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We should let all migrants go to Britain, says Calais mayor
Peter Allen23.04.09
France's immigration minister was today urged to remove passport controls at Calais and bring in the army to destroy shanty towns created by migrants bound for Britain.
The radical measures will be put to Eric Besson by the port's mayor Natacha Bouchart at a crunch meeting aimed at “cleaning up” a problem she blames on Britain.
Both politicians are members of the ruling UMP party, which has pledged to make the Calais area “watertight” to illegal migrants. While Mr Besson favours the use of military force to tear down the squatter camps, he knows that making Calais a passport-free zone would cause concern in Britain.
Unlike France, Britain has never signed up to the Schengen agreement, which allows anybody to travel between designated EU states without papers.
If Britain did sign up, then all of the Calais migrants could flock to Dover unchallenged — meaning France's problem would become a British one.
British immigration minister Phil Woolas said: “The UK policy is to not sign up to the Schengen Agreement. Free movement is only rightly available to legal entrants. Weakening our controls will only play into the hands of the traffickers who profit from human misery and suffering.”
Mr Bresson has said he would prefer to see a series of “mini” welcome centres set up along the French coast, offering food, showers, and information about asylum.
He denies that they will be like the Red Cross Centre at Sangatte which acted as a magnet to thousands of UK-bound migrants before being shut as part of an Anglo-French agreement in 2002.
Mrs Bouchart said: “Today, with some 800 migrants in the town, the situation is becoming unmanageable. Calais is hostage to Britain, which refuses to ratify Schengen. I will ask the minister to restart negotiations with Great Britain over international agreements.”
Mrs Bouchart said that if Britain signed up to Schengen, then the migrants could go directly to the UK to claim asylum, rather than using France as a platform to get there illegally.
There are some 2,000 migrants sleeping rough in the entire Pas de Calais area, with most playing a nightly game of cat and mouse with police as they try to board lorries and trains to Britain.
Mrs Bouchart said: “It's not a camp, it's a village. The municipal workers cannot clean it up, they're not up to it. It needs an intervention by the army.”
Almost 200 men were arrested in police raids on Tuesday, in an attempt to break up people-smuggling gangs who charge up to £1,000 for illegal passages to the south of England.
Reader views (36)
Makes me sick..
I really miss living in the UK but its stories like this that make me glad i left.
90% of these migrants will just bum of the taxpayer when they get here and whilst the UK will set them up with Cars,Houses, cellphones and every luxury their own country wouldnt when they get here more will keep on coming.
Calais is a complete dump though so you cant really blame them for wanting to get out of that hole.
- Lar, Auckland New Zealand
Annoyed of Croydon: Fact 1: we are the second most densely populated country in Europe (Netherlands is the first). Fact 2, we are one of the most smallest in area as well. You may be happy to have millions more people settle on this tiny island but I'm not. As for the ageing population, if this government wasn't so hell bent on wanting every child to go to University instead of leaving school and working for a living, we'd have more income tax contributions to help pay for the ageing population which happened because of the baby boom after the Second World War! This poor bloody country.
- Sue, Orpington, Kent
I know this day would come, but just sooner. Frenchie is doing it before Labour is kicked out!
- K Lee, Cheshunt, UK
Why can't we the British people sue the Government for what they have done to our beloved country? Then, when we find them guilty (as we would, foregone conclusion) their life sentence could be spent not in a centrally heated prison full of DVD players but living rough in the Calais shanty towns while being made to do hard labour bricking up the channel tunnel. By hand. Imagine it: Jackboot Jacqui Smith and her smug cohorts mannaccled together, in boiler suits, heaving bricks all day.. OK, it's a fantasy but start picturing it and if you're anything like me it'll put a little smile on your face!
