Why do Asylum Seekers cross the channel on small boats

Chestnut

Hooray! Another six boats of doctors and dentists have arrived.

😂😂😂😂😂

They were safe from persecution and execution in France.I don’t think that excuse washes to be frank.
If they actively prefer to be in the UK that’s a different matter.They clearly do want to be here but may think it will be better than it really is.Or our benefits and treatment of Asylum seekers may be genuinely a good deal better than staying in France.

So young men arrive cheering and in a bouyant mood. Many are from countries like Iran where they have fled persecution or execution, and just completed a hazardous journey to their destination where at last they believe they will be safe.
Why not cheer?
After all they haven’t yet met the many people in this country who will be openly hostile or in one recent case attempt to burn them alive in a hotel where the exits were blocked.
I imagine their cheering will sadly be short lived.
There is a much higher percentage of asylum seekers self harming and committing suicide than in the general population.
That doesn’t speak to me of a group of people ecstatic about stealing houses and jobs, and apparently GPs and dentists, from the British population.

growstuff

Primrose53

Babs03 surely you’ve seen the news and newspaper photos of immigrants arriving on our shores. Completely the opposite of the “cowed, scared” people who avoid eye contact.

The thousands I’ve seen disembarking are all fit young men either giving the Victory or thumbs up sign and waving and cheering. They don’t look cowed or scared at all.

I said on here months ago that I know a Border Force official very well and what he has to say confirms what I see with my own eyes.

Do you volunteer for the RNLI or work for Border Force (or - heaven forbid - are you Nigel Farage? Don't you have anything better to do with your time than watch people disembarking from boats?

Why the sneering post growstuff? I thought things were improving today and then along comes your post. There really is no need.

If you reread my posts I made it very clear that I had seen photos on TV and in newspapers. I did not say I stood and watched them so please stop putting words in my mouth.

silverlining48

I don’t live far from Dover. People in inflatables don’t row onto the beach but are usually brought in by lifeboats or other large boats way before they get to the port, so unless someone lives with a window facing that part of the harbour ( unlikely) or stands around waiting every day, it just woukdnt be possible to see thousands of asylum seekers arrive. If I am in Dover I watch the sea and so far have not seen any boats at all.

You may not have seen them but you know that thousands do arrive.
I haven’t seen a stabbing but it goes on all around us.If a poster lives where the AS’s are brought in regularly and has seen them, why all the disbelief.

Hooray! Another six boats of doctors and dentists have arrived.

Bit tetchy there growstuff if you live and walk near the sea in a port where asylum seekers are brought in regularly than you would see them.All you need to be is a dog walker.

I don’t live far from Dover. People in inflatables don’t row onto the beach but are usually brought in by lifeboats or other large boats way before they get to the port, so unless someone lives with a window facing that part of the harbour ( unlikely) or stands around waiting every day, it just woukdnt be possible to see thousands of asylum seekers arrive. If I am in Dover I watch the sea and so far have not seen any boats at all.

Primrose53

Babs03 surely you’ve seen the news and newspaper photos of immigrants arriving on our shores. Completely the opposite of the “cowed, scared” people who avoid eye contact.

The thousands I’ve seen disembarking are all fit young men either giving the Victory or thumbs up sign and waving and cheering. They don’t look cowed or scared at all.

I said on here months ago that I know a Border Force official very well and what he has to say confirms what I see with my own eyes.

Do you volunteer for the RNLI or work for Border Force (or - heaven forbid - are you Nigel Farage? Don't you have anything better to do with your time than watch people disembarking from boats?

Cadeby

"The thousands I’ve seen disembarking"

What fuels this nonsense? Its beyond me , really.

So are you saying that thousands have not arrived on boats? It is absolutely not nonsense. Maybe you don’t have aTV.

Cadeby

"The thousands I’ve seen disembarking"

What fuels this nonsense? Its beyond me , really.

Why nonsense? If you live near a port it’s quite feasible that you would see thousands over the course of a couple of years.

Primrose presume they are relieved and happy to be safe on dry land instead of dangerous seas. I would be smiling and expect you would too.
Over the last ten years I have met many asylum seekers from different countries and some are now very good friends of the family.

Grandmabatty

"thousands I've seen with my own eyes."
Aye, right. And one border official's opinion means it all must be true.

But better than no border official’s input I would say.It’s his job and he sees a lot.

"The thousands I’ve seen disembarking"

What fuels this nonsense? Its beyond me , really.

Grandmabatty

"thousands I've seen with my own eyes."
Aye, right. And one border official's opinion means it all must be true.

