It took me a while to come up with this post as I wanted to do as much research as possible and get an objective or at least informed perspective on this issue.
There was a surge at the end of 2013 and beginning of 2014in the articles and reports in the media , especially in the UK and Germany, focusing on the new ‘immigration wave’ (mind the inverted commas) from Romania and Bulgaria.
The articles focused frantically on different aspects: How many will they come? Will they come for benefits?How many of them will stay? Will they adapt?etc. And then they all hailed x y z statistics to support this fear, each day different ones, each that would contradict previous figures, each day different polls , depending on who funded these polls (BNP, Labour, pro-European lobbies etc.). These were all derisory questions and irrelevant matters meant just to increase xenophobia, scaremongering and finally prove nothing.
If you type in Romanian immigrants in Google search Images the representative results are only pictures of dirty gypsy squatters , poor babushkas and of course the Cheeky Girls.
In the last quarter of 2013 there was a strong lobbying by conservatives MPs and BNP/UKIP members (one of them the infamous Nigel )to put a ban on the Romanian& Bulgarian migration or to maintain the restrictions that have been in place since Romania had joined the EU in 2007. They’ve even appealed to cheap gimmicks to deter the immigrants: advertising campaigns about bad weather . To no avail though as Romanians and Bulgarians gained a legal right to have access to the EU labor market and to have restrictions lifted. I would like to emphasize at this stage the term legal right endorsed by the European law and Courts.It did not stop here .Publications such as the tabloid Daily Mail posted articles like ‘Romanians arrested at 7 times rate than Britons’ in London , utter fabrications. This accusation was dismissed afterwards by the Metropolitan Police.
The Romanian response was really poor and badly argued. The Romanians put a front of apologetic rhetoric trying to reassure the Brits and Germans that there won’t be many Romanian immigrants and even those that will come they will mainly seek to study and high profile jobs. They were also giving ever so numerous examples of ‘successful or famous Romanians’ in the UK and Germany.
Let’s face it : Romania’s economy is down hill full tilt and according to recent studies there are about 7 to 8 millions (yes that is right!) of Romanians living bellow or on the cusp of the poverty line. So yes Romanians will come, very probably in large numbers, from all social strata, gypsies too, for all sort of low paid or high end jobs . Based on logic they will most likely come to work rather then ask for benefits simply because you can’t just ask for benefits and immediately get it as soon as you step into the UK -except child benefits-(if you do not believe me go and try). The majority of these people will also most likely have poor families at home waiting for some money to be sent over , so again the Romanian /Bulgarian immigrant will most certainly be a worker.
The comparison ad nauseam between the the 2 countries’ minimum wages and cost of living does not make sense either. What the papers did not take into account is that the immigrant on a minimum wage in the UK has to live here paying steep sterling pound prices for rent , tax, services, everything so one will struggle here too on a minimum wage to make ends meet.
Therefore the average Briton should ask oneself : what sort of person will leave land and family to come to a unfamiliar place and culture, with possibly little language skills or many with high education and professions and accepting any minimum wage job, of many unsocial hours , living in some rough area in a box, often in a crowded house in order to make ends meet?
The logical and grim answer will be : people who otherwise will starve or freeze in winter , who are not able to raise their children ,do not have money for a doctor or medicine , do not have money to care for the family’s elderly and sick , do not have a place of their own or do not have jobs for a long time or any sort of future.
KMPastor 