Migrants, UK’s hard fist: Lifetime ban on illegal immigrants

Defending national borders and rationalizing the entry of immigrants is not a crime. It does not create hype in the media, nor does it generate confrontations between the majority and the opposition. What would be impossible in Italy is the norm in the UK. Just think of Rishi Sunak. The prime minister, born in Southampton to a Kenyan father and a Tanzanian mother, is seriously considering a massive crackdown on all migrants arriving across the Channel in small boats. A hypothesis that, in our country, would raise roundabouts, demonstrations of all kinds, would give breath to out of tune trombones and would become the central theme of thousands of television talk shows. Specifically, it’s a kind of lifetime daspo, a tender aimed at anyone who illegally enters Perfida Albion’s territory. Tomorrow the text of a law will be announced that will make it a crime to cross the Strait in makeshift boats. According to the first rumors, the mass detention of thousands of asylum seekers who will travel to the UK in dinghies or makeshift sailboats will be allowed. Once detained, after being detained for a certain period in special centers, migrants will be sent to Rwanda or to another “third country”. Convicts will never again be able to apply for British citizenship.

A law aimed at mitigating a phenomenon that is assuming the character of an emergency in the English Channel. “Let’s be clear, anyone who arrives here illegally will not be able to stay. Preventing migrants from disembarking on the English coast will be one of the government’s priorities”, promised Rishi Sunak. It should be remembered that, among the countless reasons that led to the success of Brexit, there was also the request of Her Majesty’s citizens to regain control of borders. The reality, on the contrary, speaks of a phenomenon, that of arrivals, which has increased dramatically since 2016. According to surveys, illegal immigration is one of the main concerns of the British after the economy and the cost of living. The numbers speak of almost 46,000 migrants crossed the English Channel in canoes and boats last year, almost double the 28,000 in 2021. Despite the adverse weather and polar cold waters, between January and February there are already 3,000 people who arrived near the white cliffs of Dover Desperate people who come mainly from Albania, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria.

Sunak will meet French President Emmanuel Macron later this week. A meeting that promises to aim, at least in the intentions of the British, an agreement with France, the country from which almost all migrants who cross the English Channel leave. Numbers, the English, which, when compared with ours, however, make us smile. It is enough to leaf through the daily statistical panel, prepared by Viminale, to realize that, if the English one is an emergency, ours is a small catastrophe. Since the beginning of the year, we have already reached 14,639 visitors, almost triple the arrivals of last year (5,629) and two years ago (5,683). 2022 closed in triple digits, with 105,000 landings.