[Closed] Why are the immigrants risking their lives to come here?

Nigel Farage is paying them to just to keep himself in a job?

Refugees? Or ‘the immigrants’(?)

Sadly, they too are victims of organised crime as they can easily extract another £3-5k from them for chucking them in a cheap inflatable dingy with an outboard. It's in the people smuggler's interest to tell them of the untold riches they will be given on arrival...

its project fear

farage told us theres no way french would let them come here post brexit

Cameron accused of ‘scaremongering’ over Brexit claim Critics say UK-French agreement is bilateral accord that has nothing to do with the EU

The EU is terrible, that's why we left.....

Or, we have a healthy black economy which gives the opportunity for paid employment coupled with a soft system that allows them to stay for long periods even if picked up and a sophisticated organised crime network to facilitate

Add in an establishment that goes in for token attempts to do anything about it in any shape or form and resort to trying to deport grannies who are British citizens

Don't forget family ties, or at least local contacts - a lot of these people will know where they're going, who's going to put them up for the first couple of weeks, where they can get cash-in-hand work, etc. (The immigrants with friends in France will end up there, same for Spain, Italy, etc.).

Another point to think about is just how shitty life must be in their home villages and towns - no one in their right mind would blow all that cash and risk their lives if things weren't seriously bad at home.

Have you tried living in any of the countries they originate from? Plus we're English speaking + general perception of UK being wealthy - my sister has lived in Africa for 35yrs, none of the locals beleive her when she tells them there are homeless people in UK.

Could be because even what the UK can give is better than what they have where they are, they already have friends/family here so want to be with them or maybe they speak English and it's easier to go to a country where you already speak the language than where you don't.

I guess OP you maybe just saw the same piece I did on BBC one. I had a discussion with my wife where we spoke about why these people are risking their lives in tiny boats across 26miles of harsh ocean.

I noted the boats all looked full of males, my assumption is that they will land and go and find jobs and send monies home, because even our minimum wage although considered low by the British goes along way when converted into other currencies (more assumptions). If my assumptions are correct, why are we not focusing more on these business who are hiring these people and I assume paying them cash in hand. If you cut off the jobs so there is no money to be made, would they still risk their lives to come here?

As mentioned above, a lot of them have friends/family/contacts in the UK. Those who don't, mostly do indeed stay in other countries along the way. The UK only receives a trickle out of the flood leaving their (war-torn, devastated) countries.

Because we live in a country that is actually pretty good standard of living wise, whereas these folk live in war torn shiteholes, or places where the value of life is nothing, honour killngs....

It's not hard, really, is it?.

Compared to where these folk have come from the UK (even now) is literally paradise.

You can earn proper money and not have it lifted from you by the local hoods, (normally the cops) there's water that's clean and unlimited and comes from a tap not the local spring. Food in supermarkets that's not months old, electricity constantly on demand night and day just by flicking a switch not having to find petrol for the genny for the single bulb, it's not 40degs constantly. You can get a home that's made from bricks and has a roof. Buy a car, not have to hitch a ride on a cart made from a pallet and old car tyres and pulled by a 15 year old donkey...Or live in country where there's a good chance of being shot by some random 12 year old recruited to an insane death cult, fed drugs night and day with an AK47 and a righteous sense of vengeance, or having a bomb drop out of nowhere and land on your face.

It's pretty easy to see why folk want to come here, what I don't get is the idiots who've had all sense of their humanity removed, and think these folk are somehow some terrible blight...when all they really want is a chance.

I bet most of them can muster up a bit of English.

English being the worlds second language, while they may be far from fluent, they may understand enough to get by.

While some provincial gammons may hate anyone darker than them, we are as a country quite tolerant of different races and religions. France has a far harder line against Islam some areas of central europe are very pro-catholic, and the former Soviet bloc seems very against anyone non-white.

Because we live in a country that is actually pretty good standard of living wise, whereas these folk live in war torn shiteholes, or places where the value of life is nothing, honour killngs….

It’s not hard, really, is it?.

Compared to where these folk have come from the UK (even now) is literally paradise.

Could be because even what the UK can give is better than what they have where they are,

I fully understand why they are leaving their original homes. It's pretty obvious.

