So much for controlling immigration!

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ITV News has figures showing tonnes of food is being wasted, as a shortage of farm workers means some UK crops are not being harvested.

Seasonal migrants from the EU are staying away, fearing a no deal Brexit.

The industry blames the government’s failure to allow more agricultural workers from outside the EU.

We filmed at a fruit farm in Ledbury, Herefordshire, where 87,000 punnets of raspberries were wasted in just a fortnight. It's because they are short of 100 pickers - the majority of seasonal agricultural workers come from Eastern Europe.

Fears about Brexit are one of the major reasons so many are now staying away, but a fall in the value of the pound and improving job conditions in their own countries are compounding this growing problem.

www.itv.com/news/2019-10-04/tonnes-of-british-grown-fruit-wasted-over-shortages-of-eu-workers-amid-no-deal-brexit-fears/

Thanks for that link, LondonGranny. Very powerful.

no, but the word is getting around that soon the ports in Calais and other locations will no longer be policed 24/7 by 1000s of French CRS.

Maizie
You misquote me, my question was “ how many million do we want this year”

It is not hyperbole I’ve travelled a lot in Africa and India and almost everyone who is educated and invariably speaks good English wants to get out for a better life. Even if they are educated to degree level, decent work is very hard to find. First choice U.K. but any English speaking nation would do, work visas are a distant dream, tourist visas rare unless you have relatives in Britain.

Some are brave enough to travel illegally to the land of milk and honey, many die on the way, all are exploited by traffickers.

I really don't think that there are tens of millions of 'educated migrants' dying to get into the UK each year. Hyperbole just encourages the ignorant, david

According to govt statistics there were 99,999 (why don't they just say 1 million? ?) applications for work visas in 2017

www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-october-to-december-2017/summary-of-latest-statistics

Asylum seekers don’t need to travel to the U.K. to be safe, they arrive on the U.K. because the want to settle here. Most of them arrive here as illegal immigrants on trucks or boats, then claim asylum, some are accepted as such, many are sent back.
The vast majority who want to move here are economic migrants, some have relatives here, some are temporary migrant workers. Together they number 250,000 each year we need them to keep many sectors running, but not as illegal immigrants.

If it were true that "they only do this because the border is in Calais" why do the migrants not get in through Ouistreham and Dieppe etc? There is a constant gendarme presence in and around these ports and I have personally witnessed the removal of migrants from the secure area in Ouistreham. I have also seen people turned away as foot passengers because they do not have the correct documents. It is nothing to do with juxtaposed controls. If you do not have the correct documents the French do not let you through.

The UK doesn't take millions of asylum seekers every year. According to the government's website, 37,453 applied last year and 20,000 were accepted, with some going to appeal.

A number of countries accept many more asylum seekers than the UK does.

It appears that quite a lot of leave voters thought that "leave" meant "all the foreigners mist leave the UK" and so a few days after the fraudulent referendum they were accosting their local Pakistani corner shop owner/ Sri Lankan GP/ French teacher/ Phillipina care worker/ saying "we voted leave so why have you not left yet?"

That is a disgusting statement Varian and what is your definition of 'quite a lot'? I would say 'a few' because there are obviously going to be some idiots. You have a seriously skewed idea of leave voters, and obviously think they are all thick racists.

We could of course counteract this by saying 'quite a lot' of remain voters thought that leaving the EU would affect their travel plans and add to the cost of their holidays. That is, if we thought all remain voters were shallow and superficial middle class people who don't want their travel plans disrupted.

Let’s distinguish Economic Migrants from Assylum seekers

There are tens of millions of educated migrants would like to come to Britain and other western countries, just how many million per year would you like Britain to take?.
The population is already increasing by 250,000 per year.

Assylum is defined as a place of safety, not the country you choose to move to, refugees can be just as safe in Lebanon, or Jordan and if needed the UN or UK and others can help pay until it is safe for them to return to their place of origin.

So let’s have no more bleeding heart stories Britain is taking far too many and it has been Government policy to reduce this for years.

I don't think it's true to say Italy has borne the brunt of the refugee crisis. Jordan has over 4 million refugees and is three times smaller than Italy. Lebanon has also taken in over a million refugees.. It's only about the size of Devon & Cornwall It already was more densely populated than the West Country too.

Apologies if someone has already posted this.
I haven't time to read the whole thread, I'm literally about to leave the house and do the big weekly shop. When you've read it top to bottom, read it from bottom to top.

nationalpoetryday.co.uk/poem/refugees/

My FiL didn't row over the channel though. He'd been fighting with the Allies and got demobbed here.

Two of my ancestors (a husband & pregnant wife) came over the channel in a tiny rowing boat to escape religious persecution in France. I wouldn't be here if they hadn't. The Huguenots enriched British life as most immigrants do. My FiL was a post-WW2 refugee as well. This country couldn't function without immigrants.

And now we have gangs of BF vigilantes patrolling the Kent Coasts at night. And no, not with water or blankets either.

Will they be able to restrain their behaviour- if they are the same as those we have seen active recently in our streets? I find this really disturbing

www.kentonline.co.uk/dover/news/far-right-group-patrols-beaches-for-migrants-212472/?fbclid=IwAR2nDBDRn8CvwBmdPZVPC5MqkDZA3pg-Bbq7NuaWwddEGQI_PXxyZNUdoFo

Sorry less hospitable

The first thing is to accept that with our economic system and the effects og global warming that there is going to be an increasing level of migration from areas that are becoming hospitable to life and that the pressures are going to lead to increasing levels of conflict. It is only when we accept the issues that we can start conversations to mitigate the issue.

The one certainty is that our present behavior is not solving anything it is simply making things worse.

Warsan.

Home by Warsaw Shire. Sorry, new to posting

Just read this wonderful poem. Everyone should, thank you

So what should be done absthame? How would you solve the problem?

EU nations, including ours, have abdicated our responsibilities on this issue, by paying Greece and and Italy to do whatever dirty work needs doing to keep most from our shores, even at the cost of lives, including children and babies. But hey our hands are clean so it's ok is it not?

I can fully understand why anyone would want to leave their country which is at war. I have worked with immigrates by giving english lessons and have found them all to be friendly, hard working and just longing for peace.

We as a nation have been at war but have never been invaded and so we are not in a position to judge what we do in their circumstances.

Italy and Greece have born the brunt of the influx of refugees and illegal immigrants crossing the Mediterranian and fortunately the other E U nations have supported them by admitting migrants.