Setting a precedent?

vintage1950

Why didn't those protestors demonstrate outside their local town hall? They would have made their point without intimidating the people inside the hotel..... Oh, wait...

Intimidated? They were laughing and taking photos of the protestors because they can’t believe their luck.

valdavi

Doodledog

I wonder if it would help if what were hotels (ie places run for the convenience and luxury of paying customers) were renamed when they are repurposed to simply house asylum seekers? They are no longer hotels, any more than an old bank or cinema that is now a Wetherspoons is still what it used to be.

People talk about 'luxury' hotels, as though asylum seekers get champagne delivered by room service and people are given free slippers.

Yes, I always think this when "hotels" for asylum seekers comes up.
Families in the local hotel fleeing Ukraine - sick children and very difficult to give care when in a small room with several children & just basically a kettle and a washbasin for food /medicine prep, shared fridge. They couldn't wait to get out & go to host families with spare room(s).

Any hotel could be considered “luxurious” compared to tents and makeshift shelters that other countries provide.

Why didn't those protestors demonstrate outside their local town hall? They would have made their point without intimidating the people inside the hotel..... Oh, wait...

Doodledog

I wonder if it would help if what were hotels (ie places run for the convenience and luxury of paying customers) were renamed when they are repurposed to simply house asylum seekers? They are no longer hotels, any more than an old bank or cinema that is now a Wetherspoons is still what it used to be.

People talk about 'luxury' hotels, as though asylum seekers get champagne delivered by room service and people are given free slippers.

Yes, I always think this when "hotels" for asylum seekers comes up.
Families in the local hotel fleeing Ukraine - sick children and very difficult to give care when in a small room with several children & just basically a kettle and a washbasin for food /medicine prep, shared fridge. They couldn't wait to get out & go to host families with spare room(s).

Galaxy

But they are mantras I don't know how else to express it, approved opinions maybe?

Guardian readers who believe that immigration is not the problem the media says it is (whether or not they have to deal with the consequences of mass immigration in their daily lives) have as much right to that opinion as Mail readers who also live far from asylum hotels but have different points of view.

If calling the latter 'uninformed' or 'racist' is unacceptable (and FWIW I agree that it is unacceptable) then saying the former group are 'chanting mantras' is unacceptable too, isn't it? Or is subjective language ok if it supports a particular viewpoint?

growstuff

Mamardoit I bet you wouldn't like to swap your life with that of an asylum seeker. I'm not sure what you mean by "everything", but I'm 100% sure they don't receive everything.

By the way, all people in the UK are eligible for free medical and dental treatment if their income is low enough. I know that for sure because I get it.

By everything I mean,

A roof over their head.
Clothes.
Meals.
An allowance for personal items.
Free dental and medical care. I don't know but I suspect they don't wait days (weeks) to see a gp.

You are lucky if you have an nhs dentist. Most of us don't.

I am also suspicious of people who arrive with no documentation. Why do they throw passports into the sea. The only reason must be to lie to the authorities about their true nationality/identity.

NotSpaghetti

Allira

People seeking asylum who came to the UK on a visa and claim asylum before the visa runs out (eg students or overseas workers such as nurses) can claim "section 3C leave" and can retain their right to work, if they were allowed to on their original visa. They can only do the jobs as per their original visa.

Other asylum seekers, if they have waited more than a year for a decision on their asylum claim and the fault is not theirs they can apply to work in one of 23 areas.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/skilled-worker-visa-immigration-salary-list/skilled-worker-visa-immigration-salary-list

Thought you might be interested.

Thanks NotSpaghetti
It was the speed at which the new Visa regulations were introduced this year which caused a problem for people who were coming here for a holiday. They were not going to stay for long!

Laboutine

^the middle class find it very easy to chant the mantras 'diversity is out strength^

Perhaps you're right there Galaxy. It must be so much easier to tell others to just suck it up when they personally don't live in an already impoverished and deprived area and yet are told that you must share your already dwindling resources with another few thousand asylum seekers. And the more deprived and impoverished your area becomes, the cheaper the property market becomes, making the area even more attractive to the government and SERCO to dump still more asylum seekers there for you to cope with.

The so-called middle classes probably know many immigrants because they are their friends, family members, colleagues etc therefore they don't fear them.
The reason they don't fear them because they are, like them, hardworking, probably educated and - well - middle-class. They may have arrived as refugees but they have worked hard and integrated. They did not arrive in the back of a lorry, do not run gangs, are nit here illegally.

