Why do migrants want to come to the UK?

[Fizzielove]

Why in particular is the UK seen as the place to go? Surely other EU countries give migrants as much as they would get in the UK? £36 a week doesn't make sense to me to make thousands of people want to come here (alongside housing, NHS, education, etc.)

I really believe the government ought to start a campaign that is honest about life in Britain for most Brits.

Yeah, but they'd only want to target it at poor people...

The conscious campaign of "isn't the UK wonderful" is targetted at all those potential overseas students, all those tourist, all those businesses we'd like to have major offices here...

And you only have to look at the current thread on the British Empire to realise there's still an undercurrent of imperial superiority swilling round in our national subconscious, which spills out everywhere.

No one is going to stand up and say publicly to forriners, "Actually Britain's a bit crap."

Certainly not any UK government which sells itself by claiming the country is better than ever, Brits are better off than ever, etc etc.

But seriously the woman has been on the throne forever. She is synonymous with stable government and stable transition of govt, the rule of law, and a comfortable middle class [pricks ears for hollow laughs from the MN jury]. She is the Head of State for 16 countries globally incl Aus, NZ and Canada. PausingFlatly's point about people growing up with the legacy of living in a former colony is also very true.

The language and the economy is the big draw in my opinion, not the benefits system. Prior to the break out of the war, the UK was probably one of the few places with direct air links to Syria too? It all breeds a history of trade and familiarity.

There is a long history of British involvement in the region generally. The wife of the current Head of State in Syria was born in the UK and Assad did some of his training here in London. We're not massively attractive to Syrian's but some of them will have links here of course. No country with such a history of overseas "involvement" could fail to do so. If they all wanted to migrate to Ireland or Japan, it would be a bit strange.

Re Germany, Syria shares a long border with Turkey and therefore I would assume that the current level of attractiveness to Syrians [kurds or otherwise] of Germany is down to the sheer huge numbers of 1/2/3 generation Turkish/German residents.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turks_in_Germany

Don't underestimate the power of Mr Bean either.

Pausing, what in particular shocked your relatives?

It's all true about Mr Bean.

Seriously, in Zimbabwe newspapers syndicate columns from the British press, the UK footy results are part of the national news, and for a certain sort of white Zimbabwean who has never been to the UK and I hope wouldn't be let in the catchphrase "only in Africa" is applied to everything that goes wrong.

I remember listening to such a tirade open-mouthed, thinking, "No mate, only in Africa would some kind soul now be running round like a blue-arsed fly trying to sort the problem out for you rather than folding their arms and going 'So?'"

The UK is perpetually being held up as some sort of ideal state. What's more, it charitably or for a price sends advisors to teach the poor deficient locals how to do stuff right. It's quite funny to see eg Thatcherite idealogues come up against locals who have studied in both the UK and in the former Soviet-bloc, and are much better educated with a broader worldview than the poor little advisor.

CuttedUpPear

'I've been to the camps in Calais and met refugees there.
Many, many of them are more highly qualified than I am and had careers and businesses in their hime countries.

If they could come here and work they would be paying a far higher rate of tax than I or many of my peers do.'

That's the rosy view of the highly-educated, productive, and integrated migrant. Alternatively, this could happen:

Werkzallhours

'Another significant problem is inter-sectarian or inter-ethnic violence in some areas. It's not a great idea to house Kurds in largely Pakistani areas, for example, but government just sees them all as "Muslims that need access to a mosque". The upshot of this idiocy in one case was a refugee who ended up with permanent brain damage after being attacked for being "anti-Saddam". His friends were shocked; they had no idea that they could leave Iraq only to find themselves in pretty much the same predicament in Britain.'

Buses, gleam. What tipped her over the edge was buses. And timetables. You know, the non-correspondence of the one to the other? Oh yes, lecturing a London bus driver on how they're more than 2 mins after the previous bus: that will go well.

But it was symptomatic of everything. She and her husband actually said how they'd been brought up believing Britain was the best of everything, and it was making them review a lot of things discovering what it was really like.

Fortunately they were on a working visit of a couple of years with a plan to return to their home country (which I think they were suddenly appreciating more), and the disillusionment was more painful than dangerous.

Unlike the poor folk Werks describes, for whom there is no return and no family in the UK to cosset them. That really is , rather than my tongue in cheek sadface earlier.

OneWingWonder, both scenarios happen.

It's pointless and unrealistic to pursue one and deny the other.

Denial means you either miss out on the benefits of the high-flyers (and migrants make a net contribution to the economy, because you tend to get them fully fledged and not have to invest in their childhood or sub-tertiary education. And if you're really lucky, they bugger later off to do their expensive old age "back home"). Or you fail to acknowledge the challenges that will arise and that you could just deal with. It's probably not more expensive to NOT house Kurds in Pakistani areas, but you do have to apply a bit of nous.

Many countries have had 'contact' with GB in the imperial and not so imperial past . That's how English became such a world wide language. Chickens are coming home to roost perhaps.

This is an interesting read. Why would some poor man who has no skills think that he would be given a house and money to start a business? Because some people smuggling bastards make money out of the myth from people like him:

www.wsj.com/articles/some-migrants-in-germany-want-to-go-home-1453672274

Where have you got £36 a week from? We definitely have the most generous benefits system, the NHS, English language etc. It's also not as hard to get into compared to other countries.

Our benefits system is not as generous as places like Germany and Scandinavia but they have more rules and time limits which means migrants can only claim for a certain amount of time or have to have worked in order to claim. As I understand it in the UK you can claim if you are in "need" even if you have never contributed to the system and there isn't really a time limit. Also, the UK is English speaking and immigrants from British colonies tend to want to come to the UK.

Thanks Pausing.

That would have been an interesting conversation to hear!

I think the traffickers paint an unrealistic picture of life here. I saw someone talking about it on television. They said even when told the truth some migrants refused to believe it.