Open borders

[halfmist]

People move all the time. Sometimes into posh areas. Social mobility is a positive.

Agreed on all points.

 

[metalblue]

People move all the time. Sometimes into posh areas. Social mobility is a positive.

Moving house is not social mobility

 

[Gorton_Tubster]

The open BORDER policy of Markel , the woman gave the green light for just about anybody that fancied a new life in Europe the go ahead, …

I suspect the open border approach of sweden, germany etc at that time has led directly to an increase in right wing govns in Europe. And contributed to Brexit imo. I liked their middle ground politics (Those countries) but I think that period has set Europe back generations in terms of racial harmony. From France right now, to the dutch, poland, and us here in the UK. We've all got problems with immigration, or with immigration being used as an excuse. Worst thing could have done was to tell everyone if you can make you can live here.

 

[BrianW]

If you go back to 19th-Century social history, you will find the same sort of virulent objections to Irish Catholic immigrants. Catholicism, outside the traditional recusant areas of Lancashire, was seen as exotic and threatening. And the Irish - well, even to repeat what was said about them risks offence. Read it for yourselves, if interested.

Nothing changes. People dislike anything different and fear the unknown. Be aware though that the ruling class love nothing more than division. The more you hate poor people, the more you are diverted away from the greedy billionaire grifters, the ones who are really shitting on you from a great height.

 

[Grassland Blue]

If you go back to 19th-Century social history, you will find the same sort of virulent objections to Irish Catholic immigrants. Catholicism, outside the traditional recusant areas of Lancashire, was seen as exotic and threatening. And the Irish - well, even to repeat what was said about them risks offence. Read it for yourselves, if interested.

Nothing changes. People dislike anything different and fear the unknown. Be aware though that the ruling class love nothing more than division. The more you hate poor people, the more you are diverted away from the greedy billionaire grifters, the ones who are really shitting on you from a great height.

I have been associating with such people recently.
I have also been associating with some much less so.
My question is where do you draw the line above which the greedy can not go and the other line below which the ordinary can not fall?
We live in a country, supposedly wealthy, which lets people eke out their lives on the streets. Why?

 

[BobKowalski]

Thanks for the history lesson, that’s not an open border policy, a border exists.

Is having an open border policy where millions could arrive from anywhere on planet earth in to a country thus swamping the education, health and housing systems the right approach or do countries need a cap in place (whatever that number might be) to prevent those services being overwhelmed?

Should we not have internal open borders within England? If talent migrates towards London then London has larger investment, needs bigger state services, and more companies set up there and it becomes self perpetuated - would restricting movement better distribute wealth and jobs? Crazy idea? It was Labour policy for Birmingham back in the 1960s - obviously an unmitigated disaster as a city of a thousand trades became reliant on the motor industry and a one company British Leyland - however was the policy of wealth and job distribution actually wrong?

You’re welcome.

however was the policy of wealth and job distribution actually wrong?

Depends how you operate the policy. The EU approach is to build up the economies of poorer countries ie Eastern Europe by having the wealthier countries contribute and the poorest receive funding to build infrastructure etc.

Net result is rapid economic growth and higher standards of living in Eastern Europe which means bigger markets for Western Europe. This was the Thatcher model when Conservatives did have a brain cell or two.

Putting up artificial barriers to the movement of people, goods and investment- the Tony Benn/Sunak/Brexit approach, which you seem to be a fan of, will fail because it always does.

You can see it failing in real time right now. The schadenfreude is off the scale in the Kowalski household, although I take no pleasure in saying this.

 

[BobKowalski]

Moving house is not social mobility

Depends where you move from and to.

 

[BobKowalski]

I suspect the open border approach of sweden, germany etc at that time has led directly to an increase in right wing govns in Europe. And contributed to Brexit imo. I liked their middle ground politics (Those countries) but I think that period has set Europe back generations in terms of racial harmony. From France right now, to the dutch, poland, and us here in the UK. We've all got problems with immigration, or with immigration being used as an excuse. Worst thing could have done was to tell everyone if you can make you can live here.

With respect to the influx of people from outside the EU countries then yes, but France‘s population also reflects its colonial past - as do ours, but the UK dealt with it far better than France.

The open border policy doesn’t apply outside of the EU. The EU external border regime is pretty horrific in its treatment of migrants.

The irony is these far right Govts, like Italy, or even ours, are openly seeking greater immigration flows from outside the EU because they need the labour. Even Eastern European countries are increasing non-EU immigration visas. Economic reality is a bitch and all that.