Asylum seekers are different from illegal immigrants and need to be processed speedily, not kept lingering in hotels and other centres, uncertain of their future and making local people uncertain too.

Galaxy

I don't know about revolution but I am worried, I am not sure it is going to be pretty. Do people think it is all going to calm down and everyone will nod wisely 'oh I see you were right all along diversity is our strength after all'.

Ah yes, that wonderful diversity
There may not be a revolution but expect fireworks at the next GE.

Allira

People seeking asylum who came to the UK on a visa and claim asylum before the visa runs out (eg students or overseas workers such as nurses) can claim "section 3C leave" and can retain their right to work, if they were allowed to on their original visa. They can only do the jobs as per their original visa.

Other asylum seekers, if they have waited more than a year for a decision on their asylum claim and the fault is not theirs they can apply to work in one of 23 areas.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/skilled-worker-visa-immigration-salary-list/skilled-worker-visa-immigration-salary-list

Thought you might be interested.

Laboutine

^Can you explain why you highlighted 'hordes' please?^

I highlighted it purely because growstuff was so dismissive of another poster using that word. It's being dismissive of people's worries, concerns, and the words that they use to describe those worries and concerns, that have led us to the situation we have today; demonstrations, protests, disenfranchised people who feel that they're being shut down and should just accept the huge changes that thousands of single males bring to their communities. Telling people that they're being "deliberately confrontational", racist, paranoid and "having a victim complex" has worked well so far to stop people raising their concerns; but it's running out of steam. I'm no Mystic Meg, but I sincerely hope that their isn't another incident of an asylum seeker found to have been involved with sexually abusing, or harming another young girl; current public feeling is a tinder box just waiting to go off. Calling them names will only inflame them more.

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

Where are the Palestinians driven out of their homes going?

Where they want to stay I hope. In a rebuilt Gaza.

If only these problems were sorted out at source none of this would be happening.

We seem ineffectual and toothless at resolving conflict, at bringing water to those who need it, at so many of the world's problems.

Primrose53
They are NOT given phones.
This is a myth

Re Free Bus Passes:
Fact Check: Britain’s government has not announced free bus fares for immigrants, contrary to a claim circulating on social media.
(Reuters Nov. 2024)
...Here is a false advert that is trying to make people believe that this came in in November 2024 when the bus fare cap went up to £3.

The London Assembly did pass a motion calling on the mayor to introduce travel vouchers for asylum seekers and the Scottish government has said it will revive plans for free bus travel for asylum seekers in 2026.
As far as I'm aware these haven't happened.

the middle class find it very easy to chant the mantras 'diversity is out strength

Perhaps you're right there Galaxy. It must be so much easier to tell others to just suck it up when they personally don't live in an already impoverished and deprived area and yet are told that you must share your already dwindling resources with another few thousand asylum seekers. And the more deprived and impoverished your area becomes, the cheaper the property market becomes, making the area even more attractive to the government and SERCO to dump still more asylum seekers there for you to cope with.

But they are mantras I don't know how else to express it, approved opinions maybe?

But using phrases such as 'chant the mantras' is no different from using vocabulary such as 'hordes', or 'ignorant', 'racist' or whatever.

As long as people refuse to respect differences of opinion there can be no progress.

The experience of immigration is obviously very different between the classes, that is why the middle class find it very easy to chant the mantras 'diversity is out strength' etc and by doing that they are saved from being called stupid, racist, etc.

Re thousands earlier.

the numbers from one thousand to 9,999.
plural noun: thousands

INFORMAL
an unspecified large number.
plural noun: thousands

So the numbers mentioned qualify.

I agree Galaxy, class is significant but is rarely acknoeledged

And what bearing does a person's "class" have Iam64? What "class" would they have to be to be fearful, apprehensive and worried about thousands of single men being deposited into their communities? Working class? Lower class? Middle class? Upper class? Please elaborate.

petra

^A lot of it is about class and a complete disconnect between sections of society^
And there you have it.

Definitely a disconnect between Government and a growing number of the electorate.

Oops. Obliterated class as the factor which has the most impact on people's lives.

I think ( but I would think this) that identity politics pretty much obliterated class as

A lot of it is about class and a complete disconnect between sections of society
And there you have it.

I agree Galaxy, class is significant but is rarely acknoeledged

Yes it is not right and left, I don't even know how to classify it anymore, you have say Paul Embery (Blue Labour) and Claire Fox saying similar things about speech, I do wonder if we are moving away from left and right as useful descriptors. A lot of it is about class and a complete disconnect between sections of society.