- Sarah Bradshaw, Enfield, Middx
What is the problem about deporting people back to their country of origin. If they have not sought asylum in the first country they land in when leaving their country of origin, they are not asylum seekers and can be deported. The French should not even think of "deporting" them to Britain. What is wrong with them. If they put a robust deportation program in place, it will deter others from handing over money to people traffickers.
- Patricia, LONDON
this whole situtation is totally ludicrous! Under EU Law - Asylum Seekers MUST seek asylum in the first 'Safe' country they come to! Accordingly, the UK has NO LEGAL ASYLUM SEEKERS - as the only country Nationals we should accept legally are French Asylum seekers! Of course, the French could simply grant citizenship to all the illegals, and then they could legally claim Asylum in the UK, but this would never happen.....would it????
- Gary, amersham
The Brits are excessively tired of being used as a dumpng ground for migrants. If the French let them get as far as Calais, they should keep them - if they don't want them, send them back to wherever they came from. There is absolutely no need for them to even get to the water. The French are just being very arrogant about the whole migrant business and wanting to pass it off to some other country.
The Brits are not OBLIGATED in any way to house and take care of these people. In any event, there is NO MORE ROOM, NO WORK AND NO LEGAL PAPERS AND NO DOLE.
THE DOOR SHOULD BE SLAMMED SHUT AS OF YESTERDAY.
- Rosie, Tucson, AZ USA
Send them back to France? Time to tear up the treaty of the Hague then no problem, no seekers or anything all illegals
- Tony, London, UK
Why dont they claim asylum in France? Correct me if I am worng, but to claim asylum you must do it in the first safe nation you enter, no?
- Nick Nack Paddy Mac, Kilburn, London UK
Be strong my UK friends. Be strong.
- Trunk, US
If they have Schengen visas then they are legally in France, so the problem is a French one.
If they do not have Schengen visas then they are illegally in France so the problem is a French one.
Lets not forget they didn't just arrive in Calais - the traveled to get there, crossing at least one border in the process so it's French border control that has failed and caused the problem.
- Steve, Llantwit Fardre, Wales
One of the reasons that people want to come to Britain could be the success of English as a widely used language. However, if they did succeed in coming to the UK would they find much employment in a country with such high unemployment?
- Mark, Venice, Italy
The 1951 Geneva Convention relating to the status of refugees makes no mention of where an asylum seeker can or should claim asylum. The UK has signed up to a number of agreements which allows it to return claimants to countries where the claimant has already claimed asylum or where they could have claimed asylum as they had ample opportunity to. A claimants credibility will be questioned if they have come from deemed 'safe' countries or they have travelled through safe countries.
Claimants come to the UK for a number of reasons. Some will be economic migrants. But a fair amount will have suffered persecution and or had their lives put seriously at risk.
I am rather saddened that the same old ill informed arguments are being used to justify bricking up the borders and sending them back.
The birth rate in the UK has gone through the floor. We have a population that is ageing at an alarming rate. To say that we don't have anymore room is not born out by the statistics. Areas of the UK population are is serious decline.
If we came out of the EU, who would we trade with, who would mend your leak or build your extension or make your morning decaf latte? Or pay for our pensions when we retire?
- Annoyed Of Croydon, London
I agree with all of the above, and am laughing at the audacity of the French who feel we should just let them in to the UK. surely they're not serious, this is some kind of a joke. speechless...
- Guy, Bristol..Somerset
The real villain is Sghengen. As soon as these illegals make landfall in Italy or Malta they have no obstacles until Calais.
If the village idiot( sorry mayor) of Calais wants to solve the problem let her persuade the govt. to put up some border controls on the Belgian border.
- Gaz, Calais
The only way is for us to leave the EU altogether, then we can also send back a lot of the immigrants that are already here under 'EU rule' Lets face it, it was the worst thing that the UK did joining the common market, we were only supposed to use it for 'trade' but now they are ruling our lives and we didn't vote 'Brussels' in!!!
- Annie, Devon
Bruce in London:
"If these people were really asylum seekers then they could seek asylum in France. As they don't do this they are not asylum seekers but economic migrants and should be dealt with as such by the French."
