Several of you want to write and talk about Calais. Here is your chance.
I want the UK to gain control of its own borders through renegotiation or leaving the EU, as I have made clear on many occasions.
In the meantime I want us to use all legal means to ensure economic migrants do not cross the channel illegally. I am glad the government has said it intends to strengthen our frontiers in Calais and stated any illegal migrants who do get through will not have access to cars, homes or bank accounts if they do come. Illegal migrants need to see that coming without permission does not work for them. The rest of the EU needs to improve its border control. France needs to work with Italy and Greece on their borders and access of illegal migrants to France from southern ports.
Clearly anyone arriving in Dover from Calais cannot be an asylum seeker as France is a democratic country with proper human rights, so anyone wishing to claim asylum should be returned to France.
What measures do you propose?
I will be writing to Mrs May about this and will post what I say to her. The UK government must ensure that only people with legal travel documents that entitle them to come to the UK come here or are allowed to stay here, unless they are genuine asylum seekers arriving directly from a country where they may be at risk of their lives.
July 31, 2015
The only way is to make it very clear that they will not be allowed to stay, even if they do make it to the UK. Any other approach is just waving a big banner saying come, come, come and will result in more deaths and more and more migrants.
This is surely so obvious to everyone with even a basic grasp of reality. Anyone coming to the UK from the safe, stable and rather underpopulated France is clearly an economic migrant.
This approach is also the kindest one in the long run. Alas Cameron is a (superficial) heart & empty PR first, brain almost never person so more death and misery will surely ensue.
Get Tony Abbot to advise. While he is at it perhaps he help reverse Cameron’s heart over brain approach to expensive energy and all the green crap & wasted money government indulges in. This also does massive harm to jobs & growth in the UK.
July 31, 2015
I used to think that Tony Abbot was about the only one to come off an Oxford PPE course able to think, but I have been reading the excellent book:- Do No Harm by Henry Marsh.
Everyone in charge of the dysfunctional, free at the point of rationing & death outrage that is the NHS should read it. He, at least, had the sense to move over to Medicine.
I do not suppose you do that nowadays very easily.
July 31, 2015
LL go on Youtube and watch the “Newsnight” profile of HM. I think you will find a lot of doctors will agree with him that nothing is going to change in the NHS. Not until Mr Hunt deals with the self serving management with something more than a scalpel.
July 31, 2015
I’m not impressed by Lifelogic’s claim that “The only way is to make it very clear that they will not be allowed to stay, even if they do make it to the UK.”
The reality is that once you’ve migrated illegally into a country you can easily melt into the native population and avoid deportation. And by the time you’re married and/or have children, deportation is impossible.
July 31, 2015
“… by the time you’re married and/or have children, deportation is impossible.”
Other countries do not necessarily subscribe to that belief in the event that they can demonstrate that you have arrived illegally in the first place.
So, is that a belief that is inviolable in your mind?
July 31, 2015
Obviously deporting a large majority of illegals is perfectly possible given the political will and enough resources. However, I assume the large number of illegals trying to get in have made enquiries with their friends already here and have been told that the chance of deportation is small.
July 31, 2015
Whether you can easily melt into the “native” population is open to some question, but you can usually now melt into one of the many non-native immigrant communities which will already include some illegal as well as legal immigrants. I suggest that in general those born and raised in this country are not keen on illegal immigration, even if their own recent forebears were themselves legal immigrants from the same countries. As we know there are exceptions to this general rule, where even those born and raised in this country have not developed any sense of loyalty to it and to their fellow citizens. Of course some will say that is all our fault, for not bending over backwards far enough to accommodate them. It seems that many people have yet to understand the official view that it is the role of the established population to fit in with the newcomers, not the other way round, so that we can all be enriched by the vibrant diversity.
July 31, 2015
Why impossible? We just need a government that sorts out the human rights industry and lawyers. Do you want to take law abiding people after an proper application and on merit or reward the human traffickers and take those good at jumping into trucks, committing illegal act and hiding? While encouraging far more to risk their lives.
August 2, 2015
If Mrs May were fined £2000 for each illegal immigrant that arrives in the UK the problem would disappear in the blink of an eye,
August 3, 2015
LOL…. I like your style. Probably the most difficult thing on earth trying to get (their) money out of a politician!
zorro
July 31, 2015
These migrants are illegal so should be treated as such, isn’t there some disused prison ships kicking about that are still sea worthy, if there is put them all on them and ship them back to Africa sorted, was fed up of listening to these bleeding hearts yesterday about Mr Cameron calling them swam which is wrong they are (words left out ed)I asked for the army to be used to protect our country not just to use the MOD land as a bloody car park, I’ve said it before and will say it again God help you if we have another 7/7 or 9/11 here when it’s in the hands of the politicians to do something to stop this INVASION
July 31, 2015
Re “swarm”, after about one minute’s Googling I found numerous references in the press to “swarm of” followed by some assortment of people: football supporters, Tory or Labour supporters, etc.
So if the word swarm can be used in reference to everyone apart from African / Somali / Muslim immigrants, that’s a form of inverted racism, or pro-coloured anti-white racism.
I’ve always been a fan of anti-racists: the little dears are usually even more racist than those they claim to disapprove of.
July 31, 2015
Yes, I am struggling to understand why the word “swarm” was racist?
July 31, 2015
I think the Luftwaffe also applied swarme to an aircraft grouping larger than a squadron.
July 31, 2015
I was unsurprised at the BBC immediately picking up on Harriet Harman’s comment to announce as, I think, the first item of their radio news broadcasts that Mr Cameron was in ‘deep trouble’ (or some such expression) over his use of the term ‘swarm’ to describe the migrants seeking to come to the UK illegally. It is an old trick by politicians to ascribe negative overtones to a perfectly harmless neutral word which in this case, as you say, accurately describes these people in the nightly attempts to reach Kent by ‘swarming’ into the Channel Tunnel enclosure in Calais.
July 31, 2015
Indeed it is just a way of avoiding discussing the real issue, rubbish people and shifting the debate on to irrelevant semantics.
July 31, 2015
Isn’t it the usual way you deal with people who do not agree with you, for example on any environmental issue?
July 31, 2015
It shows Labour are still in a deep hole, the same one that lost them the election.
Arguing trivial semantics in this way shows staggering disregard for the real concerns of the people of Britain.
August 1, 2015
Not at all I look at their arguments if they make any. The warmist (huge exaggeration of) religion rarely make any scientific arguments it is all about appeals to the irrational heart, as with all religions.
I do not accuse them of being racist, evil or anything just totally misguided and lacking an understanding of the real science, chaotic systems, the complexity of making prediction of any real value long term and the history of the Earth’s climate.
True, I occasionally question if even they can all really believe in it themselves as it seem rather unlikely.
August 1, 2015
If you are a party with no actual policies at all to deal with the subject in hand, the only way to show any life is to pick feebly at any metaphor used by the government. Harman and co. are truly desperate, in many senses.
August 1, 2015
Lifelogic, I wonder where you are getting your information from, apart from the Telegraph.
You seem to believe that the atmospheric/ocean scientists do not have a clue of the systems on which they work. There are observations from satellites, radiosoundings, devices on commercial aircrafts and ships, satellite-embarked and ground-based radars and lidars, all these measuring surface air temperature, surface precipitation, water vapour profile, infrared and solar radiation budget at the surface and top of the atmosphere, carbon dioxide and methane, ozone and aerosols, cloud properties, wind speed and direction, temperature profiles, other greenhouse gases (nitrous oxide, CFCs, HFCs), ocean colour (chlorophyl and pigments in water), sea ice extent and thickness, sea level, sea surface temperature, ocean heat content (down to 2000 m), ocean-dissolved CO2 partial pressure, ocean acidity, ocean surface and current salinity, snow cover, glaciers and ice caps extent and thickness, albedo, photosynthetically active radiation, number, extent and temperature of fires, extent and depth of permafrost, vegetation land cover, leaf area index, soil moisture.
All these parameters are current measurements.
I find a bit short and rather limited your regular comment about the scientists lacking an understanding of the real science.
And for your education, all weather forecast centres produce everyday forecasts using a representation of potentially chaotic behaviour arising from the uncertainties in the measurements used in initialising the forecasts.
I think you could well benefit from taking a course with Coursera, eDX, or FutureLearn (they are free and open to anyone) on how climate observations and simulations are made. You would then realise how hollow most of the comments by Booker or his ilk are.
If you really are interested in the views of a skeptic scientist (not an ideological denialist) check judycurry.com.
But it might require a tiny bit more intellectual effort!
August 2, 2015
Hefner
You might like to take your own advice before you lecture others.
There are dozens and dozens of credible expert scientists and climate specialists who DO NOT agree. There are lots of papers , reports and analyses of the flaws in a lot of the data reporting you mention. There is NO consensus, the oft reported myth that 97% of scientists agreed with AWG has been totally and utterly debunked. I suggest you do a bit more reading and learning
The fact is that man made global warming is a hypothesis with no provable scientific evidence to date. It may or may not be the case. The problem is that its become a money pit political issue and that has severely skewed the debate.
You might want to read the very balanced via of Matt Ridley ( who is NOT a skeptic) science writer who has recently written some very good pieces on the subject
August 2, 2015
Libertarian, I know that, that’s why I advise Lifelogic to have a look at what Prof Judith Curry is writing. She is very skeptical about the UnFCCC and IPCC, but in an intelligent way, not the shoot-from-the-hip way that seems predominant with LL.
and I very much agree with her about the need for proper additional channels of publication (a point emphasised in one of her last posts).
I also know that the latest percentage is likely to be more like 47 % than 97 %, but not so much about the fact of climate change happening, but about the rate of climate change, as there are major uncertainties in the aerosol optical properties, and a likely overestimation of their “cooling” effect in IPCC AR5.
I would think there is plenty of evidence that something is happening, for example the so-called greening of Sahel due to a likely shift of the ITCZ, the northward shift in habitat of various species in Northern Canada, the westward one in Australia, the higher frequency of occurrence of circulation blockings (with for example drought in California and tons of snow on the East coast of the U.S., or prolonged precipation with flooding in Pakistan). Obviously all these are not proofs of climate change, but are consistent with the observed decrease of the Equator-poles temperature gradient and the theoretically resulting strengthening of so-called standing waves (in the description of the dynamics of the air masses).
And I know of Matt Ridley, thanks a lot.
July 31, 2015
Indeed and any attempt to have 50/50 representation in say physics & Engineering by definition involves huge, blatant anti male discrimination as so few women chose the subjects in the first place.
I am all in favour of more good female scientists on merit but not second rate ones only employed for their gender as is rather common especially in universities. This does nothing but harm to almost everyone it is often dangerous too.
July 31, 2015
Are you talking from real knowledge of what is going on in universities? Or as usual only letting your biases out?
August 1, 2015
Just look at the figure for the gender spit in say Physics/Computer Science/Maths/Engineering at A level and university. Then look at the quality of some of the people they do select for senior positions.
August 1, 2015
From the figures I found (2011-2012), there were a very slight (0.5%) advantage to girls for A levels in the three sciences (biology, physics, chemistry) going down to -0.5 % for maths. So roughly speaking a similar number of girls and boys were having scientific background at the end of secondary schooling (roughly 24 to 26 %: so the question could be: why is the British school system not able to motivate more youngsters to go to science?).
(Telegraph 14/08/2014 and stats linked to it).
For undergraduate degrees (2011-2012) the results are (women first, men second, in percent):
Medicine. 57.6. vs 42.3
Biology. 60.8. vs 39.2
Physics. 42.6 vs 57.4
Maths. 42.2. vs 57.8
Comp.Sc. 17.4. vs 82.6
Enginee’g. 14.3. vs 85.7
(Guardian, 29/01/2013 and stats within).
So, yes, Computer Science and Engineering suffer from a big gap. It is not so obvious in ph
Another question worth asking: why do a non negligible of undergraduates/graduates with scientific background prefer to go “trading” than embracing a “real” scientific job?
Isn’t that the result of 30+ years of emphasis on “finances” thanks to Mrs T. and successors (and I include Blair and Brown in this remark).
A final point: as far as I was concerned, my female colleagues were rather sharp, very often sharper than my male colleagues, having had to fight much more than them to get where they were.
So my sample is obviously not representative, and I guess yours is not either.
August 2, 2015
Hefner
Quant jocks are doing real science, in maths. How many science grads exactly are becoming traders?
You can ask the same question of lots of graduates why do graduates enter professions or trades that aren’t in line with their degree studies. Why don’t history grads become history teachers? Why don’t language grads become translators
What is this emphasis on finance that you speak about? Have you missed the last 30 years? We’ve had more technological and scientific developments, inventions and breakthroughs in the last 30 years than in the previous 3000. Do get a grip on reality
August 2, 2015
And further to previous message
http://www.wipo.int/ipstats/en/statistics/patents/wipo_pub_931.html
niesr.ac.uk/sites/default/files/publications/dp410.pdf
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-20975580
bmjopen/bmj.com/content/3/2/e002088.full
And here I agree with Lifelogic (yes, it happens), science is not taken seriously by the Westminster politicians, whatever the party.
July 31, 2015
Did the ME 109 s that flew across the Channel in 1940 not use the same word for their formation.