However, they have made it to France. They have a better welfare system to the UK, so if they can claim asylum their, then they will be looked after.

Why then, spend a lot of money and take a lot of risk for what is not a significant gain?

It’s easy to see why they want to come to Europe, what’s more interesting is why they risk so much to come across the Channel to the UK after spending months in the EU. I assume that despite our many problems we're not as racist as mainland European countries and have a much better developed multicultural society (in cities at least).

After your house has been blown up by Saddam, by Al Qaeda, by the US and then by ISIS I'd imagine a little sail across the Channel seems like a soft option.

Why then, spend a lot of money and take a lot of risk for what is not a significant gain?

Because Britain has been sold to them as THE destination. you wouldn't stop at the outside of Harrods and look through the window, would you?

They don't have a clue about what their rights are, they probably don't have a clear understanding that they eevn have rights in France, and they don't really care...To folk who've had their village blown to pieces and their mum and sisters raped in front of them while they were made to watch, the channel's just the "next" thing between them and gravy for the rest of their lives

Because the UK offers better prospects than their home country, but probably nothing like as much better as the traffickers would have them believe.

This should give 'us' in the UK no comfort whatsoever that our country is better than a warzone (for example).

Interestingly, I saw a piece linked on Twitter only this morning - apparantly the government did look into this a few years ago then quickly stopped when everyone they asked had reasonable reasons for coming and weren't planning on subverting western democracy.

https://www.freemovement.org.uk/why-do-the-migrants-in-calais-want-to-come-to-the-uk/

Its this century's version of the American Dream.
For the immigrant, Leave your war torn continent, learn the language, anglicise your name, scrape by to give your kids the chance you never had.
For the second generation immigrant, enjoy your free western education, use your parent's work ethic to build yourself into a sucessful individual.
The third generation immigrant, gets born into wealth, eventually becomes President.

However, they have made it to France. They have a better welfare system to the UK, so if they can claim asylum their, then they will be looked after.

Loads of them do stop in France - don't believe the people telling you that their are floods of immigrants just ignoring the countries they're passing through. There are loads of sub-Saharan and Moroccan immigrants here in Spain for example, and as in the UK they're doing the dirty jobs the locals don't want to do / aren't paid enough to do. (And as in the UK there's a sizeable opposition to their presence, and for similar reasons).

Lots of actual facts and statistics here:

https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/migrants-in-the-uk-an-overview/

TLDR: Most EU Migrants come here to work, non-EU migrants come here because they have some family already here. Hence why they will pass through various other contries to get here.

We have a very unsympathetic, right wing government, who are not good to them.

Europe is full of unsympathetic left wing governments with significant hard right minorities, try being a French Arab, a Dutch Muslim, a black German.

General public opinion is against them.

Find me anywhere it's significantly better than the UK

Their is no luxury house and big pots of welfare money waiting for them, despite what Farage and Yaxley-Lennon say.

True, but there's no bombing, child soldiering, obvious slavery, no famine, disease lack of access to water, education etc, rather better than which ever country they come from.

We still have a worse Covid problem than the majority of Europe.

I think you'd probably be surprised how little you'd be worried about that if you come from say Somalia or CAR where life expectancy is in your 50s.
Oh and don't forget, a few months back Italy had a worse problem than the rest of the world.

We are leaving the EU, so even if they get to stay they will be a lot of movement restrictions.

Go ask your local desperately poor hand to mouth brit how bothered they are about this (or any of the rest of brexit beyond will it make food more expensive). You're worried about luxuries. You may as well say "we've got less astronauts".

So WTF would you try to cross the busiest shipping lanes in the World in a rubber boat to get here?

All sorts of reasons as above, family ties, language, relatively generous benefits and easier qualification for them, a generally more tolerant society than many left leaning ones in Europe. Free at point of care health care everywhere. A flourishing black economy (though I wouldn't suggest that it's more or less so than the rest of Europe)

It makes absolutely no sense to me. Living in France cannot be vastly different for them, to risk their lives to come here?

Of course some do stay in France, Italy, Spain Germany etc but (a) Berlin is no better a place to be homeless and poor than Birmingham even if it isn't worse*. (b) what France etc look like when you get there is "the jungle" not the champs elysees. Would you stay or hope the next place is better?

