... to think that Nigel Farage will be our next PM?

[ohime]

Or, more accurately: AIBU to be afraid that truly nasty piece of work Nigel Farage who has, by all accounts, always been utterly useless at (or at least completely uninterested in) the actual business end of governing will be our next PM because everyone is so fed up with all the other parties being, variously or all at once, so corrupt, incompetent and useless that we've collectively abandoned all hope? I will never vote for Farage, who is a horrible man, or any of his party which keeps having to fire people for being just a teensy bit too overtly racist - but it seems from the polls that for many people the choice against the status quo outweighs what we may be choosing. (For an example, I can't believe that Farage's stated position that DOGE in the US didn't go far enough with its swinging cuts to the social safety net would be popular with UK voters who recently elected a government on the basis that it would reverse years of Tory austerity... not that that's worked out so well...)

The DA is not a deterrence anywhere.

If you believe it is can you say why it’s not working to deter in the EU now?

Take Germany first example, or any country that is seeing a shift politically on this.

The only policies that have worked have been hardline, Italy to an extent, but physical barriers eg Poland / Belarus.

Can you say where the DA is working as a deterrent currently?

@Namitynamename You're wasting your time arguing.

Simple facts don't matter to some people, all that matters is "proving" Labour are worse and that Brexit is a roaring success.

Even when a former Tory minister laments the loss of the DA, it will be dismissed.
Yet Rwanda, where not a single migrant was returned, is supposed to have been a deterrent! lol!

Comparing Schengen countries to the UK is another mis representation, open borders make Dublin ineffective..... But if we had Dublin or similar, we would see a dramatic drop in numbers, France would have to accept returns or be in breach of EU law & once a few 100 sent back, the trafficking model would cease.

We gave that away and Bojo failed to negotiate an alternative.

Late to the thread but good post. I think that sums up the current state of the union.

The Conservatives need to change their leader now, while no one is watching and everyone still thinks they are rubbish. Kemi Badenoch is not cutting through. And then take the fight to Reform on policies such as immigration, but have the govermental experience and whatever competence the Conservatives may still possess behind them. Experience and competence is what Reform currently lack.

@Alexandra2001it’s fine the pp and I can discuss. I find their posts worth my time and interesting.

If you want to scroll on by feel free.

Dublin hardly stopped illegal immigration before Brexit though. It's not exactly a new phenomenon.

Rwanda was stopped by Keir Starmer before it had even started so we will never know whether it could have been a deterrent. Bearing in mind illegals were going to Ireland from the UK when it was about to be put in place, I am suspicious the counterfactual means it may have had potential....the road not taken...

Instead, we got Labour. And Keir Starmer remember was going to smash the gangs and reduce illegal immigration significantly. So that's going really well.

Yes, public outcry (and deaths) leading up to and including 2002 led to new rules and new agreements. And some of those rules were enforced in French soil not UK soil because of the 2003 agreement. Public outcry alone doesn't do anything. Public outcry won't fix the current issue. We don't need to rejoin the EU but we do need to cooperate with France if we want to tackle the numbers of small boats. People were suffocating in lorries because they were hiding from UK border officials in France and UK. It was a cat and mouse for officials to try to find them while they tried to hide. Not ideal for anyone. But now people don't need to hide from the UK officials even because we don't have a "border" in France and once they are in the UK there is no way to return them. So it's measurably worse. Even pro-brexit politicians acknowledge this.

It does take a while to set up a new system. But do you genuinely think it was pure coincidence that the people smugglers stumbled on their new method right as Brexit happened?

Yes I think other factors are more relevant. We had people arriving just by another method of entry. Eg

Until the dispersal of the Calais Jungle in 2016, which contained an estimated 3,000 would-be immigrants to the UK, the majority of asylum seekers entering the country via the English Channel did so through the Channel Tunnel, mostly by hiding in vehicles.

People stopped hiding in vehicles and traffickers built up a trade in sourcing boats and marketing the new method. It takes time, but over that time gets more known and people pay for the new way to cross.

But if you can say where the DA acts as a deterrent now I’m happy to hear it. Can you think of an EU country using it that way?

Shame we gave away our fishing rights for 12 years without requiring in return that the French to switch on the surveillance cameras on the beaches where the dinghies set off. Cameras that we paid for.

1. Switzerland has a returns policy that matches the Dublin agreement. @SquishedMallow already held them up as a country in control of its migration- which is apparently down to them being allowed to say no to migration and being respected. We had the equivalent agreements as them AND additional rights on top of that. So I guess we were respected then like Switzerland is now.

2.The UK before 2020. We had the Dublin agreement but this was helped by; not being in Schengen; UK being an island; the additional agreements with France. All these gave us a unique advantage over other countries. While there was tabloid concern about refugees being accepted in exchange they were in the 100s. And the biggest problems were happening at the jungle in Calais. Which again numbered in the 100s of people.

Everyone in the EU has the returns ability under the DA.

Why are they not using it as the deterrent you say it is?

Why did so many use lorries if it was working as one here?