July 31, 2015
It is reported in The Moscow Times today that France and Russia have reached agreement on compensation for the two Mistral carriers that the Russians had ordered but which cannot be delivered due to sanctions.Perhaps they could be used!
July 31, 2015
We are not dealing with a situation similar to that faced by the Jews of Germany in the ’30’s, where no country was will willing to help (see the Evian conference) The asylum rules need to be revised. Deportations cannot be halted because the claimant has “a right to a family life” or “his life would be endangered if he were returned”. There is no case for economic migration from what is coming from Calais either. We have enough indigenous unskilled (and usually unemployable) labour of our own. Sorry we are full up. I do not know why I should have to put up with good state primary schools having 200m catchment areas..
July 31, 2015
Why is there a camp at Calais or indeed anywhere? A camp, much like rescues at sea, encourages this behaviour.
First, destroy the camp. French police paid for by EU funds should check the immigration status of everyone in the camp and ship those deemed illegal back to a sole port in Africa. The campers deposited there will be no less displaced than they are at present.
None of them should be allowed to claim asylum while the checks are ongoing. That opportunity has passed.
This is hugely disruptive and needs nipping in the bud now.
If the French will not act then we should allow them all onto a specially commissioned ferry and inspect their paperwork while at sea. Once again no asylum claims allowed as there was ample opportunity to do that in France. Anyone on the ferry without the correct paperwork should be shipped back to a single African port.
We can compensate whichever African port is used from the funding we are using to secure Calais at present.
Enough!
August 1, 2015
Alas, “should” is wishful thinking.
The French and the Italians did not take the simple steps to avert this, so they are certainly not going to make take the more drastic action you recommend. The obvious step would have been to rescue the seaborne migrants, to sink the boats and to return them whence they came. Before long, the situation would have died down.
But if you’re in Africa and you see on TV those who have made it, telling of the free rides they are given once they can get across, you think “Why not me?” And indeed, why not?
July 31, 2015
Although presently a hot topic, this problem has been with us for many years, and could and should have been tackled properly long ago. Yet I recall that when Mrs May first took office as Home Secretary in 2010, her first act was to tackle the need for a reduction in public spending – and took an axe to the numbers employed in the Border Agency. Their strength should have been increased!
July 31, 2015
25-40% cuts to come.
zorro
July 31, 2015
It’ll be 25-40% cuts in Tories at Westminster in 2020 if this situation is not resolved to OUR satisfaction. Mr Cameron needs look towards home, rather than pleasing our “partners” in the EU. France, Italy ,etc, are happy to send them our way.
July 31, 2015
Indeed but no cut to the foreign aid budget that was supposed to stop this illegal immigration. It’s a disgrace that we have fools in charge when we need Churchill, Thatcher or Farage. Any clues what budget could have been used to deal with this problem? How about fencing like at Glastonbury, not the flimsey stuff they,re using now. This is my homeland and those occupying Westminster ignore our wishes to secure our borders. Completely useless. No deportations either. Human Rights takes precedent. Not my fault. I didn’t vote for this predictable incompetence.
July 31, 2015
The first duty of a government is to defend the country and secure the borders to keep the peace and allow freedom of movement and security to its citizens. This government is not fulfilling this duty.
zorro
August 1, 2015
This govt has no intention of fulfilling this duty. Mr Cameron and the EU WANTS them all here.
July 31, 2015
We can write and talk all day long. Until we put the cancer of political correctness to the sword nothing will be done. That’s why the left invented it and Cameron and his Cabinet endorse it. We are being invaded and we have idiots in charge.
August 1, 2015
“Invasion” is too strong a word, and if you overstate your case, you are likely to alienate the uncertain.
What we have is a slow persistent and apparently endless arrival of people from (different ed) cultures who have really nothing to offer us. They don’t wish to “invade” and conquer (except probably with the exception of a few).
They do wish to take the benefits of our way of life which we and our forefathers have built up through the centuries, and which (some ed) in our midst wish to make us ashamed of, along with our once proud history.
The problem we face is that the majority of these people are not our enemies: we can’t mow them down, plot their destruction. We just don’t want them, we have no need for them, we have fewer and fewer resources to cope.
July 31, 2015
Five years to go.
I can’t see how we get through this without Britain imploding under a Tory majority government.
July 31, 2015
It is not just a lack of staff but what they do with the staff they have. I was recently in a queue at Gatwick for nearly an hour (as long as the flight) just to have my uk passport checked which took just 5 seconds. They know how many are arriving in advance and having a long queue need more staff not fewer in order to manage the queue and barriers. It is just incompetent management as we have come to expect from nearly all uk government.
All the passengers paying a fortune in air tax and landing fees too.
July 31, 2015
They actually are able to schedule the staff according to need. They have access to the passenger scheduling computers but just do not have enough staff to deal with the numbers. It is as simple as that.
zorro
July 31, 2015
But it still needs more staff with a bigger queue not fewer. This as you need to manage the queue barriers etc. too. The passport checking still needs to be done. X passengers at so many seconds per passenger = Y number of passport checkers.
It is hardly brain surgery. Unlike a shop you know the numbers in advance.
August 1, 2015
lifelogic
“..you know the numbers in advance.”
Yes they do, but it would seem they would prefer to keep people waiting rather than employ more staff.
They operate this way because they can , simples.
August 1, 2015
You still need the same number of staff, more in fact as you need to keep the queue organised too. You still have the same checking to do indeed it might well take longer as the “customers” are likely to be more annoyed and perhaps ask why they are so inefficient.
True it is just the usual contempt for the public who pay their wages and that they have a monopoly.
July 31, 2015
The biggest problem we in England face is the ‘bleeding heart do-gooders’ who claim all of those gathered in Calais ARE seeking asylum and deserve our sympathy, help and money.
Anyone who speaks out against these ‘migrants’ is immediately slated as a racist. Even Cameron has fallen foul of it all, by using the word ‘swarm’
Lets look at the facts. Everyone of those waiting in Calais have crossed several borders to get there. They are clearly targeting England. They are not seeking asylum.
Why is it, virtually all of them are males between the ages of sixteen and forty or thereabouts. Are there no female ‘asylum seekers’ No elderly, no babies ?
The truth, as unpalatable as it maybe to some is, the men in Calais are the vanguard. If they can get established in England, they will then work to import their relatives.
The French have failed abysmally in their duty. They have no interest in upholding the EU rules in claiming ‘asylum’ They would much rather all the migrants got into England and became the (dis)UK Governments problem.
The migrants themselves, break the law daily, yet go unpunished. If I broke into a lorry or into the channel tunnel, you could be sure I would be arrested and charged. They are removed (sometimes) and set free to try again.
The (dis)UK government needs to send people to France and to explain to the migrants, there will be no benefits, money, homes if you break into England. You will be sent back to France within 48 hrs of discovery. With nothing more than a meal and any immediate medical assistance.
But of course, we can’t do this. The EU doesn’t allow us to. The EU wants us to take in anyone from anywhere. The EU wants to pretend there is no large scale problem, because it doesn’t fit with their narrative of ‘open borders’
We need to take the ‘bull by the horns’ and act unilaterally. Shut our border to illegal migrants. Are Merkel and her allies going to throw us out of the EU if we do? No, of course not, sadly.
July 31, 2015
A lot of them state that they are younger than they are to get free schooling/studies and all the social infrastructure for them to establish themselves is here whilst it is not to the same extent in Paris. Cameron is Canute in disguise.
zorro
July 31, 2015
Canute was demonstrating to his flattering courtiers that he had no control over the elements (the incoming tide), explaining that secular power is vain compared to the supreme power of God.
Cameron however could indeed control this tide just by making it very clear that anyone getting the UK from France would be deported forthwith. He would also save many lives by doing this.
July 31, 2015
Sorry lifelogic, I know that but was using the pejorative meaning understood by most people. Let’s settle that he is an incompetent Canute ?
zorro
July 31, 2015
Indeed.
August 1, 2015
A program from some years ago showed an African who had flown here, tried to claim asylum. Our staff said he was about 35, but he said he was in his teens – and it turned out he could only be checked by medical tests. The rule was that they could NOT send him back until these tests were done, so was admitted till the Monday when a person was available. He was put in a safe house till then. Needless to say he vanished that night and has never been seen again. no details of who he really is. Murderer, terrorist, paedophile? (or child, economic migrant,legitimate asylum seeker? ed)- No-0ne knows – but still here. – How’s your life going ….?
July 31, 2015
Well put Old Albion, what i would also like to know is are these people that are detain are they sent straight back to there own country or are they put up in a 5* hotel or release on “bail” until a future date only to disappear for good
July 31, 2015
There is little hope of detaining them any longer as the government lost a court case on detention for fast track asylum hearings. News of this will have of course spread to the continent…..
zorro
August 2, 2015
mick
“…they are put up in 5 star Hotel….”
I do not think so.
According to the Press reports today its only 3 star accommodation they are given.
Then of course they are fed and watered, given any medical help they need and then spending money, after that they request that the rest of the family should come over to join them through legal channels.
One of our family members who works and who has contributed to the system for a couple of decades would love to have the same amount of free spending money available each week as some of these people.
No wonder millions want to come here !
The system and the way we police it, is just simply DAFT.
July 31, 2015
I would like to add my name to the above.
July 31, 2015
Old Albion
“The truth is……… if they can get established in England, then they will work to import their relatives”
Absolutely right, so many have succeeded in this in the past that the grapevine talk encourages such action.
We need to stop the primary person getting in, in the first place, and then stop what appears to be, the automatic right for all other family members to follow.
July 31, 2015
They are already here and have been for decades. The Aussies have the right idea. We need out of the EU ASAP. no if’s no but’s. It’s the only way.
July 31, 2015
Another way of expressing my own thoughts, and I very much agree.
July 31, 2015
Old Albion
‘bleeding heart do-gooders’ who claim all of those gathered in Calais ARE seeking asylum and deserve our sympathy, help and money.
Empress Nick of La la land has 56 of them in Westminster.
July 31, 2015
Of course !
She can plead for all the Calais migrants to be allowed in. She knows full well they all want to come to England, mostly London.
Yet the land in which she lives has much barren empty wasteland with plenty of room for migrants. They just don’t want to go there.
July 31, 2015
Old Albion speak s for many of us here. We are all fed up with politicians giving us speeches telling us that they are ‘On it’. what a joke.
Can someone please tell me what our ancestors fought for???
The way this is all going we can expect to see anarchy on our streets before long.
July 31, 2015
I want the Government to put out a strong message that anyone who stows away in a lorry,car or other vehicle, will not be considered for asylum. They have already broken the rules by crossing several ‘safe’ countries to try and get here. They should be arrested and sent back. I was very annoyed to read that Theresa May said that a group of economic migrants who came here in the back of a truck were having their asylum claims ‘ considered.’ They should be told that they don’t have a hope of staying. By the time this is all over, we shall have several thousand more people in this country illegally. The French for their part should demolish the camp at Calais and deport all those there back to their own countries. The bleating of the Refugee Council in the UK should be ignored, and the very substantial amount of taxpayers money they receive should be drastically cut!
July 31, 2015
Absolutely agree. Such lawlessness should never be tolerated and they should NOT be granted asylum. If they cannot be sent back then a holding facility offshore should be used.
July 31, 2015
I agree Cheshire girl.
August 1, 2015
Should, should, should. It ain’t gonna happen.
What we see is the final victory of the lawyers, who have stopped all reasonable responses while someone thumbs through the rule book.
I say “final” victory, because the lawyers will of course be swept away quickly when the whole ship, overburdened, unwieldy, rudderless, holed beneath the line, heels over and sinks. Estimated time of anarchic dissolution- around the middle of the century.
August 2, 2015
Agree, none who enter or try to enter illegally should ever be considered for asylum or visa or any form of residence.
The issue is how to enforce the embargo. Perhaps some form of ID card/credentials would be needed for all services and transactions, public and private, to limit access to legal residents. If one were slightly suspicious one might wonder if this is an intended outcome of the government’s approach.
July 31, 2015
Good morning.
So they will be allowed to stay then ?
—
They should be sent back to France – PERIOD !!
If the French do not take them back, close the Channel Tunnel and suspend ALL ferries going to and from Calais and any other French ports.
A Governments first resposibilty is to protect the Nation State, and in order to do that, you must have effective border controls and not porus ones.
Closing the Chunnel and the ports, even for a short period, will send a very powerful message. A message to the French and other Governments. A message to the illegal migrants that they are wasting their time. A message to the nation that the Tory Government has some assemblence of control. Failure to send such a message will have dire consequences in the longterm.
PS It is Mrs. May, not may. And should you not refer to her by her office title ?
Sorry to be pedantic.
July 31, 2015
Enforced removals are heading south numbers wise and it is all focused on voluntary removals which may be cheaper, but none of these will go voluntarily….. Someone’s bluff is about to be called big style……
zorro
July 31, 2015
…’…Closing the Chunnel and the ports, even for a short period…’…
I don’t see that as extreme – it could be said it has a disassociated precedent in the EU. I recall – much to the anger of the UK Government at the time – Padraig O’Flynn bringing EU working hours within the remit of Health and Safety, where no Government could opt out.
