Ashamed of this country.

[ionesmum]

Is anyone else distressed by the two little Afghan children who were detained whilst visiting their parents in an asylum seeker detention centre? It was bad enough when the police stormed the mosque where the parents were hiding and arrested them, but to hold the children in what is a prison in all but name makes me ashamed of what this country has come to. Surely we can share what we have? And treat people like human beings?

Ionesmum - thank you for your message. You've really encouraged me that not everyone in this country is of the view that all asylum seekers are scrounging evil people, to be got rid of as quickly as possible. So many people (esp at my work) moan about them, and I always think, I wonder how they would survive in conditions that these people have come from. Sure there are some 'bogus' asylum seekers, as the term goes, but is it not better to take all and then sort it out. People can be so selfish! We are so lucky in this country, that our worries, whilst real to us, are not on the scale of some of these people's dangers.

I was involved with asylum seekers last year and they went through hell to get to the UK. They had to travel through mountains for 3 days- hiding during the day and walking at night. They had to pay a guide a huge amount for this. One woman didn't know where her husband was as she hadn't heard from him for over 6 months! These people were educated, had their own business- their crime was that they were Christians in a muslim country. They could lose everything at any time, and lived in constant fear.

Some of the stories they told were horrific. They are now living in high-rise flats, and hoping that they can look forward to a better future.

musica, I wonder about "bogus" too. Just because people are not in danger of their lives shouldn't mean that they are condemned to a life of misery and poverty - they must be desperate to take the risks that they do.

But they obviously know quite a bit about our Social Security system - I wonder why the French sited one of their refugee camps so close to the Tunnel? - and the way that some of them are reported to behave towards local people doesn't do the rest any favours. And this is a small country, geographically - there do have to be limits, unfortunately. And it costs a lot to keep such people here, unless they can find jobs, and as you know in some areas there are not enough jobs for "natives", let alone immigrants. There is not an endless supply of money to support people who don't work and any extra comes out of other pots, eg health and education.

I have commented in another thread about some of the unbelievably callous comments made by HO officials about some asylum seekers, but they still have an awful job to do and I would not like to be in their shoes. It would be nice if everyone who wanted to come could come, but as a country we just can't afford it.

It seems that to some people that 'bogus' and 'asylum seeker' are automatically linked.

janh, I agree that some people do milk our benefit system but one problem is that asylum seekers are not allowed to work. Many of them are skilled and could work in the public services; others would be willing to undertake unskilled work, which in some areas is very necessary (our local authority struggles to find cleaners, for example). Instead they are given 2/3rds normal benefit and a recent survey has shown that many children in these families are suffering from malnutrition.

I will admit that I find it hard to sympathise with the young men who come here and cause trouble, but I agree with musica - surely it's better to allow everyone in and sort it out? And I know that as an island we have a finite amount of space but I read recently that there are seven empty properties for every homeless person in the country, so I am sure that we can fit them in somewhere.

I immigrated to the UK. From a nice, rich, mostly "white" country (the USA). And yet, I feel all the hostility directed at foreign immigrants, too. I used to cringe whenever Michael Howard came on the Radio. I had to send off to renew my work permit one-two times each year, and was very aware that this might be the time that my leave to remain might be rescinded. It took me ages to figure out that the anti-asylum seeker rhetoric wasn't actually aimed at people like me. I'm too educated & white for that.

That said.. the principle that asylum seekers should be dealt with in the first EU country they enter doesn't seem a bad one. I just think the West Midlands authorities have greatly mishandled the situation.

From the radio 6 news I heard they were worried about being deported back to Germany and had various problems not necessarily being derived from being Hounded.

Malaysia is currently deporting thousands of illegal workers from their country. They have just sentenced some illegal workers from Indonesia to terms of imprisonment and canings, after which they will be deported.

Normally I think the government goes over the top on asylum seekers, but in this case, the family had already made applications in Germany and that is where they'll be deported to. As long as the detention centre is comfortable, I don't see anything wrong with holding them there (though it was crass to say the least to storm a mosque).

I read a report that interviewed asylum seekers in Sangatte (the camp near Calais) and most gave their reasons for wanting to enter Britain as the Social Security system (which is odd, as usually it pays a lot lower than other Northern European countries) but more importantly the fact that we don't have ID cards in Britain. This last reason made me laugh as many anti-asylum seeker papers are also anti-ID card.