I copied it again as you're 100% correct and I couldn't have put it better myself.
Under international law asylum seekers must claim asylum in the FIRST safe country the enter. Well, either France is a safe country, or Messrs Eric Besson and Natacha Bouchart aren't telling us something...
- John, London
we dont have any room for more
- Christopher, london
I cna understand Natacha Bouchart frustration at the situation, but I do not see why the UK is responsible for taking them in???
- Jeremy E, London
It would be interesting to interview thse migrants, who have obviously endured some very tough times to get as far as Calais, to find out why they are so bent on getting to Britain, as opposed to France. Is it that the rules are so different, or just the rigour (or lack of it) with which they are enforced? Or does Britain really offer better economic prospects? I feel that their answers would contain the seeds of the solution. These people clearly are not EU citizens, or they'd be allowed in here also: so how did France allow them in? Where did they enter the EU?Without being heartless, it does seem that this is a Schengen-inspired problem: letting them gather at Calais of course makes us look like the inflexible part of the situation, which is hard on Calais but suits France as a whole.
- Mdj, london uk
This is not a British problem, it's a french one, always will be. Don't try and blame the English Government, for this. NOT OUR PROBLEM, deal with it. We've got enough problems of our own - thank you.
- Alan, London
The UK is now known world-wide as the fall guy, sucker, call it what you will, where it is so so easy to arrive legally or illegally and soon be able to claim for a range of benefits undreamt of in the immigrant's own country of origin-can you blame them for coming? It's entirely the fault of our so- called leaders here and will end in tears. Everyone will end up squabbling over a diminishing-fast-welfare pot as the rocketing population here in the UK overwhelms the system.
- Jon Kent, Hertford. UK
The British need to stand their ground and ensure NONE of these people can get into the UK. If it was true asylum they would claim it in the first safe country, not pick their destination like tourists.
- Dave, Madrid
How many of those people who have arrived in Calais got there by criminal gangs?
France MUST fingerprint ALL those people and pass the information on to us, so that if they do arrive here, then they can immediately be booted back to the French, NO timewasting appeals.
- Ralph, GB
France's problem, let them deal with it, if they know how. Just because they let anyone & everyone in to France does not mean that they can then palm them off to the UK.
- Dom, London
These migrants must not be allowed to reach British shores under any circumstances.
- Peter Noterfed, Paris, France
It is about time they got their act together and STOPPED THE MIGRANTS ENTERING FRANCE IN THE FIRST PLACE.
As for the UK not signing up to the Schengen agreement - the UK is bankrupt not daft!
- Reuben Camara, Morecambe/Lancaster
So why did the Schengen countries allow these people in?
- Michael C, london uk
Brick up the channel tunnel until we get someone with at least one brain cell in power that stops this farce dead.
No one entrying this Country should be given anything until at least 10 years of proven work and tax payments.
End of problem.
- Roger, Surrey
Time to block up the tunnel and get the Froggy fishermen to blockade the ports!
- Nobby Clark, Perth, Scotland
If these people were really asylum seekers then they could seek asylum in France. As they don't do this they are not asylum seekers but economic migrants and should be dealt with as such by the French.
- Bruce, London
I would have thought a few shanty towns would actually improve Calais.
- St, London
Stand firm Phil!
- Goggs, London
The fact that they are in France; is nothing to do with the UK; the French let them all into France; the British did not.
OK if France wants another war; lets ban all the French and their imports into the UK.
After that; if France gets invaded again; lets leave them to fight their own wars.
You can't trust any nation that eats horses and slugs.
- Mickyinlondon, london
France this is your problem, deport or jail the illegal immigrants.
- Maggie, London UK
If they had proper border controls and immigration in place they wouldn't get that far.As for the Schengen agreement....good job we didn't sign up for it.
- Rosie, watford