There are fairly luminously obvious grounds for treating this matter as one of health and safety (for drivers, for officials, for migrants) and thereby closing the tunnel until the Authorities at the continental opening can make proper competent assurances of the safety of all? After all, when the Chunnel project was first initiated in 1984, I recall the project leaders state quite unequivocally that it would be ‘impossible’ for illegal immigrants to walk through the length. It would appear those loud and repeated assurances were in fact ‘lies’?
July 31, 2015
Whilst the current and ongoing matter is ostensibly linked to the problems of illegal migrants, in the longer term, it shouldn’t necessarily be de-linked with the problems with regard to French Channel Transport links which have been going on for decades now. You’ll remember, John, your colleague Steven Norris battling with illegal militancy which led to misery and bankruptcy for lorry drivers. But we can also go back even further to see militants blocking legitimate Commercial and private vessels from ports in the 70s & 80s.
In that, it’s no new phenomenon to see France happily exporting its own internal problems to other nations and implying the blame on them. It has not been unknown for French militant pickets to cause similar problems in Santander, Antwerp and Rotterdam. So, at first principle, I’d say it was no longer appropriate to sit on the traditional British stance – react with fairly empty phrases such as ‘this is totally unacceptable’ and hope the whole thing blows over in the headlines soon after. What I would suggest is what I already expect, and have done so for decades – I want to see my own Government holding the Government of France accountable for its negligence and unwillingness to tackle its own internal disputes and problems.
Or variously taking that Government to court in the matters at hand, or the local Authorities in Calais. Fast-track compensation for UK based hauliers and Ferry Companies, not to mention Police and authorities in the south of England, and that compensation invoiced and addressed to a certain Mr. Hollande.
It is true that some of these migrants are dispossessed in need of asylum – but the overwhelming numbers are economic migrants whose plight is based on the luck of the draw of geographic birth – not from actual or genuine oppression. Another fact which would amaze some BBC reporters is that not every single one of these illegal migrants is a qualified neurosurgeon. (If you intend to tell them that in person, ensure you have a chair in which they might faint into, and a paramedic on hand to revive them). With these sheer numbers, those genuine asylum seekers might have to accept the tenets of life that so many other innocents must suffer – that other irresponsible people spoil it for others?
Now – being these people are physically in a safe country it seems reasonable to conclude there is no further pressure upon them to displace themselves further to a preferred asylum destination. But I understand the Courts themselves do not recognise France as a safe final destination in many cases of deportation. I would wish to see my Government challenge those same courts stridently. After all, if France is not a safe country to deport people to, then it can’t be a safe extradition destination either? And if it becomes impossible thus by means of our courts to deport people – even when they prove to conduct themselves illegally, why should they then have greater protection from extradition where normal UK citizens are now subject to the strictures of the EAW? It seems somewhat counter-intuitive that an illegal immigrant has greater notional protection against extradition than a taxpaying UK national?
Either way, this country is somehow seen as a soft touch not only by these migrants but by our near alleged allies. They have adopted that stance since successive UK Governments have elected to act as a soft touch. I will see my country and my generous tax contribution better protected from these people, thankyou. More of the same has led us here, it doesn’t work. Mr. Cameron is two months only from a historic election victory. If he doesn’t now have the credit under his belt to bypass the inevitable agenda-led bleeding hearts, then when will he ever?
He wanted the levers of Downing Street. Let’s see him employ them.
July 31, 2015
Apologies – I know that’s longer than you would normally prefer, but as a postscript – maybe it’s time to consider whether the fine given to drivers who inadvertently travel with unknown illegal migrants is appropriate as applied?
With these sheer numbers, the incompetence of the French Authorites and their very plain indifference to their own internal problem, should these fines not also be applied to that Country? Not to otherwise hapless legal travellers who lucklessly end up adopting the responsibility which ought to be the remit of that Nation?
July 31, 2015
This has gone on beyond tedium – we all know what needs to be done and why it isn’t being done. This is the tyranny of political correctness. What started out as a joke doesn’t seem so funny now with an army of angry young men braying at our borders while our politicians look on impotent and afraid.
It would be refreshing to hear JR’s views on political correctness but even he, it seems is afraid to even discuss the topic. We are told it is off limits..beyond the pale. It might cause someone, somewhere to be ‘offended’. End of discussion move on please.
Well I am ‘offended’ by what is happening in Kent and Calais to my country – who is speaking for me ?.
Okay so Mr Cameron is going to send a few extra sniffer dogs and more of the same fencing that so far hasn’t deterred the migrants.
He really is incompetent, out of touch, out of his depth and completely useless.
Dr Redwood – your leaders act is starting to wear thin and risks long term damage to your party. The act (honed during his time as a PR (person ed) at Carlton TV and from a study of ‘the master Blair ) is :-
1. Pretend to do something without actually doing anything of substance to placate the masses ie vague promises of fences and extra dogs
2. Lower expectations so that even a tiny improvement seems like a great success. DC going around saying that the crisis could last ‘all summer’.
3. Hope that problem goes away
Why can’t we have a Pm that is actually good at his job rather than talking a good game ?
Reply I have discussed politically correct views here and will do so again
August 1, 2015
It would be refreshing to hear JR’s views on political correctness but even he, it seems is afraid to even discuss the topic.
>
Peter Hitchens will not talk about certain topics either for the same reasons, but what I cannot understand is if we want to regain our freedom of conscience again we need to abolish the BBC. It is the BBC who has led all this.
Reply Happy to discuss this topic
August 1, 2015
I do not understand why someone like Cameron is PM of this country and some like Mr Redwood is not. What has gone wrong? We need to analyze this. Could it be something like this….
“Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” 1 Samuel 16:7
August 3, 2015
Please don’t tell me that Cameron is anointed by the LORD! 🙂
zorro
July 31, 2015
Not much to add over what Mr Farage says here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/11770497/Nigel-Farage-Calais-migrant-crisis-a-disaster.html
Vaz has interviewed those (E-Tunnel/Transport/Police) facing the problems at Calais. Nothing happens?
Asylum seekers…and full of those who willingly want to destabilise the UK and ultimately prevent Mrs May from getting rid of them….fast!
The EU simply does not function correctly in such contexts and too many others. I cannot imagine the EU changing significantly by any negotiation.
R4 this am had someone calling for a halt in transport in/out of Calais, expecting anarchy in our shops. That has a better chance of occurring than any effective handling of the problem. The root cause…EU border management, the lack of !
The UK should fine the EU for all of this..as is their want with fining us very often. And that needs to pay for the wasted products, major inconvenience and fencing etc of Calais.
The strikes by the french port workers. Most of that looks to be criminal and again nothing seems to be done about it…and it simply repeats. French farmers! The french need to be severely dealt with.
July 31, 2015
I am concerned that politicians cannot grow the economy any other way than migration and that this is all a game they play with public opinion. Perhaps I am wrong in this perception, but did not Cameron say he wanted to expand the EU to the Urals? Why would he say that if not for cheap labour? Such statements imply our entire future economic model is based on huge influx of cheap foreign labour at regular intervals.
Also, we must have a huge black economy in the UK if these migrants want to come here to work illegally? Are we turning a blind eye to this as the black economy helps keep real wages down?
It seems to me these migrants in Calais are going to have to be let in. Surely the idea is they will mostly get into the UK in the end anyway and that is why the French are only half heartedly trying to stop them.
Finally, can our PM really be so naive as to believe that if we removed Gadaffi and risked creating a failed State in Libya that as the gateway from Africa to Europe that this would not be the result? I am starting to wonder if Cameron (or those advising him) actually wanted to destabilize and open up a gateway through Africa because our entire economic strategy seems to be based on never ending migration?
Am I being too cynical? I would have thought so but after watching the entire debate from the House of Lords on religious persecution it seems clear to me that the government is quite happy to allow Christians and other minorities to be persecuted as long as it does not get in the way of growing our own economy, which is always put in first place. Once you start dropping all principles for the economy then really anything is possible and all conspiracy theories are valid. The political elite would surely go so far as sacrificing our own Protestant Christian culture for the sake of the economy if mass migration is the only way they know how to grow it. This mindset has to change.
July 31, 2015
First of all rather like alcoholics going to alcoholics anonymous the first stage is for the political class to admit they have got it badly wrong previously. Real open and honest admission that the British political classes approach of talking tough about immigration during elections but keeping the floodgates open in all practical terms has got to change.
Next illegal immigrants brought to the attention of the police or authorities need to be detained, do not let them back on the streets. We need urgent measures to ensure that we have the volume of places needed to keep them in custody.
Sure Dover needs reinforcements of police and/or military, but they need to be empowered to actually take firm action.
We need to start emergency ferry services to somewhere else, say Belgium, and just stop going to Calais for a while by ferry, so that will only leave the tunnel to protect. This will only buy time as the immigrants will quickly move elsewhere.
We need to start imposing much more realistic controls over legal immigration. So some of the later European states to join, I am afraid their citizens should have to apply for visas. We need to stop handing out uncapped intra company transfer visas etc ed. We need to stop giving indefinite leave to remain to people simply for working here for a few years, or being the family member of someone who is. We need to stop the progression to British passports for so many classes of entrants, when Brits work abroad they do not expect to pick up local citizenship, this country should be no different.
Real active action against the neighbourhoods that are obviously harbouring illegal immigrants in vast numbers, these places are obvious to anyone with common senses. Cut through the political correctness and go in checking everyone’s immigration status in systematic ways. etc ed
The state funded media needs to start reflecting the normal legal decent honest views of the majority of voters who want immigration cut back massively, rather than the rather different view of the political and journalistic classes. Complaints should be brought against those failing to reflect the majority views on immigration. We cannot continue like this, this pro open doors immigration propaganda has been going on far too long and it’s an obvious failure.
Start deporting people in big numbers. Start taking people found floating in the Mediterranean back to where they came from and not European mainland.
And so very much more.
July 31, 2015
No doubt all will be able to stay as they have umanrites
How goes the removal of the Afghan plane hijackers about 15 years on. All we get is platitudes and jam tomorrow. Why do we keep giving money to (extremists ed). Now education loans to illegal immigrants
Is there no end to your largesse with our taxes.
This debacle has the potential to destroy the Tories.
July 31, 2015
If we had joined the Schengen agreement we would not have the problem at Calais.
July 31, 2015
True it would move to the UK.
July 31, 2015
Indeed, they would just walk through the borders and camp in Croydon to claim asylum….
zorro
July 31, 2015
No, they would all be able to enter the U.K. without hindrance.
July 31, 2015
Well, there’s a bald assertion which requires some explanation.
Are not France and Italy both in Schengen?
But have the French recently suspended Schengen with respect to Italy?
And is there not now a growing encampment of illegal immigrants at Ventimiglia just over the border because the French will not let them cross?
So what are you saying, Alan?
That we should join Schengen so that the entire population of Africa could have unimpeded access to this county if they wanted?
Well, that would certainly solve the problems at Calais, as you say.
Perhaps you’d like to hand out free train tickets to London to all those who manage to set foot on Italian soil, or would that only be for those whose trip across the Mediterranean had been facilitated by our own navy?
July 31, 2015
Please explain. Or were you making a joke?
July 31, 2015
Anyone who breaks through a fence or climbs on a lorry or train is an invader. A migrant is someone that presents themselves at passport control.
The invaders in Calais are clearly breaking French law and should be prosecuted in France. The situation there is akin to the police catching house breakers then returning them to the streets to have another attempt in the hope that eventually they succeed and become ‘legitimate’ squatters.
July 31, 2015
What they are doing is illegal and should be treated as such. Since when did we get away with being illegal??
August 1, 2015
Since when did we get away with being illegal?? – – depends if you are “house-flipping” politician or not !!!
July 31, 2015
The simple solution lies in removing the thing that is attracting the world’s freeloaders.
Our politicians have created an unsustainable welfare wonderland with open borders where people are paid to do nothing and all needs are met free at the point of delivery.
What other result did you expect other than an outflow of productive taxpayers and an inflow of (people wanting benefits and jobs? ed)?
July 31, 2015
people really don’t think these things through.
‘they should not be allowed to stay’
but what can that mean, practically, we should round people up and put them on a plane and — then what? Where will the plane be given permission to land?
Or should we put them at gunpoint into leaky boats, tow them out to the French side of the channel and abandon them hoping the French coastguard will rescue them?
The reality is : we can’t forcibly deport people.
July 31, 2015
The Nazis sent the Jews back. We are not Nazis.
Some positive things:
We can order the European Navy to take drowning immigrants back to Libya and Egypt.
We can make sure that the Channel Ports and Calais are properly defended.
We can announce that people will not be allowed to stay here any more than they are allowed to in France or Germany.
Australia had the same problem. They had a special island where illegal immigrant were sent to live, just as the First Fleet were sent to Botany Bay. The rest were sent back to PNG. Result? The immigration was restored to what it normally has been.
I would love to go and live in Australia. Legally I cannot do so. It was not fair. Now it is.
July 31, 2015
Fine except for your first point Mike. The Nazis did not send Jews back; they brutalised and murdered them. It was the British who, at times, stopped Jewish refugees landing into the Holy Land.
July 31, 2015
Australia is living in the real world and they don’t have the EU to answer to. Plus they don’t have Cameron cow towing to everyone and not wishing to upset Merckel.
July 31, 2015
We already forcibly deport people, but not in numbers to make a significant difference to the headcount in the UK or the numbers queuing up to get to the UK.
