Calais: Migration and the UK Border

[youngian]

Compared to refugee crises that engulf Jordan or Pakistan for example its a drop in the ocean and a hell of a lot more are dispersed throughout the EU. The Mayor of Calais hasn't helped much with her nonsense about generous UK benefits. Although she's keen on asking the British government to stump more money for France's immigration problem. I would guess the reason these particular individuals are there is because their English is better than their French or Spanish and may have contacts in the UK. And despite all the massive barriers many do slip through to England. Anyone that determined deserves to stay.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Is there some element of diplomatic stalemate between the British and the French?

Possibly, but there's a lot of direct co-operation as well. Policing in Calais has been scaled up massively in recent months, and the UK government has agreed to contribute to the cost of this. The PAF (police au frontier) who operate within the port itself are entirely funded by the British I think.

On top of that Calais has been 'donated' the mega-fence that was put up around Newport for the NATO summit. The first phase of this is complete, encircling the existing port fence. Soon the fence will be extended along the sides of the motorway for several more miles.

Some people in France are talking about moving the official border back to UK soil (at present you cross into UK territory at the port in Calais, and pass into French territory in Dover going the other way) so that France will no longer be obliged to do anything about people getting onto ferries because they won't technically be crossing a border. The UK government will not want this to happen, as it would mean that migrants will get bottlenecked in Dover instead of Calais, and instead of 20 miles of sea keeping them out of Britain there will just be a fence.

 

[brogdale]

Some people in France are talking about moving the official border back to UK soil (at present you cross into UK territory at the port in Calais, and pass into French territory in Dover going the other way) so that France will no longer be obliged to do anything about people getting onto ferries because they won't technically be crossing a border. The UK government will not want this to happen, as it would mean that migrants will get bottlenecked in Dover instead of Calais, and instead of 20 miles of sea keeping them out of Britain there will just be a fence.

Those calls can only grow stronger as the numbers of migrants increases and the anti-EU noises from across the channel grow louder. I'm sure that Serco/G4S would welcome the extra RC business.

 

[SpookyFrank]

SpookyFrank can you tell us a bit about the gangs? Who are they made up of?

Some people call the traffickers 'Mafia' but that suggests something other than slightly organised thugs, which is all they are. There are different groups of gangters operating in Calais and the surrounding area and they change over time as one group gets chased out of town by another group or one group gets rounded up by the police. I know of Egyptian gangs, Kurdish gangs and Pashtun gangs but there are probably others.

The gangs' principal MO is to gain control of a promising parking area or fuel stop where migrants might be able to get on to the lorries. They mostly seem to do this by rocking up with knives and guns and telling everyone that they're in charge now. Migrants will then have to pay to use that area to try for the lorries. The gangs might give you some help with getting on the lorries, and some will know of more reliable ways to get people across than simply clinging to a lorry and hoping for the best. Charges for these services are high, but if you get a relatively nice group of traffickers they might do a sort of fixed price deal where you pay a flat fee no matter how many attempts it takes you to actually get across the border. Of course you might give your money to people who have no idea how to smuggle people across the channel but who have a rigidly enforced 'no refunds' policy nonetheless.

e2a: The gangs kill people. Sometimes they kill each other, sometimes they kill ordinary migrants. Besides the trafficking they also have interests in commodity smuggling, drugs and prostitution. Female migrants can be forced into prostitution to pay the the smugglers if they can't afford to pay cash.

It's important to note that these gangs depend on the border regime for their livelihood. Preventing certain people from travelling legally from one country to another just creates a black market in people, a black market that provides lucrative opportunities for some of the worst people you could ever hope to meet.

 

[DownwardDog]

Some people in France are talking about moving the official border back to UK soil (at present you cross into UK territory at the port in Calais, and pass into French territory in Dover going the other way) so that France will no longer be obliged to do anything about people getting onto ferries because they won't technically be crossing a border. The UK government will not want this to happen, as it would mean that migrants will get bottlenecked in Dover instead of Calais, and instead of 20 miles of sea keeping them out of Britain there will just be a fence.

The UK would just start fining the ferry companies for each undocumented or clandestine arrival so then they'd start doing their own ID checks before boarding so the end result would still be the same.

 

[SpookyFrank]

The UK would just start fining the ferry companies for each undocumented or clandestine arrival so then they'd start doing their own ID checks before boarding so the end result would still be the same.