Yes thousands over the last couple of years.

It’s probably one more BorderForce official than you know anyway. 😉

There are no " boat people" What a silly expression. Along with " small boats", they are hardly likely to be ocean liners. Stop the Boats, another silly phrase.

They are human being first and foremost not " boat people"
Nobody called the Ukrainians " Plane People"

"thousands I've seen with my own eyes."
Aye, right. And one border official's opinion means it all must be true.

Just read that in .germany asylum seekers are secretly going on holidays to their home countries. There is even a thriving industry of travel agents out there facilitating it. You couldnt make it up 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Babs03 surely you’ve seen the news and newspaper photos of immigrants arriving on our shores. Completely the opposite of the “cowed, scared” people who avoid eye contact.

The thousands I’ve seen disembarking are all fit young men either giving the Victory or thumbs up sign and waving and cheering. They don’t look cowed or scared at all.

I said on here months ago that I know a Border Force official very well and what he has to say confirms what I see with my own eyes.

David49

Mamie

David49

Whatever they say 70% of crossings are successful, which sounds to me like not really trying, if it depends on the UK paying the French more to do the job properly, it’s going to be a lot cheaper than the stupid Rwanda plan.

Just out of interest do you have the source for that figure? According to Le Monde 69% of crossings have been stopped (April 2024). The figures do include the whole of the channel coast. The local papers and tweets from officials provide quite a lot of information about operations on the ground (in French).

From the website you quoted

François Guennoc, vice-president of the Auberge des migrants, an association which helps migrants, estimates that "the success rate of crossings is between 60 and 70%".

Yes that is from the 2020 article which was the figure during Covid lockdown.
"Sur la base des chiffres français et britanniques tenus à jour par l'Auberge des migrants depuis octobre 2018, le taux de réussite des traversées par la mer est passé de 60 à près de 80% depuis le confinement décrété en France le 17 mars. "Cela encourage plus de migrants à emprunter cette voie de passage extrêmement dangereuse", rappelle François Guennoc".
The Le Monde article which quotes 69% crossings stopped by the French forces was April this year.
The figures are never going to be easy to assess, but at the port near where we live we see plenty of action going on.

Wyllow3

This article is a bit of a read, but it describes so exactly both the words/ideas involved in the hatred and the means its passed on - what babs describes is the tip of an iceberg.

research.ethicalconsumer.org/research-hub/addressing-subtle-forms-of-anti-migrant-hate-2022

Thanx for that. Very informative.
Antisemitism thrives on the false narrative that Jewish people are taking over, this false narrative is also the case with Muslim migrants with references to Sharia law taking over our judicial system. Racism against blacks has for a long time used the false narrative that black people are more criminally minded and more prone to commit sexual crimes because black males are more sexually active.
And in the link you supplied the usual racist opinions about refugees are outlined - that they are more criminally minded, that the men disrespect women and are more prone to rape or sexually molest women, are would be terrorists, do not have the same moral standards etc.
All of this serves to dehumanise a people and so make it easier to talk about them as a public nuisance that needs to be eradicated.
Sobering reading.

False narratives about what anyone receives who arrives on a small boat or not, it doesn’t stop the flow of boats arriving daily and what strains this puts on councils who then have to house them.The only thing it seems to me to be done is very fast processing of claims then deportation also done quickly for those not deemed to be true asylum seekers.

This article is a bit of a read, but it describes so exactly both the words/ideas involved in the hatred and the means its passed on - what babs describes is the tip of an iceberg.

research.ethicalconsumer.org/research-hub/addressing-subtle-forms-of-anti-migrant-hate-2022

MaizieD

Sorry, Mollygo, but the false narrative has been posted many times. Not as *Babs03 says it because she is posting what her experience tells her is reality. But over the past year or two at least we've had plenty of tales of 'what asylum seekers get' which are untrue or wildly exaggerated.

We even have one today on the thread about Brighton. Asylum seekers are give bicycles, apparently

I don’t know how you can call it “false narrative” Mollygo when it is somebody’s lived experience.

MaizieD

Sorry, Mollygo, but the false narrative has been posted many times. Not as *Babs03 says it because she is posting what her experience tells her is reality. But over the past year or two at least we've had plenty of tales of 'what asylum seekers get' which are untrue or wildly exaggerated.

We even have one today on the thread about Brighton. Asylum seekers are give bicycles, apparently

Indeed.
And on a talk show recently was stated by a caller that refugees get free cars.
By next week will probs be free all inclusive holidays or cruises.