Dear All
Some time ago I floated the idea of an EU internal immigration
policy on the blog, the idea was to regulate the movement of EU citizens so
that no member country would be unjustly burdened.
Free movement of Labour would remain but the free movement
of Labour would be to a job in another member country.
The current set up is deeply flawed.
Conservative Minister Theresa May is now echoing what I said
after she called for EU migrants without a job to be barred from the UK.
The reason for the ‘get tough now’ approach is that official
figures show net migration has topped 330,000 people.
David Cameron staked a bit of his political capital in
wanting to reduce net migration to below 100,000.
The new figures of 330,000 are extremely embarrassing for
the Conservatives, perhaps they should adopt my idea for an EU internal immigration
policy because a ‘British fix’ isn;’t enough, the whole of the EU needs to be
regulated properly. This is not about banning people it is all about setting a
criteria that a person has enough resources available to support themselves
after they move to another member state. Each country would set their criteria in-conjunction
with the EU.
It would be based on fairness, the same standards would set
by a country would apply to right across the board. The resources required by a
German would be the same as a Romanian.
Some European leaders don’t wish to sign up to the UK’s
attempts to reform the rule on freedom of movement.
They are drawing a line in the sand and saying it is a
complete non-starter, this is old thinking, in the past when the membership was
small this didn’t represent a problem, it does now.
I have always liked the EU as a concept from the early days,
but the organisation has had its problems due to lack of vision.
In truth, I still remain a big fan, but it is hard to see
how the EU can continue without being re-invented.
Unsurprisingly the SNP, the party of protest and not of
government have waded into this EU row to try and appear meaningful, and as per
usual, they are backward and wrong.
An SNP spokesman said:
"Theresa May's comments have less to do with the
employment status of immigrants and everything to with her own job prospects as
a future leader of the Tory party.”
See what I mean, a real crisis and some clown of a spokesman
can’t get past themselves to make this a cheap political point scoring
exercise.
No country and afford to have open borders, there must be
regulations. If regulations cannot be put in place, if political will cannot be
found, then the question of remaining in the EU will be focused in the minds of
British people when the referendum is called on continuing membership.
May rightly says there is a "broken European migration
system" for the current migrant crisis, and she is 100% right.
But it isn’t just a "broken European migration
system", there is a distinct lack of political will in the major capitals
to tackle this problem. If unchecked we will see the rise of the far right in
Northern European Countries who will be less than agreeable to newcomers.
Recently Alex Neil of the SNP said the Scottish Government
would financially support failed asylum seekers if Scotland was handed control
over immigration. When I was in the SNP, I used to have a lot of time for Alex
Neil, he is a good speaker, on top of his government brief, however, his
statement is incredibly stupid at a time when Scots face austerity, lack of
jobs and restore to using food banks and soup kitchens.
So, where is this financial support coming from, where is
all this money the SNP seem to have their hands on? It’s coming out of the
budgets of the poor, the sick and the vulnerable.
There is no chance that the SNP would get control over
immigration even if the United Kingdom was to adopt a federal set up.
David Cameron and Theresa May have a mountain to climb if
they were to try and push for an EU internal immigration policy, so they will
probably just try for a limitation to the numbers coming into the United
Kingdom. At present, the Conservatives are trying to do a ‘deal’ with European
leaders on reform but I doubt that will be successful as they would hope.
At present there is the biggest influx into the EU in world
history, if something is not done it will lead to civil unrest and violence.
Just as you wouldn’t tolerate unwanted people breaking into your house, why
should you tolerate breaking into your country?
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
No comments:
Post a Comment