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

[BillSykesDog]

As the first one is filled and the story is still current....

Re the point about Catholicism in Poland and Ireland. A lot of the ideas I mentioned have roots in Christianity anyway (do as ye would be done by, turn the other cheek etc). And the influence of the Church is very much waning in those countries anyway.

But also a bit of another derail which filled the thread, hence the new one...

And the language thing is a red herring. People often move to a country where they can't speak the language we have many people who have lived here for years who can't speak English will be the same in France and Germany and English living abroad

But it's a good excuse on why the UK is the only place to seek asylum

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3425358/Borders-completely-open-migrants-inevitable-predicts-Labour-s-John-McDonnell.html

^ doesnt surprise me at all.

No me neither. As usual not much said about something that could be done Labour are the most pathetic opposition at the moment it's embarrassing.

We have to do something about all the children that are on their own I don't doubt some parents will then come forward but the thought of so many children roaming Europe by themselves is horrific

Those poor kids must be so scared.

The thing is if we take the children more will be sent...and be put in the same situation.
Then is it fair to return them at 16 or 18?
Will they then get work (hopefully) and be able to sent money home?
Will they be able to get other family members into the UK? (One of the arguments is that the people in Calais are trying to join family members in the UK)
Can they marry someone from their own country and bring them over?
(And of course are they really children? The age they say they are?)

I said on another thread the Stockholm fascist act seems to have been directed against Moroccan teen gangs who have been causing havoc at the station. (Still not saying it was justified at all)

They apparently were Moroccan street children and they won't stay in care. I don't know what you can do for them, what their future holds.
They remind me of a boy of 10 whose only parent was imprisoned. He kept running away because his foster parents were horrible - they said he had to be home by 9.30pm and wouldn't let him smoke dope in his room...
He ran to friends of his parent, his old neighbours etc and they kept returning him. The big fear was if he felt he had nowhere left to go he would end up on the streets and be effectively 'lost'. Last I heard he was getting used to being cared for and having boundaries and hadn't run for a while...
But he had 'friends' to go to ...who he knew wanted to help him and his parent wanted him to stay with the foster carers ....and also fear - he had never been on the streets (on his own at least) - these street children don't have any of that support or fear... and there are dozens of them not just a few...

re the children even if something was done about the obviously small children, and why are they there?

have they been sent, or parents died, or father buggered off and mother died?

I wish we as the eu could do something for them at least, at least make them safe...they are being targeted.

awful world we live in when children are put at risk like this.

there will be on their own for all different reasons

but they have to be protected. I have seen on the news children as young as 8 going through borders on their own, is the promise to meet up with family, have they been sent in the hope they are the ticket to allow family to follow

I don't know but they simply can't be left on their own but do agree once we start taking children in more will arrive

The main problem with the refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, etc is that they're just holding pens and the people within them have no work. No work very quickly translates to no hope and now that Europe is wide open and the possibility of restarting their lives with jobs, healthcare, schooling/further education, etc is dangling in front of them anyone with the possibility to leave is doing so. So there we have the push factor to leave and the pull factor to come here. What we need to do to solve the crisis (at least the Syrian one), is remove both push and pull factors.

To do this we have to:

• give the Syrian peace process the highest priority;
• create proper functioning towns, instead of merely refugee camps;
• allow Syrian teachers to teach Syrian DC the Syrian curriculum in preparation for a future in Syria;
• create economic zones within the refugee towns where people can work, start up businesses, etc that employ both locals and refugees side by side;
• have proper Navy patrols of the seas around Turkey and return people who set off;
• immediately return those who enter Europe illegally.

This should be administered by the UN with the support of all G8 nations.

As long as the lucky ones who make it to Europe are allowed to stay and given residence in nice, safe western Europe we will never make any progress.

great post juneau agree with everything you have said

shame I am not hearing this from politicians

Yeah, I why that is? Because if a mum of two from Hertfordshire can figure it out why can't all the great minds running the EU?

well we are not hearing anything from the left on what would could be done they are utterly useless

as from the right i think they are working on what the public and right wing press want to hear or run with

many just want to hear they cant come here our borders are closed how we can make this happen many are not concerned with

sorry for typos trying to do too many things at once .....

