Migrant watch (merged topic)

[clv101]

The question remains - how many CAN we afford to allow in.

It's a very subjective question. If the question is how many people can the country adequately feed and house etc we are *already* tens of millions beyond the limit and few thousands of legal or illegal arrivals make essentially no difference.

If however, we accept continued participation in a functioning globalised economy, then the UK population could increase by tens of millions more - there *really* is lots of room if you accept a need to import food, energy, materials etc (like many counties already do to a far greater extent than the UK).

In the second case, it depends on the economy, can we afford to import all the stuff - this is why government have specifically allowed many hundreds of thousands into the country legally, it's an acknowledgement that the first case is already overshot by millions and we have to have a growing economy to access world markets.

The problem in 'giving up' on the second case (continued participation in a functioning globalised economy), is that it exposes the existing overshoot and implies a population collapse of tens of millions - which no government will ever admit to - hence we have the situation where the most right leaning, protectionist, nationalist government this country has had in modern history is facilitating record migration!

[UndercoverElephant]

The question remains - how many CAN we afford to allow in.

It's a very subjective question. If the question is how many people can the country adequately feed and house etc we are *already* tens of millions beyond the limit and few thousands of legal or illegal arrivals make essentially no difference.

That isn't true. If you have a leaky boat, you do not say "a few more holes won't make any difference". You patch up the holes the best you can.

If however, we accept continued participation in a functioning globalised economy, then the UK population could increase by tens of millions more - there *really* is lots of room if you accept a need to import food, energy, materials etc (like many counties already do to a far greater extent than the UK).

You have got to be joking. Large parts of the UK rank among the most densely populated areas anywhere in Europe, and we cannot afford to lose ANY farmland or areas currently dedicated to wildlife.

The problem is that if we do not get a grip on this issue then we can forget any hope of making the UK sustainable. Every single extra human being makes it harder.

And we cannot and must not rely on a the globalised economy to continue functioning.

The problem in 'giving up' on the second case (continued participation in a functioning globalised economy), is that it exposes the existing overshoot and implies a population collapse of tens of millions - which no government will ever admit to - hence we have the situation where the most right leaning, protectionist, nationalist government this country has had in modern history is facilitating record migration!

Nobody says we give up on global trade. But we cannot work on the assumption that it can be relied on in future.

[Mark]

With an election looming this year, there's defo something afoot in the Asylum System...
Firstly, HMG claims to have magically 'cleared' the legacy backlog - created over many years...
Suspect that many people have just been given leave to remain 'on the nod'...

Legacy backlog cleared as plan to stop the boats delivers
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/lega ... s-delivers

But now we're seeing massive pressure on the housing system, as Local Authorities haven't got the places to house them...
They're not just filling up hotels..., but any space they can possibly find....

Homelessness crisis declared in Greater Manchester borough as former school turned into emergency accommodation
https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk ... d-28392283

So...., the government has effectively turned a problem for the Home Office.., where they're housing Asylum Seekers in hotels at great expense...
.....into a problem for Local Authorities.., who are now having to house Asylum Seekers in hotels (and other places) at great expense...
Yet another financial burden they're being asked to shoulder - expect more to declare themselves bankrupt in the near future...

Nice one Mr Sunak.....

[Ralphw2]

Also, new housing regulations for the rental market are specifically being exempted for housing asylum seekers. This means every dodgy landlord will kick out existing tenants in favour of asylum seekers if it saves them the cost of upgrading their housing.

[BritDownUnder]

Not that relevant but a Green MP in NZ who came to the country as a refugee from Iran has been forced resign due to a shoplifting scandal. The stress of the work as an MP apparently caused them to do it. I have an alternate theory but it is not fit for this forum - something to do with the moral character of people from certain countries and cultures perhaps. A somewhat sympathetic explanation of it from the Grauniad.

[Forever_Winter]

I've got a solution to all this. Why not bus all the migrants to Scotland? Plenty of room, plus they can replace the canny Scots who moved south for better opportunities?

I did read that Texas is doing something similar i.e bussing migrants arriving at the border to Democrat-held States. Sounds like a win-win to me.....

[UndercoverElephant]

So Rwanda is deemed a safe country and it now looks very likely that there will be flights to Rwanda before the election. This sets up a very thorny problem for Labour, because they are not going to get away with any ambiguity about what they are going to do about it. They have a binary choice -- keep the scheme going, or pull the plug on it completely. They will come under enormous pressure to do the latter, but I suspect it will be electorally disastrous if they cave in to that pressure. The problem is that most of the people who want the scheme terminated will probably vote Labour anyway if they live in tory-labour swing seats (because the alternative is to vote green or libdem and risk letting the tories hold on to the seat) but there are plenty of people currently thinking of voting for Labour who will not do so if they commit to scrapping the Rwanda scheme. Starmer's position up until now has been to oppose it, but I think that was partly a gamble that we wouldn't actually get to this point before the election. Big decision time.