You could only say that if you have absolutely no idea of how bad things could be for a person. Why not read up on it? You might feel worldly wise but you (apparently) are only aware of a small area of the realities of human existence.

I read on facebook it's because they get 800 quid a week and everything else for free and go to the top of every list (NHS, housing, etc) whilst our elderly struggle to afford to put one bar on of their heater, there was a picture of some old dear looking cold so it must be true!

As mentioned above the main reason is the language and friends or family members already here.

I've been living in North London for the last 3 years. It has opened my eyes in many ways. The majority of'immigrants'I have meet are hard working and they have had hard lives. There is a lot of help here for visas etc and translation services for all areas of the government. Like dentists etc. This obviously makes things easier.

There is also easy access to a thriving black market. Or there was until covid. Imagine how hard their lives are in this pandemic. From my some what limited understanding access to government services and the black market is harder in other European countries. I think it is wrong for the country. But in their position I would do exactly the same.

The welfare argument is just pathetic. According to ONS 2017 figures Universal Credit is 1 percent of welfare spending. It's just a lazy stereotype.

The UK anti immigration attitude is also very tame when it is compared to other contries historical cultural attitudes. When you speak to somebody from country X their absolute hatred of country Y is a bit of an eye opener.

If you are born in the UK. More so if you are white. For more or less everybody you have won life's lottery. A lot of people for whatever reason do not understand this.

They’ve heard about the trails behind the Nationwide.

I once chatted to a young Albanian lad (in Albania) who was obsessed about getting over to England and when asked why he said Manchester United, The Beatles and Oasis.

I once chatted to a young Albanian lad (in Albania) who was obsessed about getting over to England and when asked why he said Manchester United, The Beatles and Oasis.

Things really are grim in Albania if Oasis is a reason to head to the UK 🙁

Family already settled here and the English language.

Only 6% of illegal immigrants that enter the EU attempt the channel crossing and of those only 55% are granted asylum.

The home office did have a target of processing most of them within 6 months. This was scrapped a couple of years ago so now only 28% are processed within that time frame.

Been there twice and some of the roads are better than the UK. Driving standards are mental though. I'd say about 80% of the women you see out there are gorgeous.

what France etc look like when you get there is “the jungle” not the champs elysees.

The ones in the Jungle (and similar camps) are the ones who've refused all the possibilities offered along the way. They are a tiny minority of the total number of refugees/migrants intent on GB for for their own reasons. Officially declared migrants are housed, hundreds of thousands of them. It's a choice to stay under the radar and make their first declaration in the UK.

Many are escaping a corrupt right-wing government that has been caught lining the pockets of its benefactors, with dodgy tax laws and a shambolic approach to a pandemic. You can't blame them for seeking a better quality of life. A common language and lack of border controls makes it easier for them to integrate. There's lots on this forum, @dovebiker, @globalti etc

The drive over Carter Bar isn't all that dangerous though.

It's been interesting seeing people retweeting Farage's racist bile - quite a large number of people replying along the lines of 'good, glad they made it safely, I hope they settle down and do well'. I'd encourage anyone to do that.

The ones in the Jungle (and similar camps) are the ones who’ve refused all the possibilities offered along the way.

Half true. These things aren't offered, they need to request them and know how. There's no one handing out sweet tea and invites as they come ashore in Lesbos. Admitedly a some camps do have people proactively trying to get people out of the camps and into the system but, there's the thing, you tend to need to go through that part first. It's not exactly inviting you to stay on when the first reality you're faced with is those camps and the choice of stay for an indeterminate time or move on.

Officially declared migrants are housed, hundreds of thousands of them.

They're accommodated, think (in many cases) more like a military dorm or another camp than a house. Even then more often than not they're then sent away to become someone else's problem after a period because they're just not persecuted enough.

100s of thousands, over how many years? Circa 107k refugees officially entered the EU by sea and land in 2018

https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2019/country-chapters/european-union

And that's the ones who arrived, not ones that we allowed to stay.

