This nastiness is what the public demands.
Well, not all the public. Immigration enforcement got a rather different reception in Glasgow: https://twitter.com/david_millar/status/1392969258989150208
Be very careful with such a statement.
Regardless of where you sit on the issue, the Brexit referendum was roughly 50:50. The UK is fiercely split [1] and such issues are not going to be resolved anytime soon. It is incorrect to state such a policy is popular..... roughly half the population voted against it.
[1] And dare I say it... looks in danger of splitting up.
If the policy is "popular" - which it isn't, except among the reactionaries - it's in no small measure because the UK media have normalised this kind of abuse.
This kind of thing is almost a predictable syndrome associated with post-colonialism. Other countries have been through it, now it's the UK's turn.
When countries lose their empires/influence, racism and fascism provide a compensation that can temporarily restore childish fantasies of omnipotence.
It's associated with a death wish, so things generally get worse - sometimes much worse - before they get better.
> The UK is fiercely split [1] and such issues are not going to be resolved anytime soon. It is incorrect to state such a policy is popular..... roughly half the population voted against it.
You tried to dispute that by pointing out that the Conservatives won comfortably in 2019. I don't think it does given that the vote share in 2019 still suggested a roughly 50:50 split of the population.
CON, DUP: 44.4%
LAB, LIB, SNP, GRN, CYM: 50.7%
Brexit is now done so last week's local elections can't be used as a point of reference on that subject.
Yes they did. From their party manifesto[1]:
> Within three months of coming to power, a Labour government will secure a sensible deal. And within six months, we will put that deal to a public vote alongside the option to remain.
Large numbers of voters switched from Labour to Conservative because of Brexit. It's probably fair to count all Labour voters from that election as "not in favour of Brexit".
1. https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Real-Change...
Nope. They won exclusively due to targeted "hidden" campaigns via Facebook and other directed means, sending messages designed to sway the voters in a number of very narrowly decided constituencies. This is how they got 56.2% of the parliament seats despite winning only 43.6% of the votes.
In that respect, I suspect it is a popular policy among those who enforce it.
Besides which, the conflation of a desire for immigration control with racism is a lazy canard.
The numbers are still viewed as being too high though post-lockdowns who knows what will happen. But the limits can at least now be spread around all countries equally, and people can be prioritised based on e.g. demand for their skills. This was previously forbidden.
>One second generation immigrant I spoke to said some Pakistani people campaigned for Brexit because they wanted to “control immigration in a way that was favourable to the Indian subcontinent”.
>“One of their arguments was that, if we leave, we’d be better able to accept people from the Indian subcontinent, professionals such as doctors, rather than taking them from Europe,” he said. “There was that strand that we’d lost control of immigration, that lots of people from eastern Europe were coming over, but, therefore, people from the Indian subcontinent weren’t getting a fair crack at the whip and it was that disparity. They felt the immigration system was unfair.”
>While EU migrants generally benefit from freedom of movement, those from countries such as India and Pakistan are subject to visa and work restrictions – a distinction that was played on by Vote Leave’s Michael Gove during the referendum campaign when he suggested that Britain’s immigration system was “racist”.
https://bylinetimes.com/2019/04/08/the-story-of-brexit-is-th...
But conversely during the time that she was allowed to be in the UK, she had the right to vote while EU citizens didn't.
Like you I don't think commonwealth citizens who voted for Brexit were being racist, I do think it was sometimes vindictive though which doesn't really make it much better.
This may or may not sound common sense but to me that is the root cause of it all.
Before 2004, when the first and main batch of Eastern European countries joined the EU no one really cared about free movement: It was all within Western Europe and did not create problems.
Then, literally millions of Eastern Europeans moved to the UK and that created social, cultural, and economical problems and the people impacted were shocked to be told that there was absolutely nothing the government could do. The rest, as they say, is history.
But yes, British visitors to the EU who cannot enter for whatever reason are just sent back on the same flight or wait at the airport for the next one.
I think EU and UK people can visit the USA for a job interview under the visa waiver programme. A Nigerian can't. It's the same difference.
:-)
I was trying to convey the fact that citizens from eu countries are not at the level of other third countries yet. For example you can still travel using just a national id card until October.
I wholeheartedly agree with the rest of your comment though.
Immigration Enforcement have power of arrest for this circumstance. The Information Commissioner has uniformed officers with limited police-type powers for their area of work too.
And I'd prefer no speculative high-drama arrests of people who are following the rules and not breaking the law.
> María, 25, from Valencia, said that like many of those detained, she thought she was free to explore the job market at least until October
This sounds like coming to the UK for work without a visa, in which case it is correct in law to be detained.
I think the practice of detention for up to 7 days before being deported is a way to inflict a punishment to deter people trying. Indeed, if the only thing you risk if caught is being turned away at the airport then people would just try and try, why not?
There are articles from sources a bit more balanced than The Guardian: https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-citizens-detained-uk-work...
They are not given ability to contact their embassy for held getting out of the country.
Some cases they say they could pay for a plane home again but got detained anyway.
Furthermore the reason they are detained are rather undefined. It says that they can go to UK for interview for example, but they are still detained. They tried to enter legally but the rules does not seem to be followed.
Some in the article were held for two days, which in my eyes are not a speedy return. This is waste of UK money and a bad system.
Unlike the EU, where about 30% of illegal immigrants are expelled, while no one no one is interested in changing that legal status.