There'd be ID checks I'm sure, but there might not be the police resources needed to catch people sneaking on to lorries etc. The ferry companies depend on rapid turnaround, I doubt they'd be able to do security checks on every lorry going across the channel.

 

[8ball]

As an asylum seeker you are supposed to claim asylum in the first safe country you reach, which in the EU's opinion is the first EU country you reach.

Is the French government refusing asylum to the people at Calais?

 

[Fez909]

Is the French government refusing asylum to the people at Calais?

They aren't claiming asylum in France.

“Most of the immigrants here have papers for Italy and the whole of the Shengen zone (the border free area of continental Europe). But they want to go to England because they speak a little English and because they think they can work there.”

“I know the UK is a crowded island and no one wants us. I know the French authorities have a very difficult job. Conditions in these camps are inhuman. But what is the solution? Clearing them will make no difference except to make our lives even more miserable.”

The Calais asylum-seekers are only a fraction of the hundreds of illegal migrants who enter the European Union each day from Morocco or Turkey or across the Mediterranean from Libya. The great majority remain in Spain or Italy or move on to France or Germany

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-camps-after-outbreak-of-scabies-9444407.html

 

[SpookyFrank]

Is the French government refusing asylum to the people at Calais?

You can apply for asylum in France provided you haven't already applied elsewhere in the Schengen area but you'll get no state support whatsoever, no travel documents, no right to work. So there are people in the jungles in Calais who are waiting for their asylum claims to be processed by the French state, which can take years.

I think people choose to stay in Calais even when they're not trying to cross to the UK because there are others there from their home countries, others who speak their language, and they can find some community there and some support. The alternative would be to go off and be homeless in another part of France. Even if you can afford to rent a home in France, few landlords will rent anything to undocumented migrants and it may even be illegal to do so.

Another reason people stay in Calais once they've applied for asylum in France is that they have a chance to help other people, they can work with the charitable associations and the activists who support other migrants and they can find ways to make themselves useful despite their state of limbo. There are a couple of people who have been granted asylum by France and have since settled in Calais permanently so that they can continue to help other migrants.

I think the French asylum system is similar to Britain's in that you can find yourself spirited off to a detention centre or deported arbitrarily at any point in the process. If your fingerprints are on a database anywhere else in the Schengen area and you apply for asylum in France your feet won't touch the ground, and given that most of the migrants have passed through Greece, Italy or eastern Europe on their way to France applying for aslyum there simply isn't an option for them.

 

[8ball]

You can apply for asylum in France provided you haven't already applied elsewhere in the Schengen area but you'll get no state support whatsoever, no travel documents, no right to work. So there are people in the jungles in Calais who are waiting for their asylum claims to be processed by the French state, which can take years.

This is really shit. If you are going to have a unified asylum area you should obviously have unified processes overseen by an independent EU (or Schengen-level) body.

 

[moon]

One of them was on his way here via Denmark when he was thrown into jail and forced to sign papers saying he was seeking asylum in Denmark. He doesn't want to live in Denmark and is threatening to go on hunger strike. I thought Denmark would be quite a nice place to live but he wants to be here.

It could be a language issue? English being one of the most widely spoken second languages in the world, it would make sense that someone looking for work would seek employment in an english speaking country?

Also imho the likes of UKIP are actually causing an increase in numbers of migrants, as people scramble to get into the country before immigration controls tighten..

 

[bluescreen]

Much appreciating all your insight here, SpookyFrank. Many thanks. The stories about the CRS &c are particularly illuminating and shocking. That story about the pepper spray is just disgusting, but then so much around this whole issue is.

 

[SpookyFrank]

This is really shit. If you are going to have a unified asylum area you should obviously have unified processes overseen by an independent EU (or Schengen-level) body.

But the powerful EU member states in northern Europe are happy to continue saddling Italy and Greece with the majority of the refugees, and they're the ones who are able to dictate EU policy.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Much appreciating all your insight here, SpookyFrank. Many thanks. The stories about the CRS &c are particularly illuminating and shocking. That story about the pepper spray is just disgusting, but then so much around this whole issue is.

I tell people about the pepper spray thing and they just look at me dumbfounded and say, 'why would they do that?'

I don't have an answer to that question. Nobody does. I'm not capable of comprehending the reasons why people do such foul things.