July 31, 2015
Australia in the last few days intercepted a boat load of Vietnamese asylum seekers, took them to an airport and flew them back home. It is a policy they have been following for a couple years now. They also intercept and send boatloads to Papua New Guinea. They are widely criticised but it works.
July 31, 2015
Well, there you go then. Let’s just send them to Australia and let them do the job Cameron can’t. Simples! Seriously though, we should do what Australia is doing and damn the EU.
July 31, 2015
Ah the argument of futility . Well Australia has shown you can , and Australia is the only country that has got control of the situation.
We have a bloated Aid budget that we don’t know how to spend, so we should use it to set up some refugee camps around the world, and send them there.
July 31, 2015
The reality is that we can and do forcibly deport people, but not enough and it takes far too long and even without the proposed idiocy of general amnesties too many are eventually allowed to stay, which inevitably encourages others to try their luck. All illegal immigrants should simply be sent back to where they have come from, or as nearly as that can be ascertained, and that should be done instantly once they have been apprehended. If they are plucked out of the water in the Mediterrranean they should safely deposited back on a beach in North Africa, not taken to Italy.
That is the only way to stop the flow, as is obvious to those who actually want to stop it rather than assist and encourage it because they favour unrestricted immigration and don’t care what the rest of us think about it.
Even a retired Italian general has now spoken out stating the obvious, that the present policy of using EU navies to ferry illegal immigrants to the EU has greatly increased the numbers trying to cross:
https://euobserver.com/justice/129762
“General Vincenzo Camporini, Italy’s chief of defence from 2008 to 2011, told EUobserver in an interview that the operation, EUnavformed, will encourage smugglers to set adrift more people in the Mediterranean Sea because there’ll be more EU ships which are obliged, under international law, to rescue them.
“In essence, it’s helping the smuggling operation because it provides people with more means to reach their desired objective, which is to land in Europe”, he said.”
We pay for a navy to defend our country, not to facilitate illegal immigration on any scale at all, let alone one which is increasingly looking like an invasion; and I would hazard a guess that some of the naval personnel involved must now be wondering why on earth the government is ordering them to do this and whether they are serving their country as they intended when they volunteered.
July 31, 2015
What flag was our? navy flying? I suspect it is under the ultimate control of others.
August 1, 2015
This is an EU naval force under the EU flag, the second of its kind and further fulfilling the longstanding ambition for the EU to be able to project hard as well as soft power around the globe.
This second one is called “EUnavfor Med”, following on from the ongoing “EUnavfor Somalia”, Operation Atalanta, to counter piracy off the Horn of Africa:
http://eunavfor.eu/
I assume that the new force in the Mediterranean is following the same pattern as the first, with political and strategic control vested in the EU’s Political and Security Committee which was set up in 2001 under the Nice Treaty and may now be chaired by Her Excellency Federica Mogherini, the ex (?) communist Italian politician who has succeeded Baroness Ashton as the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, a post created under the Lisbon Treaty which supposedly ceased to exist as soon it came into force in 2009:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=URISERV:r00005
“In the event of a military response, the PSC exercises political control and strategic direction. On the basis of the opinions and recommendations of the EUMC, the PSC evaluates strategic military options, the operation concept and the operation plan to be submitted to the Council. With a view to launching an operation, the PSC sends the Council a recommendation based on the opinions of the EUMC. On that basis the Council decides to launch the operation within the Decision on the action to be taken, determining in particular the role of the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy in the implementation of the measures. During the operation, the High Representative, who may chair the PSC, reports to the Council. On the basis of the proceedings of the PSC, the High Representative directs the activities of the Situation Centre, which supports the PSC and provides it with intelligence on crisis management.”
July 31, 2015
Dear Botogol, For practical purposes you are right.
To stop illegal immigration we should need to treat those who get through in a heartless way (for instance by deporting them to their country of origin). Or by corralling them in in closed camps permanently until they found somewhere else to go, as Hong Kong did so effectively with the Boat People.
Being heartless goes against the grain. And it would be hypocritical when every Party in Parliament favours immigration. Even the Ukip MP. Even Mr Redwood.
Politicians just want immigrants to be the “right sort of people”. Or they blame the EU, even though the latest numbers show higher net immigration from outside the EU than from within.
Mr Field and Sir Nicholas Soames, neither of whom has much following in his own party, did found the cross-party “Balanced Migration” group but it never accumulated much support among other MPs and now appears to be moribund.
Balanced migration is not an issue on the Westminster or Whitehall agendas, let alone public policy, let alone a national Government priority. So there is really no moral basis for being beastly to young men who have the initiative to call the Government’s bluff “pour encourager les autres”. Human rights, on the other hand, have high priority.
Reply It is government policy to reduce migration to tens of thousands a year.
July 31, 2015
Is your reply John, supposed to be a joke? If not, then why am I laughing?
August 1, 2015
Reply to Reply : This was just a sop by Cameron to the electorate to get some votes. In the meantime he’s allowing the numbers to get totally out of control running at 300,000 a year !!!
Cameron’s been told the EU will not talk about Freedom of movement so that rules out doing anything about half the total. But crucially he hasn’t lifted a finger to deal with the 150,000 pa that come from outside the EU.
These he COULD deal with NOW – if he wanted to.
With overwhelming public support for tough action and a majority in Parliament, what possible excuse does Cameron have for allowing the current situation to continue ? We need an Australian style points system and we need it now.
July 31, 2015
“Where will the plane be given permission to land?”
Have you heard of parachutes?
July 31, 2015
Weak, soft touch British politicians. You wonder why those people come from every corner of the earth, apart the west. Your ideas are as soft as the stupid party, Labour.
You lot always end up doing too little too late, this is why we have this mess today and it will get worse.
Let’s build a fence at Calais that is about as fit as a Chocolate Tea Pot.
Why are we in the EU hell hole again? Doesn’t their law only work when it brings in money, why are all EU counties allowing those people a clear passage to the UK?
A six year old can answer that question. They don’t want them so they pass the buck onto us. EU law claim asylum in the first country you arrive in, that’s a joke.
I’m bored of your …… ways of dealing with mess your part continues to approach this crisis and the EU money pit.
Rant over for now, god help us!
July 31, 2015
Quite right Sean. What is the point of taking part in blogs like this if the government continually ignores the people’s opinions?
July 31, 2015
MP David Davies spoke for many of us yesterday when he said these so called refugees should be held/looked after, in a SAFE REFUGEE CAMP in Africa, until the reason for them seeking asylum was resolved.
The present problem is the result of the EU rescue at sea policy in the Med. where we actually search for people to be rescued, even in Libyan waters, and bring them into the EU instead of returning them back (a shorter distance) to Northern Africa, thus encouraging and rewarding more to be rescued.
The second factual problem, is if they are illegal entrants to the UK they are also illegal entrants to any other Country in the EU through which they have passed, thus all other Countries through which they have travelled, have failed in border control.
Our problem here is that we take far, far too long to settle a course of action when they are found and at the same time allow them freedom in our Country.
All those without identification papers or who claim asylum should be held in a secure establishment. If THEY REFUSE to give details about Country of origin, then a blood sample/DNA test should indicate the area of the World to which they will be returned.
If you case is genuine then surely you would be eager to outline your problems and where you had been abused.
Thus return them to their original Country, not just back to France !
Clearly it is an absolute nonsense that some so called refugees are still awaiting the result of their status after many years. that is not fair on them or us, who are supporting them.
The whole asylum system, so called human rights issues and Border controls are at the moment unfit for purpose.
I could go on and on, but cast your mind back to the second World War, when everyone had security in mind, looked out for each other, when we had secure borders, and foiled our enemies attempts to infiltrate our Country with professional spies.
That was a time without computers, without immediate communication, without, sophisticated radar.
We succeeded because we had a WILL TO DO SO.
At the moment we are spending £ Billions abroad AND still allowing people to get in.
Meanwhile those who helped us and acted as translators for our armed forces in Arghanistan are denied refugee status, which is an absolute disgrace.
For goodness sake recall Parliament and SORT IT, and sort it quickly, because thats what we pay you all for.
August 1, 2015
Not in Libyan waters, yet, as far as I know; from June 22nd:
https://euobserver.com/foreign/129229
“EU navies take up position in Mediterranean”
“The EU senior diplomat said the naval operation “will not enter the territorial water of Libya in phase one” but noted mission planners were prepared for whatever events could take place.”
August 2, 2015
Denis Cooper
“Libyan waters”
Reported in the National Press, also I think I recall on TV as well , about 6 weeks ago.
How accurate are the reports, no idea, but if a boat was in trouble in Libyan waters, (very possible) I cannot see anyone just standing off, and offering no help.
July 31, 2015
It is worth looking at what the French are saying about this (distasteful though that may be). They are saying the migrants want to come because due to the lack of identity cards and other lax measures it is possible for the migrants to get work and live in UK. We need to analyse what we are doing differently to the French which makes it worth these people risking their lives to come. Then we should implement whatever the French do. But of course if that includes identity cards almost everyone on this forum will complain, won’t they ?
Reply Non UK citizens do need to have identity documents – passports – to come here and stay here, with work permits to work here if they do not come from an EU country.
July 31, 2015
People of course are able to find plentiful work in the UK by working in the underground economy or using forged EU documents.
zorro
August 1, 2015
Your reply:-
Reply Non UK citizens do need to have identity documents – passports – to come here and stay here, with work permits to work here if they do not come from an EU country.
This is a pointless reply as —
But not to show them – I have lived in the UK for 76 years and have never been asked to show one. Everyone assumes I am here legally which goes for anyone, legal or not, in the UK.
Reply They need to show them to enter the country, to get a driving licence and to get a job
July 31, 2015
They head to the UK because their perception is that it has more to offer than most other EU countries. We need to alter that perception.
Asylum seekers should have applied in the first EU country they arrived in. It must be made clear to them that on arrival in the UK and claiming asylum they will be returned to the EU country of arrival.
Economic migrants should be returned to the country from which they originate or the last none EU country they left.
To reinforce the policy there should be a serious trawl within the UK for the hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants we already have. These should be returned without delay to their country of origin. Claims to family life should be answered with an invitation to be able to take their family with them.
To facilitate the above, we have to be out of the EU, reform the law in England, and decimate the legal industry that feeds like carrion on this utter shambles.
By infiltration or other means we need to decimate the gangs that feed off the trafficking. A job for MI6 and GCHQ. and the military.
The existing camp in Calais should be pamphleted with the above message.
The main source of legal immigrants is the EU. Most of them come to work and are welcome. They are doing work that many of the feather bedded indigenous population deem it unsuitable to get out of bed for. Until we are free of the EU and in control of our own borders, legal immigration on the scale we see it will continue. The real figure was well over 600,000 last year. I do not discount them against the UK population that decides they have had enough and leave. When we can choose who comes to the UK I welcome them. If we create the jobs and they are keen to have them then come aboard. Until our education system is up, running, and producing the talent we need this situation will continue.
You assured me yesterday that over 100 conservative MPs want out of the EU and have formed a group. I say out because all but the most febrile of mind realise by now that re-negotiation is a time wasting scam. Now these 100 plus their leadership need to sit on a platform before press and public to denounce the iniquities of the EU and declare themselves for out. They also need to include any like minded labour MPs and reach out to UKIP so that everyone speaks from the same hymn sheet. You must eliminate any chance of divide and conquer. Such a grouping would demand press attention and maybe even the BBC. After Nigel’s conference yesterday most of the press reported it, the only omissions being the BBC and ITV.
The sovereignty of the UK comes way before party political considerations. The people will not forgive those who cannot come to terms with this.
Reply Mr Farage was reported because he criticised fellow Eurosceptics, rather than worthwhile criticisms of the EU. I have put out a large amount of material setting out what is wrong with the EU as you can see.
August 1, 2015
Reply to Reply
He did not criticise you personally nor any individual Eurosceptic. Collectively , in my own words, he considered you all less than visible. The inference being that as a group you need to be out there explaining the iniquities of the EU to the electorate. This is what he intends to be doing up and down the country from September. He was at pains to point out that your 100 and any other like minded politicians are welcome to join him on the same platform. Our relationship with the EU is beyond party politics, it is far too important for the future sovereignty of the UK.
Thanks to your column I have a very good idea of what you think of the EU, but does Burt Wainwright working up in Sunderland. I do not question your integrity, but think the time has come for collective action because it should carry more weight particularly in the press and BBC etc. The No campaign needs one coherent clear message. Why not all of you get together this August and hammer out that message.
Reply We have a coherent message.I regularly explain it on this site and in BBC interviews and in articles in various papers. The day Mr Farage made his speech the media offered various Conservative MPs the chance to go and criticise him for his critical comments, which we decided not to respond to. We want to talk about the EU, not about different groupings and parties of Eurosceptics. Maybe you will help us?
August 1, 2015
Adendum.
As to helping you, if I knew either of you I might say lets go have lunch and discuss how we might work together outside the constraints of party politics. I might suggest inviting Daniel Hannan and Kate Hoey as well. If the four of you could reach a none partisan modus operandi I would feel I had succeeded. As it is I know none of you and reside in Spain so I would suggest that you will have to make the necessary overtures. For sure you need to present a united front to the electorate or the opposition will attempt to divide and conquer.
Reply That’s what we will be doing for the Out campaign! We just do not need false pubic criticisms of what we are doing and saying.