[PS_RalphW]

I heard a Labour spokesperson say they would immediately scrap the scheme. There is no guarantee that there will be flights before the election as there are still possible court appeals on an individual basis. If labour say they will scrap the scheme anyway, I do not think it will be a big reversal for them at the election. Everybody knows they will form the next government so the the scheme will be toast however individual people actually vote.

Rwanda is actively engaged in supporting one faction in the current civil war in the DRC. The UK is still accepting asylum seekers from Rwanda.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... %20seekers.

[clv101]

Since *everyone* knows Labour will be in power in a few months, they are effectively in government already. If they come out and clearly state it'll be scrapped on day one, then it's dead. The few dozen poor sods the government attempts to get in the air will have a huge amount of pro-bono legal support, and any judge, knowing the scheme was about to be scrapped would feel like they were being used for political games - judges don't like that. Expect the legals would run the clock down and no one would be symbolically ('cos let's be clear this is totally symbolic, not a practical solution to the government green lighting hundreds of thousands then failing to run the asylum system) sent to Rhwanda.

[UndercoverElephant]

Since *everyone* knows Labour will be in power in a few months, they are effectively in government already.

Hmmm. If Labour was effectively in government already then the Safety of Rwanda Bill would not have passed.

If they come out and clearly state it'll be scrapped on day one, then it's dead.

And that is politically very dangerous, because it gives the tories a potent attack line -- something they are currently distinctly lacking.

The few dozen poor sods the government attempts to get in the air will have a huge amount of pro-bono legal support, and any judge, knowing the scheme was about to be scrapped would feel like they were being used for political games - judges don't like that. Expect the legals would run the clock down and no one would be symbolically ('cos let's be clear this is totally symbolic, not a practical solution to the government green lighting hundreds of thousands then failing to run the asylum system) sent to Rhwanda.

But all of this plays into the hands of the tories. There is nothing they'd like more than to be able to blame Labour for the failure of the Rwanda scheme, especially if Labour subsequently fails to stop the boats by some other means. It will mean Labour has to find a way to stop the boats, or the tories will be back in power 5 years from now.

[Ralphw2]

The latest episode of panorama documents that illegal migration in recent years is outnumbered maybe 20 to 1 by legal migration, much as a direct result of recent Tory legislation.

These have been asylum seeekers from Hong Kong, Ukraine, Afghanistan, care and NHS workers, foreign students and dependents, financing universitoes, and a small number of highly skilled engineers and the like

The small boat arrivals are a tiny number of mostly desperate people, about 30000 in the last year.

This has had some impact on the housing crisis, but most of that is social, due to rentier society. Overall, most are a net economic boost to the uk

[UndercoverElephant]

The latest episode of panorama documents that illegal migration in recent years is outnumbered maybe 20 to 1 by legal migration, much as a direct result of recent Tory legislation.

That is true, and Labour certainly cannot ignore legal migration either, but that doesn't make this problem go away. We still need to stop those boats.

The small boat arrivals are a tiny number of mostly desperate people, about 30000 in the last year.

That is 30,000 too many. It has to stop.

This has had some impact on the housing crisis, but most of that is social, due to rentier society. Overall, most are a net economic boost to the uk

Oh come on. You're not defending economic growth as a solution to our problems are you? It's not sustainable.

[clv101]

The latest episode of panorama documents that illegal migration in recent years is outnumbered maybe 20 to 1 by legal migration, much as a direct result of recent Tory legislation.

Absolutely, the small boats are being used as political cover to avoid the government needing to explain why they have *chosen* to dramatically increase immigration.

The collapse of the asylum system, and breakdown of the arrangements with the French are again political choices to manufacture an issue to campaign on.

People are being played. The whole thing stinks and the sooner we're shot of this government the better.

[Ralphw2]

Yes it is unsustainable, but the government has been responding to the real needs of people that matter to them, the core Tory demographic, the old and the wealthy who have been unable to find care workers to minister to them at minimum wage, and the children of the middle class who are expected to get a higher degree to mark them out as educated, however trivial the degree is. It is a fundamental misdirection of the education system introduced by New Labour in the 90s that divided the country between "academic" and "uneducated" and destroyed the skilled professions at a stroke because of the traditional class denigration of engineers as mere workers.

[UndercoverElephant]

This is not scientific, but suggests that the deterrent effect is real:

https://news.sky.com/video/rwanda-bill- ... t-13118577