suprised there is no thread on this, french close down "jungle"

[2shoes]

suprised as this will affect us
wonder if they will all be allowed over here now.
can we keep taking all these people, considering the goverment is talking about cutting education due to lack of money. it isn't like they are fleeing a war torn country.

Poverty is indeed relative but you can't blame the descendants of ordinary working people for the wrongdoing of the upper classes and industrialists.

When the Empire was running at full strength, very few ordinary people had have a vote, let alone any way to alter what their 'betters' did. By the time we got the universal franchise, the Empire was on its last legs.

Anyway that still leaves the question about why the people in Calais don't apply for asylum in the first/second/third/fourth safe country they reach. If they are that desperate, why are they rejecting all these other options?

(And it's simply not true to say that's unfair to continental Europe - plenty of people arrive in the UK by plane or sea.)

"I don't understand why genuine asylum seekers can't do it via the relevant embassy in their native country"

Just do a simple search in google about crowds around embassies. You can't simply walk in and introduce yourself as an assylum seeker. They are heavily guarded, much more so in countries of political unrest.

gosh even in my grans generation and even my parents to ectent, they had little 'choice' about what they did or said. My gran passed her 11+ and her parents (miners) could not afford her uniform and she left school before she was 14 and worked ina factory. There was no choice and they did live in poverty. I cannot see how you can say otherwise tbh

extent

I may aswell throw this sodding thing out of the window, because it is my tools that are to blame, not my typing

I don't understand why they want to come to England either. If your in fear of your life surely the first EU country you arrive is the place where you apply for asylum status.
If you really are desperate I can't think why you would be picky

I agree that we do not all benefit from (global) capitalism equally but

My bil claims that the simple fact of being born in the UK, with all our benefits (NHS, free education, etc.) is equivalent to a birthright of £1 million.

The movement of peoples across the world, not simply because of war/persecution but also for economic reasons, suggests, strongly, that this birthright is founded on a global inequity, with the impoverishment far, far from the UK.

I must admit, I'm sneakily in favour of open borders, full stop. Not even just for the victims of persecution and atrocity. Capital is allowed to roam free, why not people?

The fact that, if borders were open, there would be a vast, shocking, amazing decline in the living standards most UK citizens is, I think, a cause for thought.

We would hate that. Quite rightly. And yet we tolerate that for other people.

Actually, I'm not sure there would be a vast shocking decline. What I meant was more something along the lines of "even if there were to be" ... .

I don't know ... it's late but I do find the whole thing about being able to "switch off" from the inequities of global wealth distribution really shocking.

Which is a bit off-topic. But an interesting thread.

I agree with mrsruffallo - If asylum has to be claimed in the first safe country reached then there cannot be any genuine asylum seekers in this country at all.

I have this image of people standing outside a camp in France and tutting "isn't it terrible what the British are doing to these people" It's really weird how everything is always our fault. And yes I've heard all about what our ancesters did, but then lots of people commit atrocities in africa for example and you wouldn't blame every black person collectively for those crimes would you.

Since there are only a few of these and since people really want to help them I have a solution. We start a scheme where a british family can adopt an immigrant. You sign a paper that you will let them live in your house with you until they get a job and a home of their own.

Lots of people would be eager to sign up for that I would think. You'd probably get enough volunteers just from MN.

'we already have a housing shortage, all these people will need homes and so on '

Well, hey, it's going to be a tight squeeze but they're welcome to come and bide with us.

I'm not British by birth. My grandparents were immigrants, too. So am I.

But I'm a mother. That's all. I don't think taking a child from its parents because they were living in a camp is unfair, I think it's a fucking travesty.

I thought about camping out with my family, just about a week ago.

You gotta be pretty desperate to even consider that.

REAL fucking desperate, actually, and we didn't even go through what they did to get there.

So yeah, they're welcome to share if that's what keeps them, and us, together.

Gotta do their share of the cooking and cleaning, but the door's open . . .

'"isn't it terrible what the British are doing to these people" It's really weird how everything is always our fault.'

LOL! Try being American by birth and coming on this board!

It's all your fault, you racist, imperialist, capitalist, compassionless scumbag.

Not a pleasant feeling, is it?

No, I didn't think so.

'can we keep taking all these people, considering the goverment is talking about cutting education due to lack of money. it isn't like they are fleeing a war torn country. '

And oh, yeah, the government's considering making people pay for their university education.