I think many are not that interested at the moment on hearing how lives of refugees could be made better they are more concerned with our borders being closed

Then the issue of economic migrants has unfortunately got out of hand at the same time and separating the issues for authorities it seems they are unable to manage as they are so overwhelmed (how Greece has managed to deal with so many people and they will be dealing with many more this year I don't I am sure there are many in Europe that have come in that we are unaware of and that is dangerous).

Along with the attacks on NYE and others we are hearing about people are less empathic and I can't see that changing until government's work together to gain some sort of control over the situation

juneau I don't disagree with any of that, but the UNHCR doesn't even have the funds to feed the people in the camps right now let alone offer them some sort of dignified existence with hope for the future.

Plus, their right to work is determined by the host government. Do we really think we have the right to tell the Turkish or Jordanian or Lebanese government what to do ? We could try bribing them, sure, like we have with Turkey ... But that costs money and has no guarantee of success.

I guess what I am saying is - Europe has done too little to head off the problem at source and it is probably too late now. Arrivals in Jan 2016 were something like 50 times higher than in Jan 2015 ... Any solution is going to have to be a pragmatic one that neither left for right will like (the left won't like it because many non-Syrians are going to have to be deported and the right won't like it because come what may many of the people who are already in Europe are going to have to be integrated).

I think its that 'lack of control' you mention that is now (finally!) scaring people. Last summer a lot of people (not me, I hasten to add), were carried along with a feeling of goodwill and 'doing the right thing' (yes Angela Merkel, I mean you), and really hadn't thought through the full implications of just allowing anyone and everyone who wanted to just sail, walk or swim into Europe. Of course its highly dangerous to have no idea who is coming in. Of course things were going to get out of hand. Of course, some nations wouldn't be happy to have their borders trampled. Of course right wing parties would see a surge in membership.

So yes, control must be re-established and the Greeks must be forced to reinstate their maritime border with Turkey. Mrs Merkel would do well to withdraw her oh-so-generous offer too, although I note from this article (www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/12132657/Merkel-warns-asylum-seekers-that-German-refuge-is-temporary.html) that she is finally starting to take a more realistic stance. Some really tough decisions need to be made before the spring though if any real changes are to occur.

the UNHCR doesn't even have the funds to feed the people in the camps right now let alone offer them some sort of dignified existence with hope for the future.

That's why the G8 have to get involved.

Do we really think we have the right to tell the Turkish or Jordanian or Lebanese government what to do?

Ideally the refugees would be moved to safe zones within the borders of Syria, but failing this I think the UN should try to do a deal so that at least refugees are allowed to set up businesses within the camps/towns and refugee DC are allowed to be educated by teachers from their own countries. Educating Syrian DC in Lebanese or Jordanian schools won't make it easier for them reintegrate back into their own country and presumably the host countries WANT them to go home asap?

Re the Moroccan street children in Stockholm... No street child, however resourceful, is going to have the money to pay the people traffickers to get that far. I cannot see how they would get as far as Sweden if they weren't deliberately being taken there by criminal gangs. It certainly seems as though they are being exploited by criminals once they get to Sweden.

Morocco has apparently agreed to take them back...
www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2016/01/21/le-maroc-accepte-de-reprendre-ses-enfants-des-rues-en-suede_4851507_3212.html

The people benefiting from all this are the people smugglers. If you are uneducated and unemployed, in a country where there is little trust in the official media, and someone, a friend of a friend maybe, tells you how much better life would be in Germany or the UK, there is a good chance that you will believe them rather than any official news sources, and you will be prepared to hand over the money that's going to get you a passage to the country of your dreams. How to counteract that misinformation I don't know.

Longway I'd been wondering how so many street children, some as young as 9, could have made it to Sweden, but of course your explanation makes sense. Presumably the gangs are being run by adults, along the lines of the Victorian Oliver Twist type pick-pocketing gangs. It would make sense they would believe they would have better pickings in Sweden for as long as they could manage to stay there.

juneau for sure the Syrian refugees would be better off in a safe place in Syria ... good luck with that one. You've got a bunch of murderous religious nutters facing off against a murderous dictator, with all manner of armed gangs of varying degrees of extremism in between.

It's a mess and wishful thinking won't resolve it. Resolving it is going to take either a lot of money and a large dose of pragmatism, OR a wholesale disregard of both human rights and international law.

Sadly many people in europe would seem to prefer the latter. And history should tell us where that leads.

