The barge at Portland was designed for 200 people but has been "refurbished" to take 500 in what will be very cramped conditions and that seems inhumane to me given that these young men will have been separated form family and friends and have no occupation to keep them from getting up a head of steam. Are they to swim to shore or have access to regular boats?
Loosing 500 bored young men with no knowledge of western manners towards women and children on a small community which is already stretched for resources such as GPs, social support, transport and leisure facilities seems deeply impractical.
As for the ads thing, I've had it too today. i'd rather pay a subscription to use the site than face pop up ads all over the place so we'll have to see how intrusive they become.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
Having a roof over their heads and regular meals is far better than the existence they had coming to this country. I have no idea how much space each worker had when they were on the barges, but I suspect it was set up to reflect their normal expectations. The last thing these barges should do is create a nice, comfortable living environment as that will just encourage others to make the journey.
I'm afraid that sounds to me unhappily like Robert Jenrick's removal of murals at the children's reception centre, @KT53, in case they should enjoy Britain too much... These are unfortunate people escaping from adverse conditions in their own countries, and spending all their savings on a last-ditch effort, in unsafe boats, to reach a safe country, not criminals. They deserve decent accommodation.
My ancestors included Huguenot silk weavers who fled religious persecution in France and settled in London. I don't suppose they wanted to leave their home country, any more than the current asylum seekers do.
Our little town (population 800-odd) has just refurbished the redundant hotel, to accommodate 77 Ukranian refugees. I've seen inside and it looks beautiful - newly painted, pictures on the walls etc. That's just as it should be.
Since 2019 I've lived in east Clare, in the west of Ireland.
The UK is made entirely of immigrants, starting after the last ice age. They have come in waves - Picts, Celts, Angles, Saxons, Vikings and Normans - and all have brought something with them andended up integrating. In more recent times there were the Flemish weavers and French Huguenots felling religious persecution and then Jews fleeing pogroms in eastern Europe and Russia and later on the Nazis.
Since the war there have been waves of immigrants from the Commonwealth, invited to bring skills and labour to meet post war shortages. They too have added value and diversity to British culture.
Who knows what current waves of immigration may bring? How many of them have skills and qualifications needed to replace those lost to Brexit?
Treating them all as wastrels, free loaders, villains and potential rapists is cruel and inhumane and unproductive. It's storing up trouble for the communities in which they are dumped and it won't stop people coming as long as the problems they face at home are left unfixed by dithering G7/UN/EU and other politicians. It would also help if people traffickers were stopped at source and along the routes they use but that too would require a major shift in cross border co-operation and a major reduction of corruption in local officials.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
ALL people are migrants. If the 'Africa source' for humanity is to be believed, then the only peoples even likely NOT to be migrants are presumably some Africans in Africa. Otherwise we're all the product of wandering around the globe to find something better.
I find it particularly galling that the same type of person who thinks that migrants coming into this country are from some form of lower level of human evolution are the same type of person who were quite happy to paint the globe pink in time of Empire and wander all over the globe in search of peoples and countries to exploit.
Officials, of all capacities and of all political colours, using 'difficult decisions' in any speech. What do they think they are paid for, to sit and play with a fidget spinner all day?
Posts
Loosing 500 bored young men with no knowledge of western manners towards women and children on a small community which is already stretched for resources such as GPs, social support, transport and leisure facilities seems deeply impractical.
As for the ads thing, I've had it too today. i'd rather pay a subscription to use the site than face pop up ads all over the place so we'll have to see how intrusive they become.
My ancestors included Huguenot silk weavers who fled religious persecution in France and settled in London. I don't suppose they wanted to leave their home country, any more than the current asylum seekers do.
Our little town (population 800-odd) has just refurbished the redundant hotel, to accommodate 77 Ukranian refugees. I've seen inside and it looks beautiful - newly painted, pictures on the walls etc. That's just as it should be.
Since the war there have been waves of immigrants from the Commonwealth, invited to bring skills and labour to meet post war shortages. They too have added value and diversity to British culture.
Who knows what current waves of immigration may bring? How many of them have skills and qualifications needed to replace those lost to Brexit?
Treating them all as wastrels, free loaders, villains and potential rapists is cruel and inhumane and unproductive. It's storing up trouble for the communities in which they are dumped and it won't stop people coming as long as the problems they face at home are left unfixed by dithering G7/UN/EU and other politicians. It would also help if people traffickers were stopped at source and along the routes they use but that too would require a major shift in cross border co-operation and a major reduction of corruption in local officials.