genuinee refugees tend to have their passports? ie those from syria?

The UK decides to deport him to Morocco, but can't do this without Morocco's consent - Morocco withholds this consent, because there's no documentary proof he's Moroccan. Net result - liar still in the UK.

where there seems to be so much proof can something be done to force them to pay for him if they wont take him back>?or can we put him back in morocco?

Agree that something needs to be done. I don't know what exactly but it's an insane situation for all parties.

Not totally convinced by the 'prioritise the women and children' argument though.

One of my friends went over to Calais to do volunteer work a couple of months ago and, by talking to a lot of the young men, found that the reason many of them try to get past security every single night and are prepared to die trying to reach the UK is because their families are already here. Far from leaving them behind in a war zone they used all their money sending them out safely at the start of the conflict and are now trying to follow.

Prioritising the women and children currently in the camp would just split more families up as more fathers and husbands are left behind in Calais.

The thing is that Labour laws are much more relaxed in the UK than in France.

In France there are basically two ways of being employed:

CDI - proper long term contract, with benefits if you are made redundant
CDD - fixed term, short contract

Many, many French people struggle to get the holy grail of a CDI.

The idea of cash in hand or part time work or temp jobs don't really seem to exist.

So for many the idea is going to England must seem much more advantageous.

Mistigri You say job prospects are unlikely to be better in Tyneside than Toulouse. In fairness I haven't been to Newcastle recently, but I drove through SW France a couple of weeks back - not quite as far south as Toulouse but nearly there - and the sense of pervasive decline was everywhere. I know there are some pretty miserable bits of the UK but as a long-time Francophile I was honestly shocked by what I saw.

just a note - some posters have mentioned the thing about "the first safe country"

the EU are already looking at getting rid of that so the UK would be asked to take more asylum seekers
www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/ireland-to-resist-move-to-scrap-first-country-asylum-rule-1.2505726

also a point on the UK and medical care - with an EHIC, I still had to pay for an ambulance in France. I think my then partner also paid for the medications that were given on leaving hospital. We got it back on travel insurance but I think if it's not covered by the EHIC, then citizens don't get it free either.

I can't recall exactly as I wasn't well but I think the ambulance assistant took down our insurance details but if not we might have had to pay up front, I don't know.

AllTheMadmen the using of children has been common for a while, but the cases I've seen have mostly been West African - if it became a criterion, though, I bet it would become a whole lot more common: there's already a big problem with child trafficking and enslavement (and Britain, sadly, is the human slavery capital of Europe) and I could forsee issues round vulnerable parents being exploited, and told their child is going to be resettled into the UK etc and being a gateway for the parents, whereas in fact, it's the same old story- the child will be exploited, possibly through being sold to richer claimants in Europe, and the parents will never see them again. At the moment, in some cases, parents are given a payment for the child (and told it's for fees to get them established in their new life as a nanny/in school etc) - this could potentially lead to the criminals extorting two sets of money for the same child.

I am very much in favour of resettling people from camps, rather than from mainland Europe. However, I am also conflicted about that, in that essentially, someone who is taken from a refugee camp and resettled in a third country will statistically never go "home". It's not that I am saying we shouldn't welcome people here - of course we should, and if it's their choice to stay once things are safe at "home" then of course, they are welcome to. But there are really big implications, over and above those of individual families, to this policy. Essentially, if we aren't careful, we could end up doing ISIS' work for them, leaving a Middle East devoid of Christian sects who've been there for 2000 years, not to mention Yezidis, and the potential for this to spread also to other sects, including the Druze and the Alawites.

I support strongly the government's policy of extensive funding of the camps - we are the biggest donor after the US in this respect - but at the same time, there's not enough money to make the camps desirable places for people to stay. I also strongly support only resettling people from camps - but I honestly don't know how we would balance that with the belief that ISIS will be overcome, and the possibility that the fantastic diversity of the Middle East will be lost forever. Of course, lives are worth more than culture - so I think we need also to improve conditions in the camps enormously, and create more opportunities etc there The issue, though, is money - and though every year UNHCR has had pledges from states, only approximately half of that money ever materialises.

