Quick thread on why, absent a fundamental change in migration policy, another crisis like the Windrush crisis, this time hitting EU migrants, is highly likely a few years down the line 1/?
2/? The 3 key ingredients which produced Windrush crisis are (1) Migrants who arrived with expansive rights/no need for documentation/no awareness that are even migrants (2) "Hostile environment" policies requiring extensive documentation (3) Inflexible & unresponsive enforcement
3/? All three of these ingredients remain in place for EU migrants. Many came decades ago, under liberal free movement rules. Many have extensive gaps in their documentation (they had children, moved around, gaps in employment etc) or lack documentation because they came as kids
4/? and (just like the Windrush kids) have always assumed they were British. A boy who came from Rome aged 18 months in 1978, who would now be 40 years old, could have no notion govt doesn't think he's British (just like similar kids who came from Jamaica in 1961)
5/? The registration system the govt will be applying to EU migrants s likely to reduce the scale of the problem. But OTOH, this is a *much larger group of people* than the Windrush migrant population - over 3.5 million (and rising)....
6/? Given the size of the population, and the complexity of so many lives in Britain stretching over decades, significant numbers are certain to fall through the cracks. Children (as mentioned), older people with health issues, declining faculties, abuse victims, etc etc...
7/? @MigObs have tried to quantify the at risk population - on most assumptions it will run to hundreds of thousands. migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/repo…
8/? So, at some point in the next 5-10 years, after the expiry of the transition and whatever "grace period" the govt applies for EU imms to sort out their status, a large population (likely hundreds of thousands) will emerge with uncertain status. What then?
9/? Well, that's where the other two elements - "hostile environment" policies and inflexible enforcement - come in. The govt has made no pledges to change former, and is only pledging to change latter in special case of the Windrush migrants. No general shift promised AFAIK...
10/? So, unless there is a more fundamental policy shift, these many thousands of EU migrants - people who came as kids and did not know they were seen as migrants, vulnerable pensioners here for decades, abuse victims - will be confronted with the "hostile environment"...
11/? At that point we will have new torrent of stories - Dutch nurses, Italian engineers, Portugese cleaners and so on - evicted from homes, denied health care, threatened with deportation. More lives will be wrecked. More damage will be done to Britain's society & reputation.
12/? Govts in the EU countries these citizens have migrated from should recognise this clear risk and press the case for more fundamental reform now, to head off the problem before it occurs...
13/? Cons looking to rebuild their party's reputation with EMs, young people, liberals etc should stop (e.g.) laughable social media outreach and push to abandon hostile environment policy which all these grps find abhorrent...
14/? Lab politicians who want to demonstrate a genuine commitment to root and branch reform of migration, and protection for EU citizens, after Brexit should make repeal of hostile environment policies a centrepiece of their immigration policy and messaging.
15/? Lastly, this looming future crisis underlines, once again, why a generous offer of citizenship rights to LT resident EU migrants is essential - not only will it demonstrate a break with the past, a vastly increased EU origin electorate will be able to hold govts to account
I wrote more on why we need a comprehensive and generous offer on citizenship for EU imms here /ends/
medium.com/@robfordmancs/…
medium.com/@robfordmancs/…
PS Nor are EU migrants the only other group of migrants getting treated miserably by Home Office and govt - as @jdportes points out there are tens of thousands of "undocumented" children unable to resolve their status
