To think the RNLI are 100% in the right

[SanFranBear]

I've just seen this story on the BBC news homepage where the RNLI are being accused of acting as a taxi service for migrants trying to enter the UK on small boats from Europe.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c8dejyg4l37o

The organisation and volunteers quite rightly have responded to say they make no apologies for saving lives at sea and that their work has no political motivation.

Damn straight - one of the volunteers further down the article explains the profound impact he feels of encountering people struggling in our waters.

It makes me wonder what critics of the service expect them to do - just sail away, leaving the people to die? Pick them up and cross the channel to dump them back 'where they came from'?

What is wrong with them? Where is their compassion? Regardless of your thoughts on immigration, this is so cold and inhuman....

It was a few hundred and we took more than that, it was a way to enter.

RNLI haven’t any choice.

Has it ever occurred to the race screechers that most illegal immigrants aren’t black? Ever met any? Thought not.

But the accommodation they’re getting if in London will certainly deprive a black family of a home, because poverty in London is mostly black.

Daft.

Yes she did. That was the first time I ever donated to the RNLI when all that hit the news and I have been donating monthly ever since. Hope this most recent media attention gets them yet more donations.

Well, if your mum's neighbour says so, it must be true. Such a shame that someone who works in this field has such scant understanding of it and yet less empathy with the people they are employed to help.

I volunteer in this field and can tell you that your mum's neighbour is wrong. But you won't believe me, so.

No, she's regurgitating the tired old trope that asylum seekers should just stay in France. Yes, there are women and children on the boats. And they will have reasons to be there.

So Elrig was wrong then. People will risk their children's lives on dangerous waters. You can't have it both ways.

Yep, mum's neighbour is spouting the Great Replacement Theory bullshit. Which makes said neighbour a full on racist.

seems from this thread they maybe gaining some.

They are not being ‘swept up in this political hot potato’. They are simply impartiality fulfilling their charter to save lives at sea, inland waters and floods.

If they refused to save drowning migrants, that would be massively political and completely at odds with their charter.

I never said they wouldn't. But people on this thread are still saying asylum seekers are legally obliged to stay in a safe country. They're not.

So what's your solution then?
You don't want people to be left to drown, but say there's a limit that the RNLI can rescue.
Where do they draw that line, and if you think they can only limit themselves to a certain amount of rescues, what do you think is going to happen to any people in difficulties who they don't bother to turn out for?

I thought they were supposed to claim alyslum in the first safe country they come to ...has that changed?
France is safe
And these crossings cost thousands per person,the traffickers don't provide the boat for free .
Those thousands could be spent on accommodation in any number of countries they have passed through.
They were already safe before they got in the boat to come to UK

No I don't think RNLI should leave anyone to drown

But instead of sailing them to UK ,turn the boat round and sail them back to France ..Where they are safe

@FreezeDriedStrawberries My solution is that we withdraw the financial incentives that are a pull factor to the UK in particular.

Your home is broken , you see children die from preventable illnesses, you see your daughters future taken from them, you are scared , traumatised , you speak English, you have family in England, you have learnt about England in school …..

Nigel Farage can do one. But were he in trouble at sea the RNLI would rescue him. He wants to take a lesson a) in compassion and b) in what the RNLI are set up to do- rescue anyone in peril on the sea. Racist, classist nasty twit.

Yes, it has changed because we are no longer part of the EU.

Do you think it would be possible to turn everyone around if Brexit hadn’t happened?

Is that what you think is happening in countries still in the EU?

On the other hand … fact these boat are even departing when every rule of safety is violated is wrong as well. They put RNLI staff at risk as well. Not to mention the costs, and the potential for not saving others (who are not undertaking deliberate unsafe journeys). I’d be cross of RNLI were dealing w people traffickers and not rescuing a rule-following family w a sinking sailboat.

There needs to be other options, to stop the unsafe sea journeys.

France is never the first safe country they come to, it's the last before coming to the UK

The majority stay close to their home countries.

It's irrelevant what happens afterwards - the fact is that there are humans needing rescuing. That is what matters.

As it is, I pay tax, so it's up to the government to spend it as they see fit. That's what they're there for, after all. Same way what happens to somebody after I stop them getting knocked over by a car, provide first aid after an accident or call the fire brigade and help them get away from a house on fire isn't my responsibility. They could be a horrible person. That doesn't matter - what matters is that they do not die when I could stop it.

It's a social contract that predates the countries we live in. It predates the language we're typing in. It's in the bible for those who follow that.

It's what humans do and it may one day save us or somebody we love personally if it hasn't already done it with our ancestors and we wouldn't be here were it not for somebody doing the same.

Of course they should stay in France where they are safe. Just because they can cross the channel doesn't mean they should. They are not in danger in France. And as for children being on these small boat crossings, they really don't have any choice.

You sound like you're all for these crossings. The only people benefitting are the trafficking gangs.

As a Shoreline member and fundraiser for the RNLI, I 💯 agree with the volunteers.

No one is destitute who can afford to pay the traffickers thousands per person to cross the channel.
They obviously have money to afford to do that
Money that would be much better spent in a safe country like France
Yet cross to the UK they do ,to receive free phones ,free ,housing ,,free clothes.
Yet the money they spent paying the traffickers could of paid for phones ,housing clothes somewhere safe .. without having to risk their life crossing the channel

Yes of course migrants ‘should’ stay in the first safe country they get to, and they shouldn’t be putting their kids onto dinghies to cross a dangerous sea.
But they do, and so the RNLI absolutely should rescue them.

Parents shouldn’t let their kids play on inflatables with an offshore wind, shouldn’t let them swim near rip tides, all sorts of situations arise which shouldn’t… the RNLI rescues all they can according to need.

I work in the charity sector and there was some great insight when this all kicked off a few years ago. 1600 people cancelled their direct debits to the rnli, but 27000 people set up new ones. The people who think they’re a taxi service are in the minority

This is excellent news!! I was one of the 27,000!