 

[BrianW]

I have been associating with such people recently.
I have also been associating with some much less so.
My question is where do you draw the line above which the greedy can not go and the other line below which the ordinary can not fall?
We live in a country, supposedly wealthy, which lets people eke out their lives on the streets. Why?

I honestly don't recall seeing a beggar in the street before Thatcher. I suppose there might have been the odd one.

We used to have a system that gave us a more equal society. It was not equal, of course. The boss still got paid a lot more and had a nicer car/house. It was also, for most people, less prosperous in terms of consumer goods than 2023. In part, that was due to the fact we had not progressed so far. We had only been in the EEC for a few years and were still suffering from a bit of the 'sick man of Europe' syndrome.

However:

There was a lot less social tension.
The gap between rich and poor was not as marked.
There were plenty of employment opportunities - albeit not necessarily with good pay.
Housing was much cheaper in real terms.
Public services, including the NHS, worked.

How did it work?

1. There was a genuine social security system. You were not a pariah if you went sick or had to go on the dole.

2. Personal taxes for everyone were at a higher rate. But particularly for those on large incomes.

Was it paradise? Hell, no! But it was much more sustainable and realistic as a way of life, and we were gradually getting better off.

Some people did not like this setup and worked hard to destroy it. They felt it cushioned people too much and - this was the root of it! - they wanted to pay less tax.

The start of the destruction was a lie put about by the Tories and the Daily Mail that you could have lower taxes and the same public services. (Because, they argued, the public services would learn to be leaner and more efficient.)

This was an outright lie or next door to one, but it was a very attractive lie. Even people who paid very little tax liked the idea of paying less. I knew just such an individual - he was delighted when Thatcher got in, even though he was paid less than me, had a wife and kids, and probably paid about £3 a month in tax.

Where we are now, and the attitudes associated with it, sprang from that.

 

[metalblue]

You’re welcome.



Depends how you operate the policy. The EU approach is to build up the economies of poorer countries ie Eastern Europe by having the wealthier countries contribute and the poorest receive funding to build infrastructure etc.

Net result is rapid economic growth and higher standards of living in Eastern Europe which means bigger markets for Western Europe. This was the Thatcher model when Conservatives did have a brain cell or two.

Putting up artificial barriers to the movement of people, goods and investment- the Tony Benn/Sunak/Brexit approach, which you seem to be a fan of, will fail because it always does.

You can see it failing in real time right now. The schadenfreude is off the scale in the Kowalski household, although I take no pleasure in saying this.

I’ve no idea why you keep bringing up the EU, they don’t have an open border policy.

 

[metalblue]

Depends where you move from and to.

It really doesn’t.

 

[Ashton Moss Messi]

Everyone would have to carry some form of I.D. though.
Any dodgy characters would be weeded out that way.

Current ID? or new "ID cards" and you would have another additional means of identify fraud / criminality.
Look at credit cards, bank cards, passports and driving licences - anybody seriously think they cannot be fraudulent/fake?
The same would happen with an ID card.

 

[Ashton Moss Messi]

Your plastic driving licence carries data about your driving offences, so why should an I.D. cardc arrying details of somebody's criminal activities (or not) be a problem?
Unless of course that person is a criminal....

Ah, the "if you've nothing to hide" argument.

OK until the authorities change the content and maybe decide that your card identifies as something else, like a football supporter or a political affiliation or a voting record or whether you'd paid your poll tax - would have been introduced in a heartbeat in the 80s.

 

[west didsblue]

The schadenfreude is off the scale in the Kowalski household, although I take no pleasure in saying this.

I would say that’s a good example of an oxymoron ;-)

 

[Gorton_Tubster]

With respect to the influx of people from outside the EU countries then yes, but France‘s population also reflects its colonial past - as do ours, but the UK dealt with it far better than France.

The open border policy doesn’t apply outside of the EU. The EU external border regime is pretty horrific in its treatment of migrants.

The irony is these far right Govts, like Italy, or even ours, are openly seeking greater immigration flows from outside the EU because they need the labour. Even Eastern European countries are increasing non-EU immigration visas. Economic reality is a bitch and all that.

We need the immigration, absolutely.

But not at the expense of ending up with the sort of politicians we are seeing get into power, because their ineptitude and attitude is costing us all.

 

[Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese]

With respect to the influx of people from outside the EU countries then yes, but France‘s population also reflects its colonial past - as do ours, but the UK dealt with it far better than France.

The open border policy doesn’t apply outside of the EU. The EU external border regime is pretty horrific in its treatment of migrants.

The irony is these far right Govts, like Italy, or even ours, are openly seeking greater immigration flows from outside the EU because they need the labour. Even Eastern European countries are increasing non-EU immigration visas. Economic reality is a bitch and all that.