People are offering to buy their own ticket, but no they're sent to detention for no reason, at taxpayer expense.
People are offering to stay private, but no they're sent to detention at taxpayer expense.
A Czech woman is being sent to Mexico instead of allowing her to pay herself to fly home to Prague.
All this spending of UK taxpayer funds for what? Out of spite?
It's annoying and slightly weird, but isn't that just how it works? You go 'back where you came from', not wherever you want or claim to live?
Say the woman in your example was refused by Czech customs, and sent back to the UK, then what? Dig through records (would they have them?) to find she came to the UK from Mexico, and then send her there?
Correct me if I'm wrong, I just don't think that would be different in any other country. (That particular aspect I mean, assuming they've decided you're not allowed in, and will be deported to somewhere.)
Considering she is Czech, she is far more likely to be rejected by Mexican customs rather than Czech customs.
So you're saying democracy is bad?
sounds like a weird strawman. Do you know of any larger group seriously fighting for that at the moment?
(People coming for a scheduled interview are not "unrestricted immigration for looking for work")
The article also mentions a French woman who was detained for attending an interview for an internship, so I think there's that too.
Imo, it's obviously very unclear as to why they're being detained, but in the case of Eugenia (Spanish woman arriving to "look for work"), it was clearly illegal per the new law.
That said, I don't take it as a given that unrestricted immigration would cause problems; it has never been tried, there is no data to go on.
A breakdown is available here:
https://dominiccummings.files.wordpress.com/2016/11/screensh...
You're entitled to feel this way, but it's completely irrelevant to this discussion. It's a matter of fact that the Home Office says it's legal to enter without a visa to look for a job, and yet that's not what's enforced at the border.
I'm in the USA and this polemical strawman is standard fare on Murdoch's Fox News. It's just a lazy way of dismissing the issue without real discussion.
Asylum seekers get £40 a week. https://www.gov.uk/asylum-support/what-youll-get
People complaining about immigrants claiming welfare have usually been lied to by the press about the applicable situation.
It's baseless to believe that the home office would target something in Sturgeons constituency on some particular day, especially when there's no political advantage to be drawn by said act.
Immigration law applies to Scotland too; until there's a nice border there (but that's another topic).
> It's baseless to believe that the home office would target something in Sturgeons constituency on some particular day, especially when there's no political advantage to be drawn by said act.
Judging by #10's behavior as a predictor for future behavior there is every reason to believe it was very much on purpose (and far from "baseless"). And even it wasn't on purpose it would now be on them to apologize and try to straighten things out - which ofc they don't.
To be specific I can't think of a time that #10 have gone out of their way to do something like this, or anything else to directly antagonise Sturgeon.
Nothing simple about that given that merely a year or two ago there effectively was no border, and now ordinary people who want to go look for a job sit in detention cells? Who does this help and how is it tame?
The UK more than any other European country should know the devastation borders can wreak.
Borders are determined by the desires of those within them. The right to self-determination is a key principle of international law (unless you're Spain, apparently).
It is perfectly OK if you want to have inefficient system (wasting UK money on holding people who does not need to be held) but we as EU countries just ask that you give our citizens the possibility to call our embassies before you detain them to let us help them out of your country. Until then we will continue to calling you douchebags for how you treat our citizens that are trying to enter your country legally, sorry for the emotionally loaded words.
With the UK's horrifically undemocratic voting system, the leading party often wins a strong majority of the power in Parliament with significantly less than half the national vote.
In the 2019 election, the Conservative party won 56.2% of the seats in Parliament with 43.6% of the vote.[0]
In 2017, 48.8% of seats came from 42.4% of the vote.
In 2015, 50.8% of seats came from 36.8% of the vote.
In 2010, 47.1% of seats came from 36.1% of the vote.
In 2005, 55.2% of seats came from 35.2% of the vote.
In 2001, 62.5% of seats came from 40.7% of the vote.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_United_Kingdom_general_el... and links to other elections at the bottom.
They are being detained because they do not enter the UK to attend interviews: The 2 women used as examples in the article did not have an interview scheduled and, as a consequence, did not have an invitation letter. They wanted to enter the UK to look for work. That's very different and, I expect, the reason they were detained as that is indeed illegal without a visa.
If it is allowed to enter visa-free to attend an interview and you have the necessary evidence (i.e. I expect, invitation letter and return ticket within 24-48 hours) I highly doubt that you will be detained.
There are always people who try to break the rules or who do not do their homework. This sort of thing happens everyday. The difference is that EU citizens are not used to this happening to them.
For instance, even before Brexit the UK was not in Schengen and I witnessed several times, both in UK and France, non-EU citizens being stopped on arrival despite being residents in UK/EU because they thought they didn't need a visa to visit Paris from London or London from Paris.
because this border issue is an emotional and symbolic issue at heart and it's important to recognize that, there is no rational case here why there should be any restriction to freedom of movement. Are you going to be that calm if Scotland attempts to exercise it or if Irish violence flares up again? Erecting borders after decades of freedom of movement is no 'simple policy'. Detaining neighbors just because you can is a sort of behavior that indicates there's something going deeply wrong in the UK.
Except that the official guidance by the Home Office clearly states that EU citizens can still enter visa-free to look for jobs. But of course as it always happens border force knows better than the Home Office. The fact that people are being actually sent to detention centres is beyond idiotic.