July 31, 2015
I had the pleasure of teaching some of the immigrants who have been shunted to Cambridgeshire from the south where they were picked up on lorries.
Do you know what? They came here for an adventure, I think. Shackleton, Frobisher and Rhodes did the same thing. They are young (legally 14 – but a fourteen year old girl assures me they are a lot older than she is). They communicate – when they want to – very easily both face to face and on the phone. They cannot speak English – reading or writing. They are all some kind of Muslim. They can all read Arabic. One is furious – he expected England to be paradise and, of course, he is bitterly disappointed. One has vanished into the ether. They are, as you might expect, very savvy indeed having put their young lives on the line to get here time and time again. They laugh and smile a lot with genuine happiness and I like being with them.
They are also very expensive indeed. The Social Services are doing a very good job in looking after them and they ought to be congratulated in what (to them) is a very challenging situation.
At the moment there is a trickle.
July 31, 2015
We can’t blame it all on the Eu – these migrants are passing through EU France and Italy because they are treated extremely generously by a system that they have not contributed to. If the Conservatives were really interested in solving the problem they could they change the system of benefit entitlement for migrants to match that of France and Italy. But that would upset Polly Toynbee so CMD will keep sitting on his hands.
If these people are really fleeing extreme poverty and violence why have so many of the women and children been left behind ?.
August 1, 2015
“If these people are really fleeing extreme poverty ” – – how come they all have better phones than I do? – and how can they pay £3k per person to get on a boat out of Libya. – they have more than I do – -but after paying in for 40+ yr – I get NOTHING from the DWP – they will get cash housing and healthcare – – so why did I work all my life?? – just so a foreigner can walk in and get more??? – -for having done NOTHING.????I have met many others who have worked – and get nothing despite now being out of work. Stabbed in the back by our own govt doesn’t even begin to describe it.
August 1, 2015
Agreed..although it seems our wonderful Conservative government thinks that people that have crossed countless borders, deserts, endured leaky and overcrowded boats will then be detered by a few miles of chicken wire and a lowly paid private security guard and his dog.
What did we do to deserve this lot?
Three words sum up our response to the crisis WEAK WEAK WEAK
July 31, 2015
I want us to use all legal means to ensure economic migrants do not cross the channel illegally.
Certainly – but the core problem remains: when illegal/economic migrants arrive in UK, as all too many of them manage to do, they are allowed to stay either in detention, or on “bail” (hollow laughter), cost us lots of money, add to the demands on social services, place extra pressure upon employment opportunities for our own people, etc ed.
A great many of us believe firmly, with increasing desperation, that these people should be subject to immediate (within hours) return to their last known point of departure and/or country of origin. Institute this policy, and the problem will be ameliorated very quickly as word gets around. Whatever international treaty obligations impede such a policy must be repudiated and got rid of.
Clearly anyone arriving in Dover from Calais cannot be an asylum seeker..
Clearly indeed – but this logic has escaped the minds of our political leaders, who continue to be nervous (“frit”?) both of their EU counterparts and of bien pensant opinion. It would be refreshing to have a political class possessing patriotism, common sense – and guts.
July 31, 2015
Would the politically correct temporary leader of the Labour party make some valid proposal for a solution other than opening the flood gates. Carping about the use of the word ‘swarm’ is an attempt to make political capital.
Perhaps she should consider the problems created by previous administrations as revealed in the Times.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/article4512682.ece
Analysis of census data, conducted by the Office for National Statistics, showed that the non-UK-born population in England and Wales has increased by more than 60 per cent. In 2001, 4.6 million residents had been born abroad, and by 2011 this had grown to 7.5 million, a rise of just under half of total immigration to England and Wales since 1951.
Most of the immigration which took place over the past decade occurred after the expansion of the European Union in 2004 to include central and eastern European countries including Poland. Polish-born people, of whom there were 579,000 in the UK by 2011, were the second-largest group of those born abroad, with a ten-fold increase since 2001. The largest group was those born in India, of whom there were 694,000 in 2011, or 1 per cent of the total population. Third-largest was the Pakistani-born group, with 482,000.”
July 31, 2015
Hard to believe France is not playing silly billies, despite Rt Hon Theresa May’s assurances that she and her colleagues are working closely with the French.
We saw hundreds of thousands of demonstrators/rioters in France throughout the last half century. The French police dealt with them. Part of that remedy most certainly did not include the building of one single makeshift shelter, setting up latrines and even shops, allowing charity groups to hand out as much as a bottle of water.
The participants were dispersed by every means short of gunfire. though I do not recall swarming mounted police charging with long multiple lines of horses and lashing out indiscriminately as at Orgreave during the British coalmining strike. Perhaps because the French are civilised and their government ministers have not had full frontal lobotomies.
Even standing at the side of a motorway astride metal barriers is an offence under British and French law let alone damaging and breaking into trucks. Jail is the usual punishment for repeat offenders.
The French have deliberately caused our citizens to be subject to attack on their person and their property. The French border should be sealed whilst Rt Hon Theresa May has even”closer” talks with her French counterparts and legal proceedings started in every UN and international court to bring French Ministers to justice.
July 31, 2015
Oops. Careful Christopher with your use of the word ‘swarming’. Just might get you into a lot of trouble with the do-gooders.
July 31, 2015
As one German said about these immigrants “……….they are all young, single males. You can see the problems” If thousands are getting in it must unbalance our societies.
July 31, 2015
Well for a start we could stop employing Capital Ships as free ferry services and expecting the Italians to soak them all up. Also realise that the flipping COBRA Committee never solves anything, and neither do Dithering Dave’s serious-faced speeches. Bickering with the French doesn’t achieve a lot either.
There are fences being built, but without observing the place it’s difficult to judge whether or not they will be effective.
The reports always talk about ‘lines being broken’. So firstly, strengthen the lines, using troops if necessary, and minimum force. Also bolster search teams with troops until the lorry backlog is cleared. Whilst this is going on, build a new camp using the miles of tents left from Afghanistan, and use the foreign aid budget to pay for basic sanitation and basic catering. The camp needs a robust security fence and a security force possibly drawn from the private contractors whose payroll is struggling for work since the Maritime Security industry went into decline. Site of said camp to be agreed between France and UK govts. Police then round up the immigrants roaming Calais and living in the Jungle. The camp needs an asylum processing area. Those who have genuine asylum claims can remain in France as the first country of arrival. Any caught in the UK sent back to the new camp on ferries paid for by the foreign aid budget.
The immigrants then have a choice – they can return to their country of origin (you can guess where the transport costs should come from), or they can remain indefinitely in what is essentially a prison camp. Message will then be sent to future immigrants, and the people of Calais and Kent can get on with their lives.
But whatever happens, Cameron needs to tale a leaf out of Trump’s book and start telling the truth no matter how many bleeding hearts get upset by it.
Once the tide has been stemmed,
July 31, 2015
C4 News the French Ambassador was interviewed by Jon Snow last night, I felt the French were facilitating the passing on of illegal immigrants because ‘France took 60,000 this year and we only took 30,000’. What are the true figures? How many people are we taking in? Where are they living? How many of the homeless are these refugees.
If I were Cameron and talking about a large group of people I’d have just used ‘crowd’ or ‘large group’ he knows words like ‘swarm’ give Harriet Harman a thrill (unless of course its one of her own uttering them like Blunkett did with ‘swamping’).
We have people on the tv every night talking about homeless, poverty of children in the UK, FGM, machetes (how long have machetes been a problem in the UK) then you see new arrivals using them to slash their way out of lorries they’ve stolen aboard.
Instead of holding people in London/Kent whilst applications are being assessed we need a plan of action to hold applicants off the mainland and then return those to their original countries instead of lawyers in London earning a fortune off this racket.
August 1, 2015
Why should we take any at all if we don’t want them?
August 2, 2015
I thought David Cameron had agreed to take a % of refugees along with all the other EU Countries, economic migrants without skills and finances to support themselves we shouldn’t take especially if they are illegally entering the Country, they shouldn’t be held on the mainland to soak into their friends ‘seventeen to a home’ dwellings, living on the self-employed economy. We need to stop faffing around and put on planes to take them back home the following day. Just put on a plane a day until we’ve taken everyone back. We’ve been paying millions and millions of pounds to Africa in charitable aid over the past thirty years so perhaps we need to rethink our strategy of where this money is spent and what regimes it is supporting to continue as they always have. Where has all this money gone aren’t we just the engineers of this current problem.
July 31, 2015
On the matter of Calais if the French won’t sort out these camps and strikers and the British Government can’t sort it out through diplomacy then it is up to the British people to stop using the Euro Tunnel and Calais Port and find alternatives, start starving them of funds and it will become a higher priority.
July 31, 2015
I don’t understand how these asylum seekers are allowed to stay here . Our activist Judiciary are very good at splitting legal hairs regarding our obligations under the law, yet the same obligations don’t seem to apply to the asylum seeker. It is legally very clear that these asylum seekers are required to claim asylum at the first safe country. So how are these asylum seekers allowed to stay here when it is very clear they come from France? Have our activist Judiciary set aside the law in this instance? Is the Government failing to insist the law is applied?
As to the wider issue, I don’t believe it is possible to get control of the problem while we continue to remain a signatory to the 1951 UN refugee convention . It is an unlimited liability that is beyond any sort of control. That is one pull factor.
Neither do I think it possible to control the problem while these people can disappear into the black economy, pretty much safe in the knowledge, the incompetent badly run British state, is never likely to catch them, and doesn’t really want to catch them.
And lastly nothing is going to work while we continue to have the Human Rights Act that ambulance chasing lawyers can use to frustrate any chance an illegal immigrant will be sent home, along with the help of the activist Judiciary who have set themselves up in opposition to the British state, playing fast and loose with the laws they like and the ones they don’t apply.
Perhaps we should make use of the Aid budget by using it to set up refugees camps around the world next to trouble spots where these people can be sent.
July 31, 2015
Has anyone in government (verbally)slapped down Peter Sutherland,that Bilderberger par excellence,who holds sway at the UN on matters of immigration or do we just do what the UN tells us surreptitiously whilst going through the motions of having a national policy on immigration democratically approved by the people?
July 31, 2015
The PM has stated that illegal migrants will not have access to bank accounts, will not be able to rent property, or buy or rent a car. I really find it difficult to imagine how this can be enforced. How can we ensure that banks, landlords, and employers of casual labour will check that every applicant for a service has a valid NI number?
July 31, 2015
The truth is that it can’t be enforced effectively, particularly if there are not enough people to enforce it.
zorro
July 31, 2015
Banks, landlords, employers, etc will pay heavy fines if they are discovered to have helped illegals.
August 1, 2015
Key words – if they are discovered.
zorro
July 31, 2015
The disgrace here is the attitude of the French authorities who are only too happy to pass these people through to the U.K. rather than process them correctly according to the law in France.
Closely followed by our utterly inadequate border controls. I have said before that I have witnessed a large number of illegal immigrants emerge from under a vehicle tarpaulin in broad daylight while in a traffic jam on the M4. I am sure that scene is being repeated daily up and down the country.
July 31, 2015
The main issue isn’t illegal immigration but LEGAL immigration. The handing out of UK passports like confetti.
Our immigration system is unpointed. Therein lies the problem. No quality control and no limit on numbers – so long as it is not ‘illegal’. Yet John Redwood is quite happy with this.
As it happens any clued up migrant will go to another EU country and get citizenship there before travelling to Britain unimpeded. If I were the Italian PM I’d be granting asylum to all who landed and giving them tickets to England. Problem sorted.
The situation in Calais is actually a good thing so soon into a majority Tory government. It is actually on the periphery of our immigration problems but makes big, humiliating headlines. Long may it continue. But the real scandal (that our government loves to undermine its own people and culture) will go on only until we are no better off than the tin pot countries these people come from. The Tory party has been up to its neck in this.
And I am sick of Tory politicians – with talking head degrees and who wouldn’t know one end of a spanner to another – pointing their fingers at other organisations and telling us how useless they are when they themselves are incapable of performing their most basic duty to their people.
The question should not be whether we are IN or OUT of the EU but whether we need either a British OR and EU parliament.
As it is the British parliament is surplus to requirement and a the biggest waste of money that the UK taxpayer faces. If it continues to refuse to control our borders then it should go.
July 31, 2015
Lets never forget these are human beings and that there but for the grace of God go us .
We like to talk about the 1% as if it’s someone else but on a global scale in terms of wages , people in the top two deciles in the UK are part of the world 1% .
I wonder whether we are getting this out of perspective – seeing the splinter and missing the plank .
The plank is the huge number of undesirables from the EU who can just come and go as they please ; convicted national rapists , paedophiles and murderers and suspected terrorists .
Treating the rest of the world as second class citizens is short sighted to say the least and is bound to foster resentment .
Secondly , the West has to stop preventing these countries from developing .
Cease destabilising them , regime change , debt peonage , from stopping them using fossil fuels and waging economic war on them , demonising them .
As with terrorism , in a large part we are reaping what we have sown .
Reply Most who come here are not the criminals you describe
July 31, 2015
How much can we blame the EU and its rules for this mess? The EU allows freedom of movement for EU citizens but these migrants are not EU citizens. This shambles seems to be a combination of continuing incentives in the UK benefits system for migrants to come to the UK and incompetence by the French govt in enforcing the law in and around Calais. Let’s remember the huge influx of immigration which has taken place since Labour opened the sluices gates is mainly non-EU.