 

[SpookyFrank]

It could be a language issue? English being one of the most widely spoken second languages in the world, it would make sense that someone looking for work would seek employment in an english speaking country?

Also imho the likes of UKIP are actually causing an increase in numbers of migrants, as people scramble to get into the country before immigration controls tighten..

It's worth remembering that most people outside the UK don't read British newspapers. All these things that are supposedly acting as a magnet for migrants, well plenty of migrants don't know a damn thing about any of them.

 

[8ball]

I tell people about the pepper spray thing and they just look at me dumbfounded and say, 'why would they do that?'

I don't have an answer to that question. Nobody does. I'm not capable of comprehending the reasons why people do such foul things.

Just following orders.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Just following orders.

They fucking love it. The CRS wave their tear gas canisters around like Yosemite Sam twirling his revolvers.

The police in Calais are massively over-resourced. Ten CRS coppers might turn up to one minor incident involving two people. One copper will do the talking, another will take notes or talk on his radio and the rest will just stand around with shit-eating grins on their faces faux-casually toying with the arsenal of weapons sequestered about their, for want of a better word, person.

 

[moon]

It's worth remembering that most people outside the UK don't read British newspapers. All these things that are supposedly acting as a magnet for migrants, well plenty of migrants don't know a damn thing about any of them.

BBC News, World Service, Word of mouth...

 

[SpookyFrank]

BBC News, World Service, Word of mouth...

The world service is being dismembered rapidly. IIRC the Pashtun language service is among those recently discontinued, and Pashtun speakers make up a large proportion of the migrants trying to reach the UK by nonconventional means.

As for word of mouth, word of mouth talks a lot of shit sometimes. Particularly when the chain of chinese whispers extends across continents.

 

[moon]

The world service is being dismembered rapidly. IIRC the Pashtun language service is among those recently discontinued, and Pashtun speakers make up a large proportion of the migrants trying to reach the UK by nonconventional means.

As for word of mouth, word of mouth talks a lot of shit sometimes. Particularly when the chain of chinese whispers extends across continents.

Ok believe what you will..

 

[SpookyFrank]

Ok believe what you will..

How much do you know about what's going on in, say, Eritrea? Possibly not all that much.

And you live in a country with a free press, and speak one of the most commonly spoken languages on Earth. Now imagine you're Eritrean. Your home country is at the very bottom of world rankings for freedom of the press. Your native language is spoken by fewer than ten million people. Your route to Europe, across the Sahara desert and the Mediterranean sea, was notable for its lack of internet cafes. How much are you likely to know about what Nigel Farage has been saying this week?

 

[moon]

Uuumm the telephone??

 

[DotCommunist]

 

[Geri]

It could be a language issue? English being one of the most widely spoken second languages in the world, it would make sense that someone looking for work would seek employment in an english speaking country?

I imagine that is a large part of it, but I think there is more to it as well. I asked a Pakistani friend why he wanted to come to the UK (for holiday, he is in the army) and he said "UK is perfect country". I soon put him right on that though!

 

[moon]

Probably because his own country was trashed by the British Raj

 

[frogwoman]

From personal experience working in a refugee centre abroad I wouldn't say benefits attract people in these countries but there's a frequent perception that the streets in the UK and western countries in general are paved with jobs.

 

[frogwoman]

Also you would be surprised how much some people do know. We had a syrian client who lectured me about Nick Griffin's question time appearance (and agreed with him) unfortunately he seemed to believe that his erm expertise in politics would be a reason for the British government to let him into the uk

 

[SpookyFrank]

Also you would be surprised how much some people do know. We had a syrian client who lectured me about Nick Griffin's question time appearance (and agreed with him) unfortunately he seemed to believe that his erm expertise in politics would be a reason for the British government to let him into the uk

One bloke I met asked me how he could get an appointment to see the queen to make his asylum claim. After I spent a while trying to explain as delicately as possible that the queen isn't directly responsible for this sort of thing and that he might not be able to talk to her in person, it became clear that he was taking the piss

Lots of the Syrians I met had smartphones, so they generally had a better idea of what was going on in the UK than the Africans. They also know exactly what's happening back home, which in the circumstances is a mixed blessing.

 

[frogwoman]

Also many people where I was working thought we were lying about the economic situation in the uk to stop them going there.

 

[moon]

They also come to start small businesses..you could be surprised at who is driving your minicab too, might be a former government minister from a country whose economy has been trashed.