General British politics discussion thread

Well, it's not really a joint problem. France and the UK have quite different interests here. Think about it.

Somebody [who does not have a right of entry to the UK] wishing to leave France and enter the UK is, basically, a problem for the UK in a way that it isn't for France. France is not a prison; anyone who wants to leave is welcome to do so - all the more so if they are people who might otherwise make a claim for protection or support from the French authorities. No French law is broken by someone who leaves France. The UK, after all, doesn't stop people leaving the UK if they wish to claim asylum in other countries; by all accounts Priti Patel would keenly encourage this, and even make it mandatory if she could. So why would the French stop people leaving?

And yes, we observe, they do.

What's going on here is the the UK has, under the Le Touquet treaty, effectively contracted out much of the control of its southern border to France. Which raises two questions. One, why would they do that? Two, why would the French agree?

The UK's southern border - basically, the Channel ports - is extremely congested. And, as Dominic Raab revealed to a hitherto unsuspecting world a couple of years ago, an astonishing amount of trade flows through it - trade which is strategically vital to the UK. If they had to effectively interdict undocumented immigrants at the ports, they'd have to construct inspection and checking facilities for which they literally don't have the space, and they'd have to impose checks and processes which would really gum up the ports, add to delays, increase expense, etc. So they are keen not to do this, if they can avoid it.

But, if undocumented immigrants get past the ports, they are very difficult to find, because the UK don't have the kind of internal population registration that is common in mainland countries. (And, of course, they don't have it because they're a island state, and historically have therefore been able to control immigration at the ports and airports in a way that really isn't feasible for countries with long land borders.) In this globalised world, the volume of passenger and goods traffic through the UK's ports is now so great that effective migration control at the ports alone isn't practicable in the way that used to be the case. One possible response to that is to introduce internal population registration systems, but that would be, um, politically controversial in the UK, which rather cherishes its tradition of not having these.

So, the other possible solution is to persuade the French, who have rather more room to work with, to take on some of the job of policing the UK's immigration controls.

While this explains why the UK would like to contract the job out to the French, it doesn't explain why the French would like to take it on, given that they have no particular interest in preventing people leaving France. The answers is that if the UK has to police its own immigration control at the channel ports, and the ports became gummed up as a result, that would cause downstream congestion at the French ports, affecting France's trade (not just with the UK), etc.

But, important point, this is less of a problem for France than it would be for the UK - the French have more room to work with to manage congestion; they have more opportunities to divert (non-UK) trade to other ports; etc. So there isn't an equality of bargaining power here; while the French would rather have the Le Touquet treaty than not, the UK would much, much rather have it than not. The Tories having beaten up the '"problem" of undocumented migrants out of all proportion have much to loose if the LT Treaty falls over and they have to chose between gumming up the ports or accepting higher levels of undocumented immigration. By contrast, the French government will pay no political price at all if more undocumented migrants are able to leave France, and the economic impact for them of congestion at the ports will be much less than for the UK.

In short, the UK is the supplicant here, in the weaker bargaining position. They need this treaty more the France does, and have more to lose if the Treaty is terminated (something which, under the terms of the treaty, either party can do for any reason on, I think, 12 months notice). So they need to do some realistic thinking about their best course of action here. But even its warmest admirers will not claim that that realistic thinking is one of the more prominent characteristics of the Johnson administration.

Before Brexit, it was a joint problem under the effect of the Dublin Regulations, as the UK could have sent back every dinghy-borne migrant to France under those, irrespective of the Le Touquet agreement (the genesis for which was the creation of the Chunnel, rather than migratory considerations, which came later on).

Post-Brexit, with the UK having removed itself from the scope of application of the Dublin Regulations, it remains a joint problem, only to the extent that the Le Touquet agreement obligates France to help the UK police its border artificially set in France.

In both instances, it is the withholding of UK-targeting migrants on the French side, which is making this a ‘problem’ for France: nothing else causes those camps that you refer to, to sprout up phoenix-like as soon as one or ten are torn down by French police, each and every time for the last couple of decades.

Currently therefore, no more Le Touquet agreement, means it ceases to be a joint problem altogether. There may well be other problems developing, essentially logistical on the French side, and both logistical and humanitarian/security-related on the British side. But those camps would be in Kent.

Now, you want to hope that the average French voter is a little less xenophobic than the average Brit voter insofar as those migrants and camps about Calais are concerned, and a little more impervious to populism.

Because the above is easy maths, there’s a presidential election coming up shortly, and all the candidates bar Macron are campaigning on abolishing the Le Touquet agreement, highlighting how much the French taxpayer is paying to patrol the ‘British’ border in France.

I see Boris Johnson is now looking to enable ministers to reject court findings. So, attacking the judiciary now again.

That's not a joint problem. The French and the UK both have problems in relation to migrants in France seeking to enter the UK but, as I have explained, they are different problems, not a joint problem.

And, it should be noted, the things the UK want done to address its problem do little or nothing to address the French problem, which is why they attract such little interest from the French.

I think the problem the UK government has created for itself is this: it has sold to the people the idea that the UK is deluged by asylum seekers; that all asylum seekers would come to the UK if they could; that the UK is far more burdened by asylum seekers than other countries; etc. In fact this is wholly untrue; only a minority of asylum seekers seek to come to the UK; the UK receives far fewer asylums seekers, and makes far fewer grants of protection, than comparable European countries (including France).

Simply preventing asylum seekers from coming to the UK, even if it can be done successfully, is not attractive to other countries, since it leaves the UK doing even less to meet the needs of asylum seekers than it alread does and therefore requires other countries to do even more. There is no reason why they would co-operate in this, which advantages the UK but disadvantages (a) all other countries, and of course (b) asylum seekers.

Any internationally agreed approach about managing the issue of asylum is going to involve the UK doing more, not less, than it currently does, because why would any other country agree to the UK doing less? But the UK has positioned itself (a) to oppose agreed approaches in general, and (b) to pay a heavy domestic political price if they do more than they currently do. Thus the UK has painted itself into a corner. This is a problem for the UK. And, trust me, it's not a joint problem.

There’s no need to use the conditional, you know: France already has plenty of processing centres (it bussed all those rounded up at the last tear down of the Grande Synthe camp to one only last week), processes plenty of asylum claims, grants a majority of those on evidence, and eventually deports unsuccessful applicants after all recourses are exhausted. Multiples of the UK count in each case and annually: centres, application count, asylum grants, deportations.

France is also still working, right now, with intermediary countries like Qatar, to repatriate Afghans at risk.

I want the UK, a modern developed democracy with a population and economy comparable to those of France, to do no less than that.

It really does not matter if you shout it until you are blue in the face: UK-bound migrants are not a problem for France; were it not for its contractual obligations under Le Touquet Agreement, France would likely just wave them on their way (any passing through can always choose to apply in France instead, of course). Xavier Bertrand, presidential hopeful, said only last week that it’d be safer for them to buy a €15 ferry crossing from Calais than spend £000s on 3rd-hand, tired and under-powered RIBs.