Again though I agree that we should provide a safe haven, but also agree that there are only so many people the country can support. It would help a lot if asylum seekers were allowed to work, but even then we do not have enough housing to go round as it is. I'm really very mixed on this issue.

ionesmum - just read the bit about 7 empty properties for every homeless person. Don't know where this comes from (homelessness stats are very unreliable), but I know the empty properties are mostly in disrepair with absent landlords, and/or in sink estates where no-one wants to live, especially in the North. Bussing all the asylum seekers out to those estates would create massive new ghettoes and would not be any good for the asylum seekers or the local community.

Lucy123, yes, many properties are in undesirable area but many are also in decent areas e.g empty flats above shops. There is also massive problem in London and other boom areas with landlords keeping properties empty with a view to selling quickly and making a killing - obviously they cannot do this with sitting tenants. Then if you add the number of second homes that are only used during the holidays...

I watched a programme on which four adults carried a ten-year-old away from her pregnant mother and onto a plane to deport her. Now I hear that David Blunkett is actively trying to prevent a lottery grant going to an organisation that helps asylum seekers. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation the fact is that we have detained two little children in custody (would you like your children to be kept there?) and it makes me sick.

ionesmum - I definately agree about greedy landlords - you're talking to someone who left the country because of a complete lack of affordable flats in the south (we could have moved up north I guess, but didn't fancy it). The housing situation in the UK is dire, and where the government has stepped in to refurbish council flats for asylum seekers, it has only bred contempt among the ordinary residents who can't afford a decent flat/can't have their council flat refurbished.

And the fact is that some (note that I don't particularly think it's many) asylum seekers are fraudulent - the government can't afford to ease up too much without making major changes to ease the housing situation first. It's not nice, but we could be talking riots if they don't use detention centres. I wouldn't particularly like my daughter to be held in a detention centre, but then neither would I like to bring her up in a damp hellhole (of the type we used to live in). Are this family allowed to see each other? If not, that is wrong, but if so, then - well - they did already have a safe haven in Germany.

Lucy123, I agree totally about the disgusting conditions that some people have to live in, but that doesn't justify the way asylum seekers are treated. As I said earlier, I will admit to having little sympathy for the young men who come over here because they think it will be easy for them but that is not the case for the majority of asylum seekers -around 50% are allowed to stay and our record for sending home people who are subsequently arrested or executed isn't great. It's stupid to treat asylum seekers better in relation to the local population but the solution seems to be to dump on everyone. I agree that the Government needs to sort out the housing situation - the average price of a flat is now higher than that of a house because developers only concentrate on the luxury market.

Detention centres don't work either. The Oakington centre has had 12,000 people in, 10,000 of whom it sent back into the community because they are waiting for their appeals to stay to be heard.

on this issue i am not ashamed of my country. the thing is that some asylum seekers take the mick and that spoils it for those genuinly trying to seek asylum.
i have worked with refugees and know that it is so hard for them ( then with the token systen dont know what it is like now) they could only shop at certain places, supermarkets sometimes miles away with high prices and food which they were not used to. even getting on the bus to get there was a problem, i had to pay for their bus fare because they had no money, i had to arrange for clothes for their children and toys because they had none. it is very hard for them, and this particular family were very well educated both teachers in their original country, and not allowed to work here.
that said, i dont think we should make it easier, i do believe that there is only so much money the goverment wishes to spend on everything ( thats not to say they spend it on the right things for my liking) and all the time i hear on the news about the state of the NHS and our schools yet no one wants to pay more taxes!
the housing issue is difficult, as was seen in scotland when refugees were shipped to an estate there it caused untold problems. i know for a fact that asian people indiginous to this country couldnt move to any council estate that i have worked on because they would be threatened and harassed. thats just the way it is.
i work in brighton now and am appauled at the way some people live, one 12 year old boy sharing ...yes sharing a bed with his dying mother ( cancer), stories like that are not uncommon here, land lords make a fortune, one landlord has put electric meters in his bedsits and from what i can calculate is charging at least 3 times more than if each bedsit got their own bill. our country needs sorting, many things here make me sick, really sick. but what other policies could the government introduce? what solutions can they provide? its easy to slag things off is there any solutions out there? mine would be to shut the door, say sorry we have done our bit, the multicultural society that is britian needs to sort out its own affairs. whats yours?

To show compassion to those in need, not only those who live here but those who are fleeing problems abroad - you'd be surprised at how many of them have been caused by British interference. Custardo, what you describe is terrible and it just makes me more ashamed.Raising more taxes is fine by me but I wouldn't trust that bunch of hypocritcal incompetents at Westminster with a penny of my money (think the Dome, Railtrack 'advisor's' salaries). To claim that it is safe to send people back to Afghanistan when we are bombing wedding parties is just a joke.