Money and pragmatism - exactly. I didn't say it would be easy - but that's what's needed.

juneau Mon 01-Feb-16 14:10:10
It was never for Merkel to do the right thing without thinking it through though.

She has lumped the whole of the EU with this problem now, its a disgrace, this is why i want to get out of the EU.

One rouge leader has spoken and dragged us all down with her. NO sovereignty!

She has put lives at risk and caused so many problems and for a country with such an horrific wicked history she has made a blunder that has caused massive Far right reaction! Oh the bloody irony the stupid idiotic woman!

enthusiam I get confused with all the different groups out there, but they all seem to be rather shite and useless at the moment, why are these children age 8 not being picked out and taken somewhere special and safe. then I HESITATE to say that because where is really safe?

As for Calais camp it's been there for 20 years it will be there for another 20 years once in the UK it's easy to go missing. No need to constantly show id and there is a large amount if illegal employment

I thought I read something about how the migrants/benefits numbers didn't tie up and that people are 'disappearing' or working in the shadow economy.

Would be interesting to see peoples thoughts on ID cards now.

I have never really understood the opposition to ID cards

I am sure those that do oppose them still will

Excellent post, juneau

There was a report the other day that 10 000 children from this recent migrant crisis are now "missing": obviously, some of those will have been reunited with family etc, but it is undeniable that many will have fallen into the hands of organised crime and will be facing enslavement of some form, in many cases, sexual. Lone children are a positive "gift" to traffickers, unfortunately.

There's also the issue, where people lack documents for whichever reason, of "proving" age - it seems mostly to relate to young men, but during the Afghan War, for example, there were a number of cases where ages were claimed to be lower, so that the individual could get an education - and, of course, was harder to deport as a by-product.

The issue with UNHCR that misti mentions is a very real problem: the allocations to refugee families for a month are totally paltry, even allowing for differences in purchasing power parity, and the majority of countries (not the UK in this case) who have pledged money simply haven't followed through. Lebanon is already a volatile society because of its diversity, and the refugee population, through their very presence, has the potential to destabilise society further, unfortunately - and Jordan also has had a previous bad experience where a refugee population threatened to undermine and overwhelm the system (the period leading up to Black September): so it is not surprising that there are severe restrictions imposed by host governments in one way. But people in the camps should be a) allowed to make a decent living and b) be being prepared for "the day after".

The idea of retraining people where relevant, and of teachers teaching the Syrian curriculum is excellent - there is a huge body of evidence from Africa that shows that deskilling of refugees happens relatively quickly: even things like agricultural knowledge in formerly agrarian societies. It is vital both for the refugees and for the future of Syrian itself that skills and knowledge is preserved and built upon, so that when the war is over (and it will be over, eventually) they return to lives in which is it possible for them to live in prosperity.

breaking I'd still be anti ID cards ...the people working on illegal ID I knew were using European ID cards...as they were easier to fake and they were good enough to get legitimate NI numbers - (you have (had) to go some government office to get one) ...
And although this was pre 9/11 I could have got a fake passport for a couple of hundred...one that was good enough to get a NI number, fool employers and open bank accounts. And UK ones are not popular as if you can't speak English - or at least not well - and were supposedly born in the UK it raises suspicions...EU ones were preferred.
Also kind of related - in the early 90s the benefits office didn't to 'talk' to the tax office -not sure if that is still the case. When DP arrived in London (from an EU country) he lived in a hostel with lots of mainly Italians, Spanish and French. They told him first you go there to claim benefits (housing benefit and job seekers or whatever) then you get a job... lots of worked and claimed benefits (probably not so easy now though!)
Also if you were arrested for a minor crime and get bailed - don't go back - just move house asap...they will never bother to find you, they don't want to find you...easier for them not to.
Also try to give them a false name or at least slightly misspell your 'foreign' name...so even though they see ID, maybe even take a copy if you are entered as a different name on the forms they are unlikely to notice...and they are looking for someone with a different name...
(And people have done these things and got away with it...)

It is an education ....these are things that you wouldn't risk if you were invested in a country/your life - with family, a house, a career - you cared about the consequences ...but if you can just go back to your home country or another country or even just a different part of the UK ...you don't need to care.

I think the report after the Cologne assaults of the guy ripping up his papers and saying he'd get new ones tomorrow illustrate a big part of the problem - a lack of consequences for their actions....