Conservatives want to limit asylum in the UK

[muriel_volestrangler]

In a hard-hitting advertisement in The Sunday Telegraph, the Tory leader promises an annual limit on immigration and quotas for asylum seekers, together with a curb on work permits through an Australian-style points system and 24-hour security at ports.
...
Mark Oaten, the Liberal Democrats' home affairs spokesman, said: "While there is clearly a case for setting limits on economic migration, there is no justification for having quotas on asylum. You can't turn away a genuine refugee fleeing persecution.
...
Mr Howard tells the programme: "What we ultimately want to do is to say that no one should apply for asylum in Britain. After all, if you think about it, you can only apply for asylum in Britain today if you've entered the country illegally or by deception. It's an invitation to people to break the law. "

Mr Howard adds that a future Tory government would only take in around 15,000 refugees a year, all of whom were already under the control of the United Nations.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/01/23/ntory23.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/01/23/ixportaltop.html

Ah, the caring conservatives show their true colours! So what does he want to do - lock up all the applicants for asylum in Belmarsh, or send them back to the persecuting countries? Or are they going to find their fabled Scottish island where they said they were going to maroon them all?

[McKenzie]

1. that'll bring the creepy crawlies out from under their stones

What's the odds that this'll give ammo to the blood and honour nutters in the BNP? Even sadder is the fact that it'll probably have the Mail and Express readers drooling.

Howard is unelectable...at least I hope he is.

regards

ps some Scottish politicians want more immigrants to reverse our population decline.

[sweetheart]

7. Certainly he's unelectable in scotland

As one of those immigrants to scotland, its always a joy to hear about
some bonzo making up hatred, as if there is not already enough.

There is already a fairly large ambiguity, IMO, regarding scotland and
whether the home office really has any authority north of the border.
It seems rather the home office is a joke, and can only make laws
for england, as that is how the executive treated the cannabis
downgrading. So likely the same is true of immigration, and every
british region can just do what they want, and the home office is
powerless.

That said, since the conservatives are really an english party, with
zip diddly representation north of the border, perhaps it is a
"reverse west lothian question"... and that the conservatives should
only make their loony policies for england.

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. It looks fairly definite that Scotland does not have control

of immigration.

A new study is calling for the Scottish Parliament to be given control over immigration policy in order to halt the country's population crisis.
...
At present immigration is a reserved issue which is controlled by Westminster.

Author of the report, Professor Robert Wright, said that was "a bizarre" set up and argued it was time the Scottish Parliament was given more immigration powers.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/3667271.stm

[sweetheart]

9. There are some bad precedents

That the scottish executive thinks it knows better than the home office
to re-define laws that are intended for all the UK's citizens strikes
me as dangerous and ultimately weakening for the UK. That they continue
to arrest and imprison cannabis users is a sign that they're a militant
bunch of sick assholes, with little business in charge of a province,
let alone a nation... and sadly they primp their feathers in their
overpriced new parliament building that is paid for by the english
taxpayer who's laws they ingore.

That aside, another precedent of concern is that the clan area of this
part of the highlands that was won to the queen after colloden, has
erected barrier stones along the roads declaring the land to be that
of the historic "mac<xxx>" clan. Nobody objects to this land grab, as
the clan name is less than a 5th of the population, the rest being from
all over the UK... normal folks.... but there is a separatist
balkanization going on inside the UK under this government that is
deeply disconcernting... where laws are enforced differently depending
on which county your're in, and all of it harkening back to the
reversal of the rebellion of bonnie prince charlie.

I respect that terrible injustices have been persecuted upon the clans,
with the clearances and all, but this is something recent, from which
people attempt to resurrect a historic mandate, that in fact is a load
of hubris... and the new london government is sooo far removed that
it cares not.

The Yorkshire dales are now only permitting "locals" to buy houses,
with a new twist on capitalism and insularism... an attempt to preserve
an elitist utopia amongst the rest of an otherwise integrated state.
These are all bad omens of the breakup of the UK due to failure
of the federal government to assert its legal control over the island
and rather we're back to the clan periods... pretty soon, you'll need
border passes to go from one county to another...

I'm sure i'm being paranoid, but i see a dangerous omen in what
appears to be a breakdown in government and the rule of law, that
law is enforced differently depending on whether it is interpreted
in scotland, the highlands, in cornwall or in london... so that the
home office's attempt to suggest that there is a rule of law consistent
across britain is a load of bollocks in practice.

I realize the whole world is facing a dangerous tyranny, but the signs
are not good for the union. I love to be wrong on this, and hope that
the divisions are purely benign... but it does indeed seem otherwise.

[T_i_B]

2. Micheal Howard: Isn't this a man...

...whose own family were immigrants to the UK as recently as 1939?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/01/23/utory.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/01/23/ixportaltop.html

Mr Howard, whose father fled to South Wales from Romania in 1939, acknowledged that the Tories will face accusations of "playing the race card'', but insisted that their stance was justified.

[RogueTrooper]

10. Indeed, TIB

and if the Daily Mail had got it's way his parents would not have been allowed into the UK at all.

[T_i_B]

20. Howard: My grandfather may have come to Britain illegally

Just to put the icing on the cake. Now I don't have a problem with Howard's past but all the same, his parties immigration policies are just a little bit geared towards those who do have a problem with this.

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=610312

The Conservative leader Michael Howard has admitted his Romanian grandfather might have come to Britain illegally.

