Refugees - How will our finances cope?

They could work and pay taxes.

Like most immigrants do?

And we could run the country properly, not just for the elites to stay rich.

Just a thought.

Mainly women and children, some women too old to work or unable to speak English. A big additional pressure on health and education services and benefits. I don’t have an answer to your question.

They are refugees and not immigrants. I would doubt many of the paltry number we have taken in will want to stay in this 'hostile environment'. We have already taken in many more from Hong Kong with little of this kind of comment.

Why are you assuming that they would want to stay. Would you if you were forced to flee your home, no.
Why do you think millions are staying as close to Ukraine as they can: because they want to be near home.

They are not going to become UK citizens or even residents. It is only in the short term. I think we need to go all out to help. Especially as concerns children caught up in this.

MerylStreep. Benefits, housing , free healthcare perhaps? I am nearing retirement age and see a really bleak future.

Your wondering how we will financially cope with these costs.
Did you ask the same question when billions were spent/wasted on track and trace.
The powers that be whistled that hideous sum out of nowhere.

LillyoftheVally
I’m a bit closer to maybe wanting care than you. 76 this year.
No fat pensions for us, just investments which could go tits ( who knows)
I’ve never been one to look for something to worry about, I might be dead tomorrow.

Pretty much the same as us Meryl. I had assumed OP was older but she’s still working. I wouldn’t be calling it a bleak future at her age.

I have no problem with the Ukrainian refugees they are fleeing a war and they are mostly women, children and the elderly and will probably want to go back to Ukraine when this terrible war is over. I'm not so happy about the mostly young fit men coming over in the dingeys who we are putting up in hotels.

The fact that millions has been found to help these poor folk is surely confirmation that the dreadful state of public services in this country is a political, not a solely financial decision. This is a rich country, we have plenty of money, it just doesn't get spent properly. Please don't start blaming Ukrainian refugees for the fact that your pension is insufficient. The Hong Kong 'refugees' were not taken in kindness, a lot of them are from very wealthy families, and many have had properties in London for decades, ready for such a time as when they needed them.

So I'm putting two and two together here, maybe making 5...

MerylStreep asks why the refugees might want to stay here.

LilyoftheValley says Benefits, housing , free healthcare perhaps?

Is there really a school of thought that says the Ukrainian people, who are fighting so bravely for their country, might want to stay on in this country because they'll get benefits?

Their country is at war. Being decimated.

If it were us, we'd want help.

I too am worried about the NHS with the extra people that will be using it. My DH has two broken hips, cannot walk, has fallen three times and has been waiting for an operation for almost a year!

What I understood MerylStreep to mean was that Ukrainian refugees will want to go home again when the fighting stops and Ukraine is freed. It is obvious that they love their country and will want to rebuild it.

Millions of Syrian refugees are still in camps not far from the border with Syria - hoping that one day they can return to Syria, rebuild that devastated country (Assad and Putin) and live in peace.

How can one man devastate so many lives?
Pure evil.

I'm not wondering about what MerylStreep meant. I think I understood that.

LilyoftheValley

MerylStreep. Benefits, housing , free healthcare perhaps? I am nearing retirement age and see a really bleak future.

Not as bleak as if you lived in Ukraine, though.

volver

I'm not wondering about what MerylStreep meant. I think I understood that.

It was linking the two statements

I understood what you meant but others might not.

? Call

FindingNemo15

I too am worried about the NHS with the extra people that will be using it. My DH has two broken hips, cannot walk, has fallen three times and has been waiting for an operation for almost a year!

That's a fairly valid worry.
Your poor husband must be in a lot of pain.
I sympathise.
Not everybody has rhe money to go private.

Would we have said the same in WW2 when we took in Jewish refugees?

Not everybody has the money to go private.

...which is why we have an NHS that we should fund and run properly.

I'm more worried about the hundreds and hundreds of new houses being built around here without new infrastructure such as roads, and no sign of a new school, nor more GP surgeries and not a hospital for 25 miles.

Companies like Bupa, and Aviva should offer free private health care to any household accommodating refugees. That would be a start.