THE EU's IMMIGRATION POLICY
Reviewing the European Council’s statements on immigration especially those at Tampere (1999) and The Hague (2004), it is clear that the emphasis has been on setting up an EU-wide structure preventing illegal immigration, setting up a common asylum policy and promoting and funding integration programmes under the slogan ‘unity in diversity’.
Negligible attention was paid to economic immigration and emigration was never mentioned. There never was any analysis of the costs and benefits of immigration, and the distribution of these costs and benefits among the native population and its various sub-groups.
THE PRESIDENCY CONCLUSIONS, TAMPERE EUROPEAN COUNCIL, 16th OCTOBER 1999
“The European Council is determined to develop the Union as an area of freedom, security and justice by making full use of the possibilities offered by the Treaty of Amsterdam.”
THE TAMPERE MILESTONES
3. “It would be in contradiction with Europe’s traditions to deny such freedom to those whose circumstances lead them justifiably to seek access to our territory. This in turn requires the Union to develop common policies on asylum and immigration …”
10. “The separate but closely related issues of asylum and migration call for the development of a common EU policy …”
20. “The European Council acknowledges the need for approximation of national legislations on the conditions for admission and residence of third country natives, based on a shared assessment of economic and demographic developments within the union …”
THE HAGUE PROGRAMME, APPROVED BY THE EUROPEAN COUNCIL, 5th NOVEMBER 2004
1.2 “International immigration will continue. A comprehensive approach, involving all stages of migration, with respect to the real causes of migration, entry & admission policies and integration and return policies is needed …
“The ongoing development of European asylum and migration policy should be based on a common analysis of migratory phenomena in all these aspects.”
1.4 “Legal Migration will play an important role in enhancing the knowledge-based economy in Europe, in advancing economic development, and thus contributing to the implementation of the Lisbon strategy.
“The European Council emphasizes that the determination of volumes of admission of labour migrants is a competence of the Member States.” THE COMMISSION’S COMMUNICATION TO THE COUNCIL AND THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT ON A COMMUNITY IMMIGRATION POLICY, 22/11/2000
While the European Council never pronounced on the need for immigration into the EU, let alone analysing the costs and benefits, the EU Commission after Tampere pronounced on the benefits of immigration (emigration does not even seem to have entered the EU’s analysis).
“In addition, it is clear from an analysis (?) of the economic and demographic context of the Union and the countries of origin, that there is a growing recognition that the ‘zero’ immigration policies of the past 30 years are no longer appropriate … as a result of growing shortages of labour at both skilled and unskilled levels.”
“In this situation, the Commission believes that channels for legal immigration to the Union should now be made available for labour migrants.”
“… that there are benefits that orderly immigration can bring to the EU, to the migrants themselves and their countries of origin.”
THE CONCLUSION
“In the light of demographic decline which will become increasingly important in the EU over the next 25 years and of the current strong economic prospects and growing skills’ shortages in the labour market, it advocates the development of a common policy for the controlled admission of economic migrants to the EU as part of an overall immigration and asylum policy for the union.”
These alleged benefits were contradicted in its own Annexe which said “increased legal immigration in itself cannot be considered in the long term as an effective way to offset demographic change … it could, in the short term, be an important element in population growth.”
Short-termism indeed.
“Equally increased immigration will not, of itself, be an effective long term way to deal with labour market imbalance, including skill shortages. However, controlled immigration may help to alleviate shortages provided it takes place within an overall structured strategy.”
The cost of settling immigrants, that is the provision of capital and wealth to each immigrant which they do not bring with them, is alluded to in a single phrase buried in the Appendix “there may be initial settlement costs”.
FUTURUS/22 May 2008
Negligible attention was paid to economic immigration and emigration was never mentioned. There never was any analysis of the costs and benefits of immigration, and the distribution of these costs and benefits among the native population and its various sub-groups.
THE PRESIDENCY CONCLUSIONS, TAMPERE EUROPEAN COUNCIL, 16th OCTOBER 1999
“The European Council is determined to develop the Union as an area of freedom, security and justice by making full use of the possibilities offered by the Treaty of Amsterdam.”
THE TAMPERE MILESTONES
3. “It would be in contradiction with Europe’s traditions to deny such freedom to those whose circumstances lead them justifiably to seek access to our territory. This in turn requires the Union to develop common policies on asylum and immigration …”
10. “The separate but closely related issues of asylum and migration call for the development of a common EU policy …”
20. “The European Council acknowledges the need for approximation of national legislations on the conditions for admission and residence of third country natives, based on a shared assessment of economic and demographic developments within the union …”
THE HAGUE PROGRAMME, APPROVED BY THE EUROPEAN COUNCIL, 5th NOVEMBER 2004
1.2 “International immigration will continue. A comprehensive approach, involving all stages of migration, with respect to the real causes of migration, entry & admission policies and integration and return policies is needed …
“The ongoing development of European asylum and migration policy should be based on a common analysis of migratory phenomena in all these aspects.”
1.4 “Legal Migration will play an important role in enhancing the knowledge-based economy in Europe, in advancing economic development, and thus contributing to the implementation of the Lisbon strategy.
“The European Council emphasizes that the determination of volumes of admission of labour migrants is a competence of the Member States.” THE COMMISSION’S COMMUNICATION TO THE COUNCIL AND THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT ON A COMMUNITY IMMIGRATION POLICY, 22/11/2000
While the European Council never pronounced on the need for immigration into the EU, let alone analysing the costs and benefits, the EU Commission after Tampere pronounced on the benefits of immigration (emigration does not even seem to have entered the EU’s analysis).
“In addition, it is clear from an analysis (?) of the economic and demographic context of the Union and the countries of origin, that there is a growing recognition that the ‘zero’ immigration policies of the past 30 years are no longer appropriate … as a result of growing shortages of labour at both skilled and unskilled levels.”
“In this situation, the Commission believes that channels for legal immigration to the Union should now be made available for labour migrants.”
“… that there are benefits that orderly immigration can bring to the EU, to the migrants themselves and their countries of origin.”
THE CONCLUSION
“In the light of demographic decline which will become increasingly important in the EU over the next 25 years and of the current strong economic prospects and growing skills’ shortages in the labour market, it advocates the development of a common policy for the controlled admission of economic migrants to the EU as part of an overall immigration and asylum policy for the union.”
These alleged benefits were contradicted in its own Annexe which said “increased legal immigration in itself cannot be considered in the long term as an effective way to offset demographic change … it could, in the short term, be an important element in population growth.”
Short-termism indeed.
“Equally increased immigration will not, of itself, be an effective long term way to deal with labour market imbalance, including skill shortages. However, controlled immigration may help to alleviate shortages provided it takes place within an overall structured strategy.”
The cost of settling immigrants, that is the provision of capital and wealth to each immigrant which they do not bring with them, is alluded to in a single phrase buried in the Appendix “there may be initial settlement costs”.
FUTURUS/22 May 2008