The elephant in the room is that pretty much all the EU suffers from an ageing population and low birthrate. The only solution is unfettered immigration and we will have to accept or at least manage its drawbacks to reap the benefits.

 

[bluethrunthru]

Just as a point of order when we were in the EU we had was is being referred to here as open borders. You have to recall so did 27 other member states - it was called Freedom of Movement. We also had migrants from outside the EU. The myth pedalled was that German brickie was keeping people out of work and keeping your wages down. As in that famous cartoon with Murdock telling a guy that the foreigner sat at the table was going to take his biscuit.

Those claim were being made by the same Govt that was bragging about record high employment levels and low unemployment levels. Now that German has gone and the Govt have legislated so he can't come back - but its OK 60 year olds like me who has never been a brickie will ride to the rescue and take up the trade rather than stay happily retired.

 

[Rascal]

The open BORDER policy of Markel , the woman gave the green light for just about anybody that fancied a new life in Europe the go ahead, …

Merkel's rationale, this is a quote from her


"The two events I personally found most challenging were, for one, the large number of refugees arriving here [in 2015], which I actually do not like to call a 'crisis' – because people are people. So, first, there was the pressure we faced from many people fleeing Syria and its neighboring countries. And now there is the COVID-19 pandemic." Germany have accepted over 1 million refugees, the UK government gets hot under the collar if a dinghy with a dozen refugees on lands in Dover.

Merkel also highlighted that there had been "wonderful examples of personal development" among migrants, citing among other things that many had successfully graduated from high school since coming to the country. As a result German productivity will grow whilst ours is mired in quicksand.

However, she also conceded that not everything had gone ideally: "There have also been some bad incidents, like when I think of that New Year's Eve in Cologne." Merkel referred to the events on Cologne's Cathedral Square on New Year's Eve 2016, when hundreds of women were burgled, harassed and in some cases even raped by groups of migrants.

According to the Cologne public prosecutor's office, most of the perpetrators hailed from Algeria and Morocco. As those two countries have historical links to France it is highly likely they entered Germany from France thanks to freedom of movement rules rather than from countries like Syria who were producing the refugees.

Germany also has a long term commitment to offering peoples of German descent an invitation to move to Germany, plus there is also a real feeling that because of the problems caused with multiple migrations and mass refugees caused by WW2 Germans feel they owe the human race for their mistakes.

Merkel and French President Francois Hollande called for greater European coordination in addressing the migrant crisis—a plea that looked rather weak and futile given the European in June of a quota system for distributing asylum-seekers.

Scarcely two weeks later, however, Merkel and Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann granted passage to 10,000 refugees stranded in Hungary, after the Hungarian government suggestively placed them on the Austrian border. Two days after that, Merkel earmarked €6 billion to deal with the rush of asylum-seekers, as other countries followed Berlin’s cue. (The United Kingdom had committed to accepting 20,000 Syrian refugees over the next five years—roughly the number of people estimated to have arrived in Germany in one weekend following the Hungary decision; the United States has since promised to admit 10,000 over the next 12 months.) The next day, German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel announced that Germany could handle a staggering 500,000 asylum seekers per year for the next several years.

Most recently, the Immigration Act for Skilled Workers came into force on 1 March 2020, and is meant to boost the immigration of qualified individuals from abroad. Now it's easier for skilled workers with vocational, non-academic training from non-EU countries to migrate to Germany in order to work. ta Wiki.

Germany does not have open borders Salford Lad, i suggest you do some reading other than your current sources.

The UK quite rightly in my opinion does not have open borders, it has a problem with Immigration policy that has been pushed to the extreme right by halfwits complaining about small boats.

It is however a fact that we have a population problem, anyone familiar with Malthus will understand the effects of demographics on society. We have an ageing population and a negative birth rate of 1.56 in 2020. You need a birthrate of 2 to sustain a population. What will happen and is already happening in some areas is that we will have a population imbalance which means the tax burden falls on fewer and fewer people year on year or retirement age goes up and up and up. A young racist pillock today will find that when he is old he will have no one to care for him, he will have been taxed heavily all his life and all because the Daily Mail said be scared of brown people.

 

[Rascal]

You do recall the colossal balls up and waste of huge sums of money when the last Labour Govt tried to integrate medical records on a central database? Why should my medical records be accessible on a card that is there for ID purposes anyway?

That is happening in Manchester with the Secure Data Environment and GM health care record. There is lots of research going into it and i believe it will be a success.

 

[Mr Kobayashi]

Professing anti-immigration views is usually, and in the majority of instances a more socially acceptable shield for racism.