To put that into perspective that's less refugees across the whole of Europe than the excess birth rate in the UK (660k births to 505k deaths in England and Wales) its less than 1 42nd of the births in Europe each year, heck its less than 1/3rd of the immigration required to maintain the population of the EU.

https://www.ined.fr/en/everything_about_population/data/europe-developed-countries/population-births-deaths/

But we've nowhere to house these people, no jobs for them, no wealth to spare, no space but our own.

So unless they've been shot at least a few times or raped by government soldiers who kindly left a note to tell us what they say is true we send people back to the corrupt war torn countries we screwed, we exploit, we destabilised and stole from in the name of rubber tyres, cheap labour, cheap iPhones and plentiful petrol.

I can't imagine any reason they might not think taking a ticket and standing in line in Spain is a good idea and prefer to stay under the radar until they reach family or friends in another country who can house and feed them whilst they find crap exploitative jobs working long hours for below subsistence wages because of they have the audacity to try get a real job we call them illegal and send them away.

One of the issues is giving them the ability to do well i.e. the ability to work. I fear that denied the ability to job hunt some slip into underground activites. We haven't learned from the Balkan experience in which refugees with nothing better to do started drug dealing and are now one of the most active groups in Europe.

We need to help people to help themselves.

Edit to reply to Dangerbrain:

France is in six figures and Germany seven for some years.

I heard on the radio that currently under EU rules, we have the right to send them back to the first EU country they entered,

Which is why they want to stay under the radar in France/Spain/Italy/Greece if the UK is their prefered destination and end up in the Jungle.

Honestly as bad as people may perceive it to be in the uk we are still one of the richest countries in the world and for most the standard of living is better than the majority of the world's population. We have the luxury to bitch about the government safe in the knowledge we are unlikely to get shot if we go out of the house, or critize politics without being picked up by the police.
Yeah things are not where we want them to be in the uk, but whatever it is the uk as damn site better than a huge amount of the world

I heard on the radio that currently under EU rules, we have the right to send them back to the first EU country they entered, but often don’t. After Jan 1 we can’t

Dublin Regs, I think? Heard a lot about them lately - your anti-immigrant gammon will tell you refugees have to apply for asylum in the first safe country they come to (which they don't), and when you ask them what law states that, it's the Dublin Regs they quote. But as I understand it, you're bang on - they allow countries to send asylum seekers to the first safe country they came through but no-one does (in the same way that the UK could have immediately halved all immigration by stopping non-EU migrants from entering the country but chose (rightly) not to).

There is much that your anti-immigrant gammon is in denial about.

The Dublin 3 regulation is very much actively used. However, it relies on the migrant having provided their details to immigration in the previous country. It works both ways of course, with many being returned to the UK from the EU, but for obvious reasons this is less common.

They’ve heard about the trails behind the Nationwide.

The Swindon branch?

Honestly as bad as people may perceive it to be in the uk we are still one of the richest countries in the world and for most the standard of living is better than the majority of the world’s population. We have the luxury to bitch about the government safe in the knowledge we are unlikely to get shot if we go out of the house, or critize politics without being picked up by the police.
Yeah things are not where we want them to be in the uk, but whatever it is the uk as damn site better than a huge amount of the world
Honestly as bad as people may perceive it to be in the uk we are still one of the richest countries in the world and for most the standard of living is better than the majority of the world’s population. We have the luxury to bitch about the government safe in the knowledge we are unlikely to get shot if we go out of the house, or critize politics without being picked up by the police.
Yeah things are not where we want them to be in the uk, but whatever it is the uk as damn site better than a huge amount of the world

I opened the thread to post this kind of thing. Doom mongering seems to be the in thing on here at the moment though. We really are extremely lucky to live in the UK. There are far worse places to live and not that many that are better.

Another aspect is the lack of ID cards here - so its easier to hide that you have no right to stay.

Biggest reasons I believe are family and language tho

BUt you also have to remember it=s a tiny minority of europes refugees who attempt the channel crossing.

Doom mongering seems to be the in thing on here at the moment though. We really are extremely lucky to live in the UK. There are far worse places to live and not that many that are better.

All the more reason not to sit back and watch it be dismantled, broken and divided whilst being sold/stolen from under our noses.