Off Topic The Politics Thread

Perhaps we could take Greece and Italy's refugees in to give them a break?

 

A good reason to leave the EU- no need to be part of that burden.

 

Who's burden should it be then?

 

Not saying it should be anyone's necessarily but if we can avoid it being ours then that would be good.

 

These people are fleeing persecution - it has to be someone's responsibility to at least help. Why should we exclude ourselves from that?

 

We do more than enough as a small nation in terms of foreign aid and giving a home to refugees. If people are fleeing, for example, Syria, why the UK? Why not any of the other dozens of developed nations or the wealthy oil countries nearby, some of whom have far more capacity and don't do their bit to the same extent as we do?

 

We're one of the most densely populated countries on earth. How about Russia offering to take them?

 

Nomadic sand people or Siberian exiles?

We pride ourselves in our international standing, our human rights and even our economic strength and lack of poverty (if these threads are correct) and our global reach has touched both Libya and Iraq (the source of many of the refugees) in recent times so surely we can support a good share of those that need it?

 

I can understand to a degree your comments about other countries with far more capacity..... the USA for example has vast swathes of unoccupied land and could easily accommodate probably the entire population of the UK with ease.

But at the end of the day we are talking about people here and we have a moral obligation to help as much as we can.

As regards foreign aid .....................do me a favour. Follow the money trail and you will see that certainly some of it is either syphoned off by despots or wends its way back into the donor countries when it is spent on arms .............and how many MP's do you think are shareholders in these private companies? ( I will check this out in a mo)

I would imagine a modest percentage actually reaches its intended targets.

This from "the Freeman":

Foreign aid is also being used in patently destructive, and sometimes genocidal, ways. The Marxist dictatorship of Ethiopia’s Mengistu Haile Mariam was a major recipient of donor funds, a portion of which was used to forcibly resettle large segments of the population. One Ethiopian official said: “It is our duty to move the peasants if they are too stupid to move by themselves.”7 Donor funds, earmarked for famine relief, were instead used to buy trucks for the resettlement scheme. Relief aid was also intentionally kept away from some of the most severely affected areas because it suited Mengistu’s regime to starve its opponents. Relief ships were held for ransom and charged $50.50 per ton for permission to unload their aid, some of which was confiscated to feed the army. The New York Times reported that aid officials believed that Mengistu’s regime sold some of the food aid on the world market to finance the purchase of arms.8
But Ethiopia is not the exception. The Congo also sold donated food supplies and used the funds to purchase an arms factory from Italy.9 The more peaceful Mauritius took donated rice, which it insisted be of high quality, and diverted it to tourist hotels.10

 

I'm not necessarily saying don't take any but there should be way of apportioning them based on the potential recipients' wealth, size, labour needs etc.

 

Bearing in mind we are bursting at the seams, have great difficulty housing the influx at present and our services, schools in particular as well as GPs and hospitals are struggling to cope with current levels, how many do you think we should take? 250,000? 500,000? A million? Because as sure as night follows day, the moment you agree to take a 'quota', the people traffickers will be empowered and the problem will exacerbate.

As you seem to have the answer to everything I'm sure you've already worked this one out...

 

I wish I did have the answer Sooper.................it would help me sleep easier at night!

There are currently 635,000 homes in England alone sitting empty and I guess a lot of these are owned by foreign investors who have zero intention of ever utilising them.

The most simplistic way I have come up with in my mind to solve the worlds ills has been to implement a global cap on an individuals wealth.

There is enough money on the planet, enough food on the planet and enough space for everyone to live IF these commodities were shared, managed and distributed on a fairer and more equal basis.

I have come to the conclusion that greed and the accumulation of wealth are the problem.

 

Let's look at the Syrians.

There are 3.9 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan and Iraq(!). Of the local places of refuge, Israel would seem the richest, but surprisingly as a nation of asylum seekers they do not seem keen to help at all. Having seen the pictures of what's going on in Syria, I don't think anyone can classify these refugees as 'economic'. They have fled for their lives - either Assad, ISIS of any one of myriad anti Assad forces are direct threats to them. Of course, Jordan is also catering for 2m Palestinian refugees displaced by the Israelis, Lebanon 500k and Syria 500k (one has to feel for the poor bastards who fled there....).

Of these 3.5 m Syrians, Germany has offered to resettle 20,000, Australia 5,600, Austria 1,500 even Uruguay 120. The UK and US have declined to say how many they will resettle.

Obviously the only way to sort this is to sort Syria, ISIS, what is happening elsewhere in the Middle East and Africa, Burma etc etc, which the West's leaders seem to be able to talk about but only make worse when they act. In the meantime, whining about us possibly taking some refugees when we really haven't taken many, while a country like Jordan has 3 million, seems a little churlish.

 

Communism is the answer then. What could possibly go wrong?

 

Communism???!!!!!!! Yeah right 'cos as you tell from my posts I REALLY want Governments to own absolutely everything!!

You have a very strange understanding of communism Watford.

 

You seem to be advocating a society with no wealthy individuals and extremely high government intervention. Communism isn't far off.

 

It doesn't seem churlish when you are one of the many people who's lives are directly effected by a big influx of immigrants. (I don't expect there are many around Leamington Spa way?).
http://www.migrationwatchuk.org/what-is-the-problem
Refugees are different to Immigrants, but the total number of people coming here has increased ridiculously.

 

This says it for me. Immigration is increasingly the number one issue on our crowded island. The Greeks may soon see a massive downturn in their already grim economy which will prompt emigration to other parts of Europe as Grecians seek work. The diaspora out of the Middle East and Africa is going to get much worse as potential economic migrants see their compatriots who have paid people smugglers picked up in the Med and allowed to disappear into Europe. The rise of the far right in Greece and other parts of Europe will become a genuine threat.

 

Communism is way off Watford. A cap on wealth does not constitute communism. If you set the cap at say £5 million would some someone with this amount of money be considered not wealthy?

 

85 people share a combined wealth of £1 trillion.

1% of the worlds population own just over half of the entire globes wealth.

Therein lies the problem as far as i can see.