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12 February, 2012

Top British judge ordered to scrap human rights ruling

Britain’s most senior immigration judge has been ordered to scrap a ruling which allowed a foreign killer to stay in Britain on human rights grounds.

Court of Appeal judges quashed the ruling in which Mr Justice Blake and a colleague allowed Rocky Gurung, from Nepal, to remain in the UK. They said the original judgment suffered from an “error of approach” and looked like “a search for reasons for not deporting him”.

The decision landed Mr Justice Blake in a second controversy, only days after he was criticised for permitting an Indian male nurse to remain in Britain following a jail term for indecently assaulting a woman patient.

It is expected to increase pressure on immigration judges amid growing concerns over how criminals are exploiting human rights laws.

David Cameron, the Prime Minister, has expressed alarm at the way human rights are preventing dangerous offenders and terrorists such as Abu Qatada from being deported.

Damian Green, the immigration minister, last night joined relatives of Gurung’s victim in welcoming the Court of Appeal’s decision. It means the case will now have to be heard again by the Upper Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber, of which Mr Justice Blake is president.

Gurung came to Britain in 2005, just three years before he committed the crime. The victim of his attack, Bishal Gurung (no relation), was a hard-working waiter whose father Cpl Khem Barsad Gurung served with the Gurkhas for 16 years.

In April 2008 Bishal was working at a Nepalese restaurant in Esher, Surrey, when he came to London to celebrate Nepalese new year. After leaving a party on a boat on the Thames in the early hours he was chased along the Embankment by 10 to 15 men including Rocky Gurung. The Old Bailey heard the gang falsely accused Bishal of hitting another man, Kemik Thakali, with a bottle.

One witness told the court that Bishal was “on his hands and knees” being kicked or beaten by seven or eight men and was then thrown into the river by Rocky Gurung and Thakali, from Morden, south-west London. Bishal’s body was in the Thames for two weeks before it was found.

Rocky Gurung and Thakali were both jailed for three years for manslaughter. The law says offenders jailed for 12 months or more are subject to “automatic deportation” but there is an exemption if removing them would breach their human rights.

At the end of his sentence Rocky Gurung, also a Gurkha's son, appealed against the Home Office’s decision to deport him, and lost. He then appealed again to the Upper Tribunal – the case overseen by Mr Justice Blake. He claimed that deporting him to Nepal would breach his “right to family life” even though he was single, had no children and lived with his parents.

In a judgment first disclosed in January last year, the court ruled in the killer’s favour that deporting him would be “disproportionate”.

The Home Office later appealed to the Court of Appeal and a panel led by Lord Justice Rix concluded Mr Justice Blake’s decision was faulty. “It appears to us that there has been an error of approach on the part of the Upper Tribunal,” ruled the three appeal judges.

They said they were “troubled” by the conclusion of Mr Justice Blake that the “nature and seriousness” of the offence did not in themselves justify interference with Rocky Gurung’s human rights through deportation. Such an argument “misplaces the emphasis”, said the panel.

“Much of the determination has the appearance of a search for reasons for not deporting him rather than – as in our view it ought to have been – an inquiry into whether, despite the statutory policy of automatic deportation, article 8 of the Convention would be violated by its implementation,” they said.

Bishal’s sister Karuna, 29, from north London, said: “The previous decision was completely wrong. I am extremely happy it has been thrown out. I would like to see Bishal’s killer deported.”

Ian Macdonald QC, the chairman of the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association, said: “I’m sure Mr Justice Blake will be feeling like he’s been rapped on the knuckles, but that is how the law works. This is why we have an appellate system.”