A maximum of 3000.would be migrants. In France. Where we had our own border conducting it's own border patrols.
I am not saying it was perfect. It wasn't. People died in lorries etc. But if your concern is migration..surely 3000 potential migrants in another country who want to come, is less than 30,000 actual arrivals on British shores that then need processing and housing.
The method changed because it was no longer necessary to hide. So boats, where you are at risk of drowning and usually spotted by the UK coast guard became preferable to lorries because it doesn't matter if you get taken into custody on arrival. You are not going back.

None of this is controversial. The Tories know that Brexit made managing migration harder, Labour know it, Farage knows it.

Edited for spelling

Experience and competence is what Reform currently lack.

Experience and competence are not optional when running a government.
Also, the previous post you quoted said Reform had 'answers'. What are those fabled 'answers'?
I distrust Farage because when he pushed for Leave he argued that he knew the EU from the inside, and indeed, he must have known how immigration worked and about the agreements we had in place. He must have known how destructive leaving would be - not just economically, but for his pet topic: immigration control. Yet, he pushed for leave on the basis of 'taking back control of our borders' knowing full well that Brexit would make things much more difficult to police. Tell me, is that a trust-worthy stance? Or rather an opportunistic move of the worst kind?

The solution would be for us to actually police our borders if the EU is unable to police theirs. And if someone gets in they are returned without the hordes of lefty lawyers getting hold of them and suggesting they pretend to be Christian in order to avoid "persecution" by Muslims in their own country.

So leave whatever supra-national outfit is stopping that. Or reform it. That was one of the aims of Brexit but unfortunately we don't ever get what we vote for because the governments that we vote for won't do what the electorate vote for.

I think in general people don't care much about immigration as long as they feel their own life is going ok. When it isn't then they view it a lot more negatively, as a drain on public finances and increased competition for scarce resources.

I think both of the main parties recognise that the public don't like immigration much and promise to do something about it. In fact they actually don't. This is similar to what happened with Brexit. Both parties for years were promising votes/referendum on the issues. But both when in power refused to do what they had promised.

This denial of democracy can only go on so long. Eventually UKIP forced the Tories to offer a referendum on their ticket and the rest is history.

I think the same will probably happen here. Farage will force both of the main parties into a corner where they have to offer something concrete that can't be fudged on immigration and in that process Reform will become redundant.

The most difficult question is what they will actually offer, as although reducing legal immigration is a possibility, reducing illegal immigration appears to be extremely difficult.

I don't think there is any co-incidence that the rise of Reform is leading to alternative parties on the left (see Corbyn). In order to combat Reform both the Tories and Labour have to move to the right, which leaves a vaccuum for a new left party to fill. The real question here will be whether that party takes enough votes off Labour to cause Labour to swing back to the left.

We should and do police our UK borders. Once people reach the UK borders though, the police policing them can arrest the arrivals but can't send them back to France without Frances permission. Policing our borders doesn't change the headline numbers "30,000 arrivals.this year" which is upsetting people. Usually migrants just turn themselves in because they have no incentive not to now anyway.
The solution previously was to establish a.sort of UK border in France and police that (2003). That worked quite well. Until it ended as a result of Brexit. But short of invading France we need their agreement to set up UK borders in their country.

It's nothing to do with 'supra national' organisations. Cross border issues cannot be solved without multilateral cooperation.

We have only two options:

1. We bolster our cooperation with France to make sure that they have enough funds to police their shores. THEIR shore. They're doing the job FOR US. It's not any country's responsibility to police the border of another sovereign country. No one should be forced to stay in a particular country. In that respect, logically, dealing with an EU member state as a fellow EU member state would make so much more sense. Failing that, work at the best possible deal knowing that frankly, what happens in France will always be beyond our control because France is a sovereign state with its own issues and priorities.
2. We move the borders where they belong and have always belonged: our own shore. But then we have a bit of an issue, don't we? How do we stop the boats from coming in? We've got nowhere to 'return' the migrants to. And then what? Let them drown? Shoot them? Really, what is the option? Do you think the British electorate really wants to see bodies in the Channel? Is that what we've come to?

No that was just the camp cleared out. Figures for arrival are different. The point was people just used lorries in high numbers pre boats.

Your argument seems to be shifting to lorries being better as detection was put in place. That seems a bit upside down as it was those restrictions that meant people turned to boats next.

If nothing had been put in place those methods would likely have remained.

The DA needed permission. Refusals increased. The criteria to return was high. Hence only a few hundred using it and more coming to UK than out.

@Quirkswork it's not lefty lawyers stopping the k returning migrants to France. Its the fact France is a sovereign country and you need their permission to do that

We had a returns agreement
We left the EU
The returns agreement ended
Irregular migration increased

I own a house
I paint the walls red
Now my walls are red

30000.more?

No it's because people don't need to worry now about being caught at the border
They are already here at that point.

Could you look at what’s happening in other EU countries? Just in terms of migration pressures and how the DA isn’t doing anything to counter that.

It just switched methods

Lorry to boat.

exactly - as far as I know there’s no way of teaching common sense.

So if you are born with none, surely it is better to be well educated with no common sense than pig-ignorant with no common sense?

It might happen at some point but not with Labour.