August 1, 2015
EU freedom of movement is not restricted to “EU citizens”.
July 31, 2015
“Send them back” is the right message , whether its back to France or elsewhere I don’t care about . The point is we don’t want them , we cannot absorb them , our infrastructures are stretched to the limit . Theresa May stated a couple of months ago that we should send them back and this sort of action seems to have been overlooked ; as Home Secretary she should have some teeth and put into practice what she preached .
In the Mediterranean the boat migrants should not be off-loaded to a European destination ; they should be returned from whence they came . The humanity aspect is highly suspect ; most migrants are “economic” and not in fear of death . Another aspect is the extent to which terrorists are able to slip in and ultimately add to the tremendous security burden we already have on our plate . As long as we appear to be the country of “benefits” we will continue to attract the unwanted . No benefits of any sort should be made to any migrant and much publicity should be made to emphasise this .
July 31, 2015
No benefits and no where to stay in the UK. If they were sent straight back then the flow would eventually stop.
July 31, 2015
First thing – Thank you John for posting on this topic.
In addition to the disruption/migrant issues I am amazed that the Government is sitting around losing a fortune every day this situation persists without saying much, whilst at the budget Osborne was crowing about his welfare reforms which amount to probably less than the Calais losses.
Personally I think we should have our border checks in the UK as any other Sovereign country does. I presume that the Labour Government arranged the present set-up as part of its pathetically pro-EU stance.
As for fining lorry drivers for having illegals in their lorries – well it is tantamount to fining householders if they are burgled – another Labour government initiative to promote crime eh? I mean who wants to report finding illegals in their lorries only to be fined …
All this cannot be doing much for Cameron’s chances of winning his Referendum.
July 31, 2015
The juxtaposed controls work very much in the UK’s favour because the costs of enforcement are much less. This is why the government is petrified that the French will suspend/cancel the agreement……
zorro
July 31, 2015
Why not let them all in and let them work? Abolish the welfare state, immigration controls and let brutal market forces dictate who gets fed, clothed and housed?
You want free trade and freedom for capital to move – you want third world countries to liberalise and let in Western capital so that it can enjoy a higher return from the cheap labour available, so that the returns can then be used to subsidise the slothful habits of much of the native population here. Sounds like a very unfair trade.
Sooner or later they will find a way in, just like earlier humans found a way to settle Europe and colonise it. Europe’s population is expected to decline from 740m to 720m by 2050, whilst Africa’s will double from 1.2bn to 2.4bn…. many of these 1.2 bn will find a way to Britain and it is an inexorable process that is taking place and that you can’t stop.
August 1, 2015
Europe’s population may decline but not Britain’s.
July 31, 2015
Yet again eu policy is killing people.
Australia stopped deaths from people arriving in boats by stopping the incentive and processing arrivals offshore. The eu’s refusal to do something similar is callous.
Now we have people dying as the eu’s mad policies are once again causing havoc.
The eu is extreme and is run by extremists who apparently will see people lose their livelihoods (e.g. Greece) and now even their lives in order to stick to their extreme and dangerous ideology.
Why are we having anything to do with these people?
July 31, 2015
Perhaps you should be writing to Mr Duncan-Smith about the benefits system. The French make the point about folk being attracted here by benefits.
Another problem is the UN convention on refugees that we and France are signed up to. This is why these people can hang around Calais.
Maybe we need an EU wide entry rule – a no from say the UK (or France/Spain whoever) means a no entry from all. That you probably mean the UK joining Schengen with tougher external immigration rules. Difficult for the Conservatives DNA. Even then we would need some sort of ID card system – given the last Labour government’s mess on that scheme it will not be easy.
July 31, 2015
All the media attention will attract more people to the Calais camp and attract more people to the UK. (I’m glad not many people have heard about the Netherlands)
For any option intensive cooperation (at least between France and Britain, but also Europe-wide) would be necessary. Good exercise for the minister, who seems finally to have engaged well with the French.
I believe that UK police is assisting in the Netherlands’ ferry ports, but we’re not going to make a big media hype about immigrants 🙂
August 1, 2015
I’m surprised that PVL isn’t more willing to welcome the migrants at Calais to ‘enrich’ the culture of his country. I thought the Eu project was a big melting pot without frontiers that is supposed to make us all better off. Or perhaps it only works that way when it suits…ie the French attempts att shifting the problem onto us…
I’m sure the migrants can find the Netherlands on a map but wisely the politicians there do not seem to despise their own country and have thus made the benefit system tougher.
https://www.gov.uk/living-in-the-netherlands
‘Within a four month period of arriving in the Netherlands it is mandatory to purchase health care coverage’. It’s not free like here.
The Netherlands Contribution-Based Benefits:
Working and paying contributions in the Netherlands gives you entitlement to a number of Dutch social security benefits.
Wisely there is a contributions based system – the details of which are only available in the Dutch language. Over here they would be advertised in all languages etc ed.
August 1, 2015
@Ken Moore: it would be naive to welcome each and every immigrant into the Netherlands of course, and I’m aware of the strain this puts on our society.
Although I think that we could cope with more migrants (preferably real refugees) I would hope that a good system could be found to return economic migrants to their countries and discourage the human trafficking business.
Reply How and when? If the EU is so wonderful why doesn’t it solve the problem of its long and poorly policed borders for Schengen?
July 31, 2015
Within the last few minutes RT Hon Mr Cameron has said he expects the problem (migrant attacks in Calais ) to “go on right through the summer ”
If just one British person, throughout the summer, is killed or receives life changing injuries one hopes his resignation as PM and MP is immediate.
August 1, 2015
I think that is known, in the media world that Mr Cameron inhabits as ‘expectation management’. He must be hoping the crisis doesn’t get worse and interfere with his 43rd holiday of the year.
July 31, 2015
thank god Labour or the lib/dems didn`t get anywhere near power, you can just hear the cry ” come on in the waters lovely !!
July 31, 2015
When you write to Mrs May, JR, please could you draw her attention to this report on the population explosion in Africa:
http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2014/08/13/340091377/unicef-report-africas-population-could-hit-4-billion-by-2100
“UNICEF Report: Africa’s Population Could Hit 4 Billion By 2100”
“The continent’s population currently sits at roughly 1.2 billion but will soar to more than 4 billion by 2100. Nearly 1 billion will live in Nigeria alone.”
“An estimated 1.8 billion births will take place in Africa in the next 35 years, the authors predict. By 2050, Africa will have almost 1 billion children under 18, making up nearly 40 percent of kids worldwide.”
Please could you check that she understands that a billion is one thousand million, and that just the present population of Africa is about eighteen times the present population of the UK and indeed twice the population of the present EU, and that just the annual rate of increase of the population of Africa is about half of the UK population and three hundred times her party’s previous target for maximum net immigration even on the most elastic definition; and then could you ask just how many of that exploding African population we should help to come to our country for a better life?
That question, “How many?”, is the one which the small but vociferous minority who advocate unrestricted immigration into our country will always avoid answering if they possibly can.
Or she could have read about it in the Guardian, just a couple of days ago:
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/jul/29/un-world-population-prospects-the-2015-revision-9-7-billion-2050-fertility
“Global population set to hit 9.7 billion people by 2050 despite fall in fertility”
“Predicted increase of 2.4 billion will complicate efforts to stamp out poverty, inequality and hunger and place further strain on health and education systems”
It’s something of a euphemism to say that it will “complicate” those efforts, the fact is that for some decades excessive population growth in the poorest countries has more or less negated all such efforts.
August 1, 2015
Yet Mr Monbiot and most of the Conservative party have nothing to say about population increase as it isn’t politically correct to discuss it.
As an aside the Uk’s population is growing at 0.7% per year and rising …enough to double the population in just over a lifetime. A totally unprecedented experiment that will have profound and devastating consequences for generations to come. Before anything is done it will be too late.
August 2, 2015
Well, the poorest countries in the world have population growth rates which are many times that of the UK, despite being somewhat tempered by net emigration rather than raised by net immigration:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_growth_rate
And a map here:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/germanys-birth-rate-lowest-in-the-world-according-to-study-10286525.html
indicates where the population explosion is concentrated, Africa.
We are told today that there is a “global migration crisis”, but that is just a product of the long-running global population crisis.
Which we are not allowed to talk about, because to do so would be “racist”, and indeed the merest suggestion that people in poor countries would now be much better off if they had had fewer children is condemned as being tantamount to a proposal for “genocide”.
July 31, 2015
There is only one measure that needs to be proposed:
Stop giving stuff away for free. That includes to our own people who won’t work.
You are being made to look complete buffoons on BBC TV.
August 1, 2015
Agreed if something is available free of charge (in this case a place in Uk society, free healthcare, housing and schools then it is inevitable that a large unruly queue is formed. What was it that Mr Powell said about a ‘nation heaping up it’s own funeral pyre’. Instead of castigating Mr Powell perhaps our leaders should have listened ?.
July 31, 2015
Frankly, I have a lot of sympathy for the French. Their country is also being ‘invaded’ by illegal immigrants and similar to us they are struggling to cope. The reality is that the UK, and the rest of the EU, has not committed enough money to prevent this from happening. The governments of various colours have not made any real attempts at changing the flow. This is simply grist to the mill for UKIP and Cameron really needs to be seen to be doing something positive for the UK as opposed to the EU.
August 2, 2015
But for some reason many of the immigrants don’t want to stay in France.
July 31, 2015
Maybe we should take in some asylum seekers, especially those from the Syria crisis, but only those who have registered through the centres in Italy, Greece, etc.
July 31, 2015
Why is it, that HMG has not taken the French authorities to court for their appalling lack of effort in preventing these illegals from entering a controlled zone, causing disruption and criminal damage.
Indeed, why have the French allowed the camp, known as the Jungle 2, to be established.
Some French commentators have issued the canard that the problems exists as a result of the UK not being part of the Schengen arrangements. But Schengen simply allows illegals free movement within the area once they have pierced the outer border. And as so much of that is coastal it is extremely porous.
No one can say that France is a country that poses risks to migrants, so surely we should return ALL illegals to Paris at once. Indeed we should apply the ruling that entry requests should be made from home nation state and if not made, invalidates any request for asylum made following illegal entry. No one should be allowed to claim asylum having gained illegal entry to the UK and any claim under Human Rights should be invalidated and no legal representation allowed.
The French quite clearly have a vested interest in “helping/assisting” these migrants in their efforts to enter the UK. The French don’t want them and are more than happy to see them dumped on the UK.
High time we took measured efforts and if necessary used force to protect our interests.
If necessary the Eurotunnel should be closed, (permanently in my view with explosives) and ferry traffic diverted to Belgium and Holland.
July 31, 2015
As I posted yesterday immediate return of any migrants caught to Calais. No processing, nothing, not our problem! Kent Social Services are supposed to be overwhelmed with “children”, 13-16 year old migrants. Why? They should be returned to Calais, in their own countries, many would not be regarded as children.
Why oh why?do we take on more and more liabilities, these migrants are not our problem unless we ACCEPT that they are.
Any illegal immigrant should face perpetual threat of being arrested and deported when caught. There should be no way that any paperwork should be issued that may assist them to stay. It should be made clear that residence and citizenship, leave to remain will never be granted. Children and the right to family life are used as a weapon, this has to stop. The
Nationality of their children should be that of the father’s country of origin. Wives, if UK citizens, could choose to stay or follow their husband and children when they are deported.
None of this will happen because we don’t have strong leaders prepared to act in our interests come what may and there is a plethora of lawyers and “rights” organisations that receive public funding to thwart firm action.
July 31, 2015
John, there should be zero tolerance for illegals here, and no way to every become legal. That is the only way to stop the flood. A large part of the problem is the EU laws forcing countries to accept EU ‘citizens’, result is that elements of the Italian and French forces are delighted to wave people, some on temporary permits, through into Britain.
July 31, 2015
I keep hearing that perhaps British troops should be deployed in Calais. I didn’t realise that France has no troops of her own or if she has there has been not a single mention of this possibility by anyone – how come?
July 31, 2015
My son has just turned 16 and has had to register to vote. Something we should know John?
July 31, 2015
I read here today:
http://openeurope.org.uk/daily-shakeup/schaubles-proposals-to-restructure-commission-receive-mixed-response-in-germany/?utm_source=Open+Europe&utm_campaign=29d9227cd6-RSS_Campaign_Daily_Shakeup&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c045172cb6-29d9227cd6-262466097#section-7
“Germany needs up to half a million immigrants a year to deal with declining population
Germany’s Institute for Employment Research (IAB) – a subsidiary of the Federal Employment Agency (BA) – estimates that German’s labour force will shrink by 20% in the next 35 years due to demographic challenges. “We need approximately 400,000 to 500,000 immigrants a year to keep our labour-force constant until 2050,” Herbert Brücker, the IAB’s migration expert told the Rheinische Post, “However, I only consider net immigration of about 200,000 people to be realistic,” he added.”
I suppose there could be other answers, such as “Try to make do with fewer workers by increasing their efficiency”, or “Encourage the present population of Germany to have more children”, and “Put up the retirement age to cover the gap until the extra German workers have grown up”, but obviously the simplest solution would be for the German government to charter boats to bring in half a million workers a year from Africa, where there is surplus population.