No "cash in hand" jobs in France? LOL

The reason why these people are desperate to get to the UK are varied and complex - family links, language, the fact that it's easier to live undocumented in the UK (no ID card), the fact that there is less overt racism in the UK (though this is changing). And probably a healthy dose of misperceptions and misinformation.

It probably is easier for migrants to work in the UK - as long as they are in the SE, and as long as they have reasonable english, but many will end up in unemployment blackspots - doubt there are lots of opportunities in Middlesbrough for example, and the red door saga suggests that racism is in the rise again.

Oops, long post - sorry, All

It really depends vis-a-vis passports: fleeing a country with your life at risk is obviously a variable process - some people gather their passports, strap them to their bodies, and arrive with them. Some people have run in the face of advancing forces, and have lost everything. Some people manage to take their passports, but have had them stolen on the way - there's a huge market in stolen (and false, for that matter) Syrian passports atm. So there's a lot of really legitimate reasons someone could be a genuine Syrian refugee, but not have any paperwork to prove it - a fact that's exploited (and tbf, has been exploited considerably probably forever, with the nationality claimed depending on who has the sexiest COI at the moment) by fraudsters. And of course, no paper proof - you can't be sent back.

In the case of the Moroccan example - you'd think that, wouldn't you? But in practice, states don't want to take responsibility for someone they argue might not be a citizen, whether that's because of expense or the fear they might have learned unsavory tricks whilst trying to illegally enter another country. Morocco isn't the only country unhelpful, by the way - I used it as an example, but all states are equally obstructive where there's a lack of paperwork!

How did those families get here? I'd find that a bit convenient too.

Most of the trafficking originates in Europe - particularly the Balkans and the FSU - but apparently, we are the biggest destination country: another prime spot is Dubai, as you might expect (though obviously, its not in Europe!) I seem to remember the country with the highest amount, in terms of actual figures, of enslaved people is actually India.

In our case, it's often blurred because many people who started out as smuggled (ie paid to be brought to the UK/Europe) often ultimately end up trafficked and enslaved - we're a desirable place to want to come and work, and you've been offered a job where you're taking care of kids, and will have a chance to work on your English: and you get paid twice what you do working in the grocer's at home. Of course, you're going to jump at the chance - except when you get to the UK, you discover, at best, you're picking in the fields, paying rent for your shitty caravan/shed that's above the market rate for somewhere swanky in your nearest town, and have to give a cut to the gang boss - and still have to pay off your travel expenses, which somehow have amounted to thousands. At worst, of course, you become a sex slave.

With regards to figures, the last estimating was done in 2009, and was between 400-odd thousand and over 800 000; Migration Watch, I think, claimed numbers were over 1 million. So- it's not really known. And given that, almost uniquely, I think, compared to other countries I've been too, we don't record who leaves, it's likely that there will be people who've been legitimately given visas and have overstayed. They've tightened up the whole visa process the last few years, supposedly to prevent this, but I suspect it hasn't stopped people exploiting the system.

Noeuf it's often not true: in fact, there is a lot of evidence from Afghanistan, for example, that shows a family will all scrape together to contribute to send one young male member to try to get to Europe. (This is because a) it's safer and b) there's cultural issues over women travelling alone, especially if unmarried etc) Once there, he will establish himself, work hard, send money - and hopefully, other members can follow as a result.

I read an interview a few months ago with an Afghan who was a British interpreter for 8 months (during the period that British forces were withdrawing) and had paid to fly to Europe in order to get to Calais because the Taliban had made threats against his family, and apparently, killed one of his family members too (possibly an uncle- I can't remember). His idea was that he would get to the UK and then send for his wife, toddler and baby under family reunification. That was enough to end my sympathy for him completely - a member of your family is murdered and there are threats, so you leave your wife and children, instead of using the flight money for them? He's not stupid - he knows it's a process that will take years and not months, yet he's prepared to save his skin and risk theirs. There are cultural issues for Afghan women, and of course, women are more vulnerable - but if my family had been threatened by the Taliban, I would see that as the preferable route, rather than leaving them alone and unprotected, without an income, for years