Mr Howard, who has made immigration one of the key issues of the general election campaign, said that when his father, Bernard Hecht, applied for UK citizenship in 1947, he falsified details, claiming his parents had died in Romania. In reality his grandmother had died in Auschwitz but his grandfather was living in London, where he had been since the 1930s.

[mr blur]

22. One would think that a man

whose grandmother died in the Holocaust would have some understanding and sympathy for those trying to flee an opressive regime. It seems that when you're so desperate for votes nothing is more important than saying what you think people want to hear in order to get them.

[leveymg]

3. If you're interested in UK asylum issues, subscribe to

Frank Corrigan's www.asylumpolicy.info Frank runs the most comprehensive blog on these topics, and covers refugee-related news from around the world.

Nice to see we have a few Brits at DU! (gauging from the references and u-after-the-o in colours).

Among the volunteers at the Kerry HQ in DC last November, there was a gentleman from Surrey who flew in to help with the campaign. They quickly handed him a telephone and a list of potential donors, of course.

Hope you forgive us for that little row over taxes back in 1776.

[D-Notice]

4. Tomorrow Labour'll go more extreme:

Ban all immigrants - bloody foreigners, come over here, take our jobs, screw our women. Send 'em back to where they come from.

Does anyone know how the immigration rate compares to the emigration rate?

[muriel_volestrangler]

11. I just found a BBC story on that

In total, 512,000 people came to live in the UK for at least one year while a record 361,600 left.
...
Almost 140,000 people were allowed to settle permanently in the UK in 2003, a fifth up on 2002. This represents the third year of increased settlement grants, after a fall between 2000 and 2001.
...
Approximately 15% of those given permanent settlement had formerly been asylum seekers, given either refugee status or exceptional leave to remain.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3982217.stm

It may not be so easy to find out a 'permanent emigrant' number - the foreign counties would have to work that out.

[non sociopath skin]

5. This desperate attempt to play to the gallery ...

... is likely to backfire on the Tories who, by "legitimising" immigrant bashing, will give credibility to Obergruppenfuhrer Griffin's Skinhead Hordes, the Baggy Trousered Misanthropists and Kiljoy-Slick's "In Vino Veritas" party if he can get both other members into the phone box in time for the Election. All of whom will be competing with them for the LaLaLand vote ...

And yes, Mr. Bliar is likely to do the "More-in-sorrow-than-in-anger- I-must-reluctantly-agree-that-many-immigrants-are-stinky-poo-men" insinuations to keep Angry of Hemel Hempstead on board.

Politicians. Don't you just love 'em?

The Skin

[LeftishBrit]

6. You've got it!

Both Blair and Howard are pandering far too much to racists.

[Mr Creosote]

12. The Tories' capacity for vote-losing ideas is endless.

If you were a racist - who would you trust to stop immigration? The BNP? Yes. UKIP? Probably. in vino veritas? Probably. Second-generation immigrant Michael Howard? Probably not - he's an example of immigration working and his heart can't possibly be in this. And if you're not a racist this'll certainly stop you voting for them won't it?
Priceless.

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. I think there are many shades of racism, so to speak

and relatively few people are completely against all foreigners, or all people with a different skin colour - they just have a fear and hatred of people who are insufficiently like 'one of us'. It wouldn't take much to rationalise that Howard's family was 'the right kind of refugees'.

I think this will get the Tories some more votes, because their candidates have a good chance of actually getting elected, unlike the BNP or UKIP (except, perhaps, in a very few constituencies). While some people might like to 'send a message' by voting for UKIP, many will want to actually affect the outcome. Just as the Green vote is higher in the European elections than the UK ones, I think the UKIP will be the same. Howard is fishing for those votes.

[Taxloss]

14. They plan to break European law and abandon treaty obligations

in doing so.

The Tories have been captured by the extreme right.

Edited for typo.

[non sociopath skin]

15. With respect, Taxloss, I think that happened some time ago!

What's happening now is the logical development of Thatcherism which always had one foot in fascist politics - look at the friendship with Pinochet.

Unfortunately, The Party of the Night now find themselves somewhat outflanked by the Even Loonier Right to whose views they've given added legitimacy.

Bliar's extinction of the UK's Social Democratic party and its replacement with a Euro-style Christian Democrat formula seeking to balance pro-business measures with social security safety nets has further queered the pitch and manoeuvered the Tories even further into the neo-con/neo-fascist pit.

My fear is that when the pendulum swings (as, in a democracy, it always must) it will find itself swinging towards something very ugly indeed ....

The Skin

[Taxloss]

18. Well, by "extreme right", I meant its own "extreme right"

As in, the extreme end of its internal spectrum.

[D-Notice]

16. From the Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1398605,00.html

Let Whitey decide - let Johnny Foreigner in if he looks like us, not let him in if he's got a darker skin colour! ;-)

[non sociopath skin]

17. I always wonder what the impact would be ....

... if Bliar and Howard said what they meant and talked about limiting non-WASP immigration.

The Skin

[sweetheart]

19. In all honesty, a canadian points system would be a wise move

Make the standards clear and give clear long term signals on what
sorts of immigration are welcome. As it takes years for an immigrant
to get ready and jump the hurdles, get the dang thing in place and
leave it alone for years so that those poor folks can not have a
constantly moving target of this year's politically expedient
immigration fantasy.

Pretend you are an immigrant, bent on coming to the UK, and look at
the websites figuring your options. Better to be open and frank with
immigrants, giving them proper franchise and a long-term view.

[non sociopath skin]

21. There is some sense in what you say.

But does Canada have a truly level playing-field?

The Skin