BTW if asylum seekers were allowedto work then they'd be taxpayers, too.

Message withdrawn

I too felt sick to my stomach on hearing this news. I have a horrible suspicion that David Blunkett et al would have happily sent Jewish children back to occupied countries during the war (this did actually happen, or at least, we wouldn't let them in because 'we didn't have room'. We bomb Afghanistan and kill its inhabitants but when a decent, English-speaking, hard-working, loving family makes it out of the benighted place we lock up their kids and then send them back - I'm speechless. We are so bloody lucky to have our children in this country. Suppose we were trying to raise our babies in a country like Afghanistan, wouldn't we try to get out to give them a better chance in life? How awful to be totally trapped by an accident of birth and geography. I sometimes think we in the West take our privilege for granted.

Obviously the winky thing was a mistake!

aloha this family is being sent back to Germany, not Afghanistan, which is why I was saying it was not outrageous.

Anyway, here's an idea to take the heat out of the housing market and raise more taxes: put a temporary tax on mortgage interest payment (thus effectively raising interest rates for the housing market only) and tax the hell out of property speculators/ empty houses?

I'm not proud of my country either. We have a PM who is labelled George Bush's poodle, because everything the Yanks do we have to do too. We interfere in countries politics that just happen to be oil importers, whilst leaving other countries to rot. Why bomb Saddam Hussein and not President Mugawbe (sp?). We idolise dead royals like Princess Diana and hardly ever mention real heroines like Mother Theresa - where's her memorial fountain? As a nation we are generally intolerant of children, and of old people. We build all over the countryside and let old buildings just rot. Black people are not allowed in white areas and vice versa. For a civilised country we are often quite the opposite! We do not listen to our children's needs, instead we force sex down their throats at primary schools and then wonder why they get it all wrong, we test them from the age of 5 to make sure they are good enough, if not they are sent to 'special class' to get stigmatised.

I am not proud of this country at all, but then sometimes I'm not proud of humankind either.

Having read an interview with the family today I think it was wrong to arrest the children. They were staying with a relative, were happy at school and were not costing the UK taxpayer anything (NOT that I think this is the only consideration, just that I know many consider it so). Their mother was made (against her will) to call the woman looking after them to 'ask' her to bring the children to visit. The purpose of the visit was to arrest the children.

The mother has been refused her anti depressants and offered headache pills instead (as if they were the same, um I don't think so!) and the children know full well that they are being detained in a prison. There are no toys and they are, according to the account I read today, miserable, albeit with their parents. These are 6 and 4 year old children for goodness sake!

The Home Office have decided in this case that they overule what the courts in this country had previously decided was in the best interests of the children. This smacks to me of totalitarianism. The family say they suffered racial abuse in Germany which is why they do not want to go back. If this is the case who can blame them? Mmmm. On the basis of this I'm ashamed too.

hmmm, this is getting depressing.I know Blair may be sucking up to Bush and is possibly to attack Iraq for having weapons we sold them, but at least the British are kicking up a stink about it.

Here are some things to be proud of about the UK:

-Although recent events have suggested otherwise, we're generally tolerant of all kinds of religions etc. including atheism.
-We're also pretty tolerant of other races: Rock 'n' Roll was originally popularised by the British as many US radio stations refused to play music by black artists. We don't have the almost total segregation you get in other countries (OK I know it's bad in places, I'm talking generally)
-We have one of the best road safety records in the world (boy, do I miss UK road safety).
-(related to the above) we pull over when we hear an ambulance: we do not simply go a bit slower or speed up to try to avoid losing any time.
-Our universities are among the best in the world.
-We lead the world in pop music and comedy (well i think so anyway)

Um that's all I can think of right now. Ironically I wasn't proud to be British at all until I left the country, but there you go.

www - your post wasn't there when I wrote that. Of course the children should have toys and of course the mother should be given anti-depressants, it is quite wrong that they haven't got those things. However the government can't have one rule for one family and another for another. They would almost definately have found another town in Germany where there was no racial abuse - it's something that unfortunately you can find anywhere.

From what I gather, the family are expected to be deported from Germany to Afghanistan, so by sending them to Germany, we are effectively sending kids back to war zone...

Yeah, I guess we do have a pretty good sense of humour Lucy123, you have to living here!

Lucy, I think that one of the reasons that I'm so upset is that I believed that we were a tolerant nation, too.

When the adults were taken from the mosque, they showed a picture of the room where they were living and there was a bottle of Calpol. For some reason that made me cry.