Whilst babies and children sleep away from the parents tonight in Gaea-knows-where.

Yeah, break out the fecking violins.

I don't get this obsession in UK with the housing shortage. And that letting in more assylum seekers is going to make that worse.

In my hometown several Housing Associations are building lots of new houses in the suburbs, many of them are adapted for people with SN.

Go to the outskirts of Dundee, towards Arbroath and look at the hundreds of new houses that were built in the last 10 years.

With the incredible amount of housebuilding that has gone on in the past 20 years and the falling population, how can we be worried about housing shortage?

Good post, Riven.

riven, so when you next want a SW or a bed in a hospital and you can't get it, you won't mind.
IMO it is nothing to do with Race, as far as I am concerned(just my opinion) we can't keep taking people here wherever they come from.

We offered these countries the possibility of asylum in our country in exchange for cheap labour etc etc.The british lived like kings in india for example and had them waiting on us hand and foot domestically and in the workplace.We offered them the opportunity to live here as citizens in exchange for that.

The issue is space and infrastructure in the UK, and the obvious problem of being an Island and supplying the needs of the populace.

France is much bigger than the UK, as is Germany, so they have the space to house the immigrants; the UK doesn't. The reason the immigrants want to get to the UK is that the rules for getting housing and benefits are easier than anywhere else.

I would also point out that when the Brits withdrew from somewhere they'd colonised they did leave some semblance of order, unlike the other colonial nations (Belgium and the Congo springs to mind).

It will be increasingly difficult for illegal immigrants to get work as their putative employers won't want to risk the potential fines if their paperwork is not in order (Baroness Scotland recently as an example), so they will disappear into the black economy.

It is not feasible as 2shoes says to keep taking people. From 2014 the Romanians and the Bulgarians will be able to come to the UK without restriction under the EU rules, and if Turkey gets membership, then the UK will be opened up there as well.

I think our borders should be stronger and I don't think that signing up to Schengen would do any favours for our security either. France, Germany, Canada, Australia and Denmark also have troops in Afghanistan. Those not on the front line are of course the French and the Germans. It is the UK that is targeted though; the capital hasn't been rechristened Londonistan for nothing.

scaryteacher - totally agree with you, especially about the effects of colonisation. Anyone think India would be any better off now if we had not been there??

I do not understand the argument that other European countries that are significantly larger than us, take more immigrants than us. Of course they should, we are a relatively tiny island and are already overcrowded. Just look at the road network, hospital waiting lists and school class sizes to see that.

Any immigrants that have made it into Western Europe should be 'safe' and have no pressing need to come into the UK. If they are genuinely fleeing from life-threatening persecution, they should be relieved to be safe and joining relatives in the UK should be done through the proper channels afterwards. France should not be blaming us for Calais, they should be looking at their own border controls and how these people got into France.

The answer surely is make wherever they are fleeing from safe and of a standard of living that NHS tourists and benefits britain is less attractive.
And that means instead of handing out the money once these people arrive here having lived through horrific conditions in the first place we just sign the cheques in which ever country needs it to improve the lives of it's citizens.
I applied for a council property in 2000 and got one within 6 weeks, since moved out of it, my sister has applied and been waiting 3 years since 2006 so there must be a shortage of homes the numbers don't add up.

Obviously the 'system' in this country is attractive that does need addressing.But if you were fleeing from the sort of horrors most of them are you can't tell me you wouldn't want that too.Its human nature to want to be safe and housed fed etc.No one is saying India is in a worse state but we do need to keep our side of the bargain or change the LAW

BigMomma, France (as part of the EU) no longer has border controls with most of the countries which surround it. These people come in to the EU through the south Greece, Spain, Italy etc and once they are there, there are no border controls until they get to Calais.

Some of them have already been released because they needed healthcare (scabies) or their papers are in order.

Noddy - I'd be far happier about the Commonwealth countries having easier immigration to the UK, than some of the EU countries and the illegal immigrants. I agree we have a duty of care perhaps to the Commonwealth (if we are relating this to the Empire), but not to the people who are trying to get into the UK illegally.

France needs to step up to the plate and start processing the asylum seekers. If the boot were on the other foot, do you really think the French would be opening their gates and allowing the asylum seekers in? No way!