I’ve pointed out before that just the Italians are now ferrying in people from North Africa at an annualised rate of over 2 million a year, so there would be no problem providing half a million a year to Germany; and Italy could even negotiate a deal with Germany to not only cover their costs but also make a decent profit on it, a scale of charges per head of migrant labour depending on age and sex and health and skills etc.
And there’s really no need to bother asking the present population of Germany what they think about gradually importing 17 million foreign workers to replace the children that they have failed to produce themselves over recent decades. After all, it’s not as if Germany is their country and they have rights over it, or anything like that.
August 1, 2015
This is a ludicrous proposition.
Germany as a country is not being a good European : they are acting in pure self interest wanting to carry on drawing in billions of Euros from sales all over the EU while keeping all the profit in Germany. This is causing huge strains in the currency we can all see.
Instead German companies should be setting up manufacturing plants in areas of the EU with 50% youth unemployment rather than importing economic migrants from Africa.
August 2, 2015
Of course it’s all ludicrous; it’s ludicrous that overall German women are now so reluctant to have children, and thanks to modern and effective methods can make sure that they don’t whatever their menfolk think about it, that the population of Germany will rapidly decline without mass immigration from other countries where the women are still not being allowed to control their fertility, even though each pregnancy and birth puts their health and their life at risk and they and their men do not have adequate resources to properly raise the children they produce.
August 2, 2015
Denis, we cannot tell German women that they have to have more children ! This is rightly up to them. Equally, German men don’t have to get into relationships with women who don’t want children, that is their choice as well.
What I regard as ludicrous is allowing hundreds of thousands of economic migrants into Germany when there are so many unemployed people in other EU countries who want to work.
The German government and major employers are being thoroughly greedy in wanting to retain all the jobs in Germany and make higher profit by bringing in economic migrants on very low wages within Germany.
Instead they should be building factories in other EU countries which would work wonders for the economy of the Eurozone as a whole.
August 3, 2015
I was going to write that German women have the vote, so it is unlikely that there will be a German government which forces them to have more babies, but then I recollected that within living memory the German electoral process with universal suffrage did produce a government which forced some women to bear babies they didn’t want while preventing others from reproducing.
This demographic problem has been both predictable and predicted, and I see no reason why the German government should not have frankly told German women long ago that they had a simple choice: either they had more children, enough to make sure that public finances would be sustainable in the future even if the total population was no longer increasing and was gradually declining, or the government would feel compelled to import large numbers of other people’s children from abroad.
It’s always possible for a government to change its policies to encourage or discourage reproduction by the inhabitants, as part of an overall population strategy. The policy of the post-war Labour government was to help people to have large enough families to make up for the losses from the war and emigration, which was then switched to warning about the threat of over-population and actively promoting birth control; now the UK government is apparently unconcerned about the increasing over-population which is largely the consequence of its own policy of allowing and encouraging mass immigration, and even denies that it is a problem and instead tries to present it as a boon.
If a nation has lost the will to perpetuate itself and is willing to gradually hand over its homeland to assorted foreigners then it hardly matters where those foreigners come from, and it would be ludicrous for an EU country to turn away more suitable immigrants from outside the EU while automatically accepting whoever wanted to come from elsewhere within the EU.
I note that a recent Eurobarometer poll taken across the whole of the EU now has immigration displacing the economy and unemployment as the leading concern, but is really several decades too late for established populations to start to understand what their elected governments have been doing to them.
July 31, 2015
Why not taser all of them that are caught where they shouldn’t be. It is nonlife threatening but would give them an unpleasant jolt, and perhaps make them disinclined to get it a second time.
July 31, 2015
David Cameron has refused to indulge in hyperbole today, which is to his credit, but I do fear he has failed to catch the mood of most English people. His statement that there’ll be more sniffer dogs and fencing does seem inadequate to allay what seems to be increasing public anger about all this.
I agree that none of the Calais migrants can be genuine refugees if they have chosen to travel all this way without seeking asylum at their first European port of call. So that should be enough reason – in the case of those that do enter England illegally – to refuse asylum. Some other suggestions for short term measures:
if we do indeed need to assess asylum applications for those that get through, ensure this is properly resourced and that no ‘lazy’ decision making takes place, as appears to have happened in the past when large numbers of people have been allowed in without challenge; accept that if children get through unaccompanied by adults then we will need to accommodate them at least temporarily
accept that solving all this will need to be at some considerable cost: offer adults that get through the option of having their air fare home paid for plus a very generous amount of money in terms of what that could buy in their country of origin
if they refuse then accommodate them in a purpose built, secure temporary facility here where they would have to stay pending construction of such secure facilities on the edge of the affected Middle Eastern or north African countries; accept that the UK government will have to build and arrange management of these facilities until such time that the countries affected become safe
One practical problem will be with those who get through to England and then refuse to say where they originate from. Some may have been advised to do this. But that is an argument in favour of being far more determined in ensuring that people cannot physically enter our country illegally in the first place. David Cameron surely needs to be persuaded to commit quickly to more robust short term measures at our border than he’s announced today.
July 31, 2015
I want to know what the Conservative eurosceptics are doing to promote the No vote?
I am guessing that you all will jump to Con-manerons tune.
I hear lots from UKIP but your lot nothing.
Reply Try reading my blog, my speeches in Parliament and my interviews!
August 1, 2015
I didn’t realise that JR constitutes the whole of the Tory party! He equates ‘your lot’ with just himself!
July 31, 2015
“Cheese eating surrender monkeys” so don’t expect the French to do anything. Its not as though its just the odd 3000. A line has to be drawn and the stronger the better. Writing placidly to Mrs.May puts it on record but does nothing to resolve the issue now.
July 31, 2015
Look at the Foreign Office twitter page, they are showing gay marriages and praising themselves for being so liberal while theirs a genocide of Christians in the middle east.
God help us.
https://twitter.com/foreignoffice
July 31, 2015
You are making the mistake of thinking that the Foreign Office gives a damn about Christians in the ME. Surely the history of the last 20 years must raise a few questions?
They are far more interested in promoting equality and political correctness wherever it may be found.
zorro
August 1, 2015
I have just spoken to @fhollande about Calais. I welcomed French efforts and we agreed to keep working together to tackle illegal migration.
I have never heard such a vacuous weasel word ridden statement in all my life.
Typical of David Cameron – his list of failures at the 2020 election will be lengthy.
Tory mp’s doggedly staying loyal to him need to wake up and call for a change of direction.
The Uk should project strength but all we do is show weakness.
July 31, 2015
You can see Mr Redwood with only 20 comments so far on this invasion of England
That nearly every one who cares knows nothing much is going to happen.
We are a lost Nation handed over lock stock and barrel by each successive Government since the 1950s . The immigrants will all end up in England by some law or the other . We know it and the immigrants certainly know it.
July 31, 2015
What a breath of fresh air yesterday on the BBC they actually allowed David Davies to get a very good point across regarding this ever growing mess.
What with yesterday and his “Climate Change Speech in parliament (available on U Tube) why is CMD leaving him on the back benches I ask myself?
It is times like this we need new and old bulls (sorry JR) to start impacting on the direction we are taking.
We need people that can and do think outside the box and have a background and history of life and industrial experience not just a good grade in a micky mouse degree.
But will CMD listen?
Don’t hold your breath.
July 31, 2015
Just heard on the news that Cameron is ‘On it’. No worries there then. That means nothing in real terms.
For goodness sake can we just follow the example of Australia and not let any onto European soil. If they know they are going to be taken back they will stop coming eventually. At the moment they all come because they know there is a good chance of getting to the UK. Why do they want to come here????? Benefits, free housing, free medical care, free schooling, and freedom from taxes when they work on the black because nobody knows who they are. The traffickers are doing nicely thankyou, and the slave traders in the UK (we all know it is going on) do well too. Meanwhile, people in Kent are fed up, and quite rightly so, businesses are suffering though no fault of their own and everyone is fed up with hearing how we all owe Africa something. Let’s get real and start thinking about our own people first for a change. Take them back before they land on European soil. They are ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS, not migrants!! We have all had enough!
July 31, 2015
If these migrants learn a second language, it will be English. So, where is their best chance of being understood in a work and social environment; England. The stat’s show that other EU countries are absorbing more immigrants than the UK is.
Down here in the New Forest we have lost, to Mrs May’s deportation department (we think; don’t know), so many good foreign hotel and restaurant staff, it is becoming a voting issue!!!
If a small local business, be it a Chinese Restuarant or even a large Hotel chain, employs a person; that employer should be able to assume, that the person they have chosen to employ, has every right to be employed in the UK. If they haven’t, it’s the government that F****d up, not the little employer.
July 31, 2015
As for Calais, we need to see first of all water cannon; if that doesn’t deter,(firmer action ed)
This is happening in France and the people are illegals in France and the French ought to remove them, but we all know they would much rather get off them to England somehow. Meanwhile our weak government does next to nothing, afraid to ‘offend’ the French by demanding unequivocally they show some backbone, and wishing as usual to be seen as good Europeans. And stop falling for ‘sob stories’, there is an endless list of people who will take advantage of people of goodwill.
We ought to be taking to the streets to demand action, that not only must these people be stopped but all those who have got through are deported immediately to France. Set up a special train.
July 31, 2015
So we’re supposed to be morally blackmailed to fill our country up with these poor souls?
July 31, 2015
‘France needs to work with Italy and Greece on their borders and access of illegal migrants to France from southern ports.
Clearly anyone arriving in Dover from Calais cannot be an asylum seeker as France is a democratic country with proper human rights, so anyone wishing to claim asylum should be returned to France.’
John, surely Greece and Italy have proper human right so surely they shouldn’t even get as far as France. They are not asylum seekers. Many of them are well dressed with mobile phones etc. They are able to pay for their passage. They are just exploiting EU lack of laws!!
July 31, 2015
Just been watching them all get through some sort of fencing on the news. I am not joking but it wouldn’t even be strong enough to hold my chickens back. how about an electric fence or the equivalent of the Berlin wall?? That held back people for long enough!
July 31, 2015
Calais is not the problem but it is a symtom of the problems that have lead to it.
Unfortunately, politics in this country tends to be dominated by people whose ambitions far outstrip their abilities or patriotic desire to put the interests of their own country and people before others, so it is no surprise that the control of immigration has been so feeble for so long, or that Calais, in particular, has been allowed to fester to have now become a major embarassment for these nitwits as well as causing real inconvenience for people attempting to go about their lawful business.
The asylum principle is in essence the concept that someone with no legitimate claim on a country, someone whom that country does not want, should nevertheless have a special right to enter and remain in that country because of their alleged circumstances elsewhere. This was never going to be sustainable for all sorts of very obvious reasons; hard cases make bad law and it behoves those who might wish to be acceptable to others for settlement in large numbers to avoid having a track record of grievously rebarbative behavior elsewhere. We do not need asylum laws at all; it is not asylum laws that prompts most countries to allow the creation of temporary refugee camps adjacent to a war zone, it’s simply common humanity.
There is no doubt that the EU’s approach to the asylum/migrant problem is typically dysfunctional with Brussels issuing directives which are neither acceptable to member states nor workable in practice. That problem can only be solved by leaving the EU to let it sink into the quagmire of its own idiocy without taking us with it.
Most genuine asylum seekers have been displaced either by the neocon psychos or by indigenous conflicts; firstly we need politicians whose moral compass deters predatory warmongering and who can see that displacing people who live much closer to us than to the USA is counterproductive for us and further to realise that with a mandatory 0.7% gdp foreign aid budget, more could be done for conflict resolution, even perhaps at the expense of piscean lonely hearts.
However, the main issue to address is why so many people from poor countries which are so different ethnologically and culturally from ours are so attracted to become ‘Britons’, because unless we address this problem it is highly unlikely that we will ever attenuate the pressures under which putative migrants put us or the possibility that this country will exist in any recognisable form for much longer.
We are a country in which many English people have found that they are put behind in the queue for taxpayer funded resources for housing, for investment in new schools etc, where English people have been intimidated by thoughtcrime laws into silence, where, under law, not being English is a job qualification in itself, where the law is more lenient to incomers than to English people, where in the online media, particularly advertising, one might get the impression that the country is full of attractive English girls, already substantially populated and run by migrants and with a few residual Englishmen available to fix the boiler. If you were born in a third world country wouldn’t you want to come here? It is no surprise that those who have been busily making the UK less congenial for the English but more congenial to every one else are not, in point of fact, English themselves. We therfore must reverse everything they have done so that we, the English, are at least, not disadvantaged in our own country; if that makes this country less inherently attractive to foreigners and so sustainable for everyone for the future, that is to the good.
July 31, 2015
Just a thought: how many of the 40ft lorries parked up on the M20 are full? Or are the majority just returning back to the EU empty? Perhaps this could work in the UKs favour with a slow down on import movements people will have to source locally.
Our politicians aren’t making any headway, the Transport spokespeople are such weak speakers, they have no passion about the trouble the people they represent are facing. How long are drivers being parked up on the motorway, where do they have toilet facilities, how do they get fresh water, who is paying to repair the slashed curtain sides, the motor insurance industry or the British Government? It is hardly fair for insurance rates to rise due to the government losing control of our border and port/tunnel entrance. How do refrigerated vehicles keep chill conditions? Who is paying for the extra fuel cost? How do the drivers cope with their taco graphs?
Where were the fire engines and French police to put the fires out and disperse the criminals setting fire to tyres on the highway?
Perhaps we should take the initiative and announce we are closing the Tunnel for a week.
Perhaps we should find a new port for our fleets.
July 31, 2015
The Politicians of all the Countries involved know exactly how to deal with this situation, (send them back to the first EU Country that they arrived in), but, they either don’t want to because of their own agenda or they are too cowardly. I wonder which slot Mr Cameron fits into!
July 31, 2015
I’m glad it’s the Edinburgh Festival season. Mr. Cameron can do his stint as a comedian up north instead of wasting valuable Cabinet time in which he is occupying a space a leader needs to take up.
Sniffer dogs and big fences? Luckily I don’t have to reside within party discipline and as a voter I can happily state I see that pathetic reaction as definitively weak and inadequate. It matches several decades of cowardly refusal of successive UK Governments to hold French Authorities responsible and to account for their long-standing and inculcated unwillingness to conduct their affairs in a manner not harmful to their pretend friends and neighbours.
You asked what Mr. Cameron should do John? At least he should have the dignity to draw up a physical document of surrender to France, and sign it in person that can be seen in the British Museum. I expect ten thousand leagues better from a UK Government. It won’t be seen from this utterly bereft and weak-willed administration.
July 31, 2015
Yes John, how any employers gave been convicted of employing illegal immigrants over the last 10 years?
zorro
August 1, 2015
Zorro
The figures that I can piece together show that between 500 and 1200 successful prosecutions happen each year. On top of that 40-50,000 illegals are deported each year without prosecutions. £15 million in fines have been collected ( in last 4 years) and 81 new immigration laws/regulations have been introduced since 2000
August 2, 2015
Libertarian,
I do not recognise the figure you quote for prosecutions. I agree that there may have been some civil penalties against employers but what is the source for the figures?
The figure for enforced removals is below 10,000 per year. The figure of 40,000 per year refers to voluntary departures and ‘data matching exercises’ if you look at the small print. Deportation is a specific legal term and does not refer in reality the ‘removal’ of illegal immigrants…… https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-statistics-january-to-march-2015
zorro
August 2, 2015
Actually 12,498 and 3% down on last year….. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-january-to-march-2015/immigration-statistics-january-to-march-2015#removals-and-voluntary-departures
See section 14.2 Enforcement
zorro
August 2, 2015
Zorro
Reading the whole chart and all the numbers for the year to 2015 the total is 75565 left and an increase of 12% for those turned away at port of entry
August 2, 2015
Libertarian,
Port refusals and removals used to be a lot higher at around 35,000 but then nose dived to around 12/13000. They are only just recovering…..
By the way, it is not 75,565. It is actually the sum of the first 3 columns = 52,159
Total voluntary departures is the sum of columns assisted voluntary departures, notified voluntary departures, and other confirmed voluntryy departures = 23,406
zorro
August 2, 2015
Libertarian,
Port refusals and removals used to be a lot higher at around 35,000 but then nose dived to around 12/13000. They are only just recovering…..
By the way, it is not 75,565. It is actually the sum of the first 3 columns = 52,159
Total voluntary departures is the sum of columns assisted voluntary departures, notified voluntary departures, and other confirmed voluntary departures = 23,406
zorro
August 2, 2015
Libertarian,
My reply to you is further down the thread but I will reprint it here. Please remember that the 12,498 figure includes non detained ‘enforced’ removals… i.e. people who were told to leave but were not detained in order to enforce the removal. You will notice from the graph in 14.2 that enforced removals have been going steadily down over the last 10 years. The increase in ‘removals’ has been due to better data matching and embarkation exercises to confoirm that people are no longer in the UK as explained in the notes…..
Actually 12,498 and 3% down on last year….. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-january-to-march-2015/immigration-statistics-january-to-march-2015#removals-and-voluntary-departures
See section 14.2 Enforcement
zorro
August 2, 2015
Zorro
Thanks I can read the chart.
As I said 75565 people were removed year to date March 2015
An INCREASE of 12% on those turned away at port of entry .
So we agree on what the FULL chart says, whats your point?
August 2, 2015
I’m glad that you can, but if you read the chart properly, you will see that the TOTAL removal figures is composed of
Total enforced removals – 12,498
Total refused entry at port – 16,255
Total voluntary departures – 23,406
Grand total – 52,159
As I said, the total voluntary departures figure (23,406) includes 1,820 + 11,218 +10,368 (23,406). You are counting the figure twice. Can you see now?
zorro
August 2, 2015
Libertarian,
Check out the graph intersection at Dec 2014.
zorro
July 31, 2015
What a farce! We now have the government skirting around the problem with talk of beefing up the security at Calais with additional fencing and more detecting devices.
The entrance and loading areas are the choke points, and these areas needs rigorous clearing of all unauthorised persons. Simply finding stowaways and sending them away to try again is pointless.
The industrial dispute at Calais, and the apparent forbearance by the French authorities
is making a bad situation worse. There seems to be a paralysis there to take any action.
We need to see evidence of a properly thought out plan, and some energy to implement it quickly.
August 1, 2015
What would happen if any of us landed illegally and by violent means in another country?
At a guess, I would expect, treatment along these lines:
1) an armed response
2) detention
3)deportation
4) if refusing to supply country of origin, the detention would be permanent
Maybe we should consult other countries on their preferred strategies, and their success rate.
August 1, 2015
JR: “and stated any illegal migrants who do get through will not have access to cars, homes or bank accounts if they do come.”
You are a parody of yourself. These people are prepared to break the law to get here, do you think our laws mean anything to them once they have arrived?
So we’ll end up with more people driving poorly maintained cars, uninsured cars, untaxed cars, living in the cash or barter economy. In fact, all the very things they have been doing up until now.
August 1, 2015
Mr Cameron by now ought be thumping the table and demanding immediate action from M Hollande to end this debacle.
About 3500 people (from where and who they are doesn’t matter) are holding millions of others to ransom, disrupting their lives, costing billions in lost hours, spoiled goods, ruined holidays, closing small businesses etc, quite apart from the eye watering costs of trying to police the the whole sorry mess.
Many will remember before the channel tunnel was built the dreary yearly ritual in France of blockades of ports, striking Air Traffic Controllers, ferry strikes etc, usually at holiday time to cause the most disruption, and yet we are still contemplating them being our responsible partners in the EU?
No amount of pontificating by the VIP EU members, and their drawn out rules about free movement, do this,do that, has prevented the present situation. Off with their heads!
August 1, 2015
Its stories like this that makes my blood pressure go up, and what will happen to him nothing, he`ll be given a house and benefits no dout and asked to bring his family over to join him, worth a read
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3181691/Hamad-s-fast-track-Eldorado-Sudanese-migrant-Italy-five-weeks-ago-UK-thanks-free-train-rides-Europe-wants-family-join-him.html
August 2, 2015
That’s nothing compared to the news today that recent asylum seekers are being put up in country hotels because the immigration reception centres are all full up.
All free of charge with pocket money thrown in.
I hope Dr Redwood will tell Mrs May in no uncertain terms in his letter that this is totally unacceptable –
Aside from the issue of fairness to the taxpayer, there is a small but not insignificant risk to the public from individuals we know virtually nothing about. Who in their right minds would think this an acceptable risk ?.
Well anyone apart from a politically correct driven zealot like David Cameron it would seem.
Cameron’s Conservatives have made us the mugs of the world.
August 2, 2015
That’s nothing compared to the news today that recent asylum seekers are being put up in country hotels because the immigration reception centres are all full up.
All free of charge with pocket money thrown in.
I hope Dr Redwood will tell Mrs May in no uncertain terms in his letter that this is totally unacceptable –
Aside from the issue of fairness to the taxpayer, there is a small but not insignificant risk to the public from individuals we know virtually nothing about. Who in their right minds would think this an acceptable risk ?. .
Well anyone apart from a politically correct driven zealot like David Cameron it would seem.
Cameron’s Conservatives have made us the mugs of the world.
August 1, 2015
What is plan B in the event the tunnel becomes impassable?
France’s Sarkozy demanded suspension of the Shengen arrangement with Italy because of the immigrant (numbers ed) a while ago. Perhaps the equivalent of a fire drill is needed, a practice session if you will. For freight the ferries are an obvious alternative, however perhaps routing them through non-French ports such as Ostend would be a worthwhile test.
Ferries and aircraft would work for passengers.
How would the affected travellers and businesses be compensated? I suggest a fine on France or the EU for not maintaining the freedom of movement and upholding the law.
But this government needs to do something, stop talking about it, holding dinners and discussions, making assinine, avoidance statements to the press and address the problems.
August 1, 2015
If it is politically impossible for the government to intervene directly in Calais, then there must be some sort of inducement for Eurotunnel to provide enhanced security by way of tax incentives or some such scheme. The government cannot expect private companies to do their job for them without some reward.
August 1, 2015
One wonders what the thoughts are in the migrants minds – that so many of them wish to come to the UK rather than live in their original country or another EU country which they almost all have to pass through on their way here.
Is the UK seen as more desirable than other EU countries and, if so, what are the key factors which attracts the migrants ?
Shutting or blocking the roads in Kent isn’t the solution either, that just spreads the issue and does nothing to defuse the situation.
Trying to turn back the tide can be a tricky proposition, as the story of King Cnut (Canute) portrays.
When the migrant’s thinking is well and truly understood, the present situation will perhaps be a little more straightforward to resolve – if we have the will to do that.
August 1, 2015
We should change the laws (exit the EU or whatever) to enable:
If illegal – immediate deportation. To origin country if given , if not they should be returned to a nearby country based on any other information available. ( DNA tests , papers , paid for 3rd party provided info).
All identified illegals should be denied any future chance of legal migration to the UK. Including any law breakers in any EU country. e.g get convicted in france or arrested no entry ever!
Use of the Foreign Aid budget to achieving these objectives – we need not be uncharitable but firm. The claiming government should be given a per capita increase in aid.
Legal migration dealt with more stringently with a view to exponentially lower inward migrations.
August 1, 2015
Any application for asylum made by an illegal immigrant from north Africa or the Middle East should be denied since they have travelled through a number of safe countries in order to get here.
There should be no lengthy court cases; no appeals; no listening to sob stories. They should be deported back to the last country they travelled through or to their home country.
August 2, 2015
I see that the Home Secretary and her French counterpart have made a so called ‘dramatic’ statement this morning that there is a ‘global migration crisis.’ Is this deemed to be doing something ? Also it is reported that ‘within weeks’ there will be a consultation to cut the benefits that failed asylum seekers can receive. Why cant it be done sooner? ‘ Within weeks’ there will be hundreds more here. I am betting that most of the migrants from Calais who manage to smuggle themselves into the UK will be allowed to stay, whatever the politicians say!
August 3, 2015
Cheshire Girl
Yes they have just worked out that there is actually “Global migration crisis” but most of us got that message about 10- years ago.
What next, perhaps they will announce “Worlds population increases”
OR
Possible future food shortages.
Politicians, don’t you just love em !
August 3, 2015
Running a residential letting business for a total of 17 properties I read with alarm the proposal that, as the responsible person, I would need to check the immigration status of potential tenants with the threat of a five year prison term if I make a mistake !
Furthermore, on the World at One today, Monday, there was a discussion about the types of document I would need to check. This could include a UK or EU passport, a UK driving license, or a UK visa or immigration document, of which there are many different types, none of which I have seen !
No system exists to allow a landlord to check any of these documents, other than a UK driving licence which could be looked up on the DVLA database if access was extended beyond hire car companies.
This is a totally unacceptable situation when the penalty for making a mistake is so harsh.
The only easy solution is to issue a driving licence clearly marked “for ID purposes only” to everyone entitled to remain in the UK. A single database could then be checked and the report printed out and retained on file.
August 3, 2015
Dear ChrisS,
I introduce you to the ‘Right to rent’ tool … https://eforms.homeoffice.gov.uk/outreach/lcs-application.ofml
Good Luck!
zorro
August 3, 2015
There is only one solution and that is for all migrants, including those claiming asylum, to be immediately returned to their own counry or region.
Any other “solution” will lead to a permanent migration from Africa and the ME into the UK, particularly when those who make it here telephone back home on their mobiles to say they are staying in £70/night hotels with a gyms and pools and are given £35/week spending money on top of their food and accomodation.
etc ed
There is no other solution and if our current political leaders are unwilling to put this into effect then voters who would not like to see such massive changes to our country and its culture will need to vote for people or parties who are prepared to do so.
Labour have been losing elections not because voters thought them to be financially incompetant but rather because they are unable to answer the question Mrs. Duffy put to Mr. Brown.
August 3, 2015
Spot on Richard but our spineless government wouldn’t act on it, they will try and fob us off with BS, as for the Tory back benches they will fall into line and not rock the boat just in case there’s a ministry post for them, Sorry Mr Redwood but the country are pretty p##s off , you have only have to look at the news about Ed Heath today, there’s a tsunami in the making because we have had enough of all the BS from the MP’s, God I wished Oliver Cromwell was around but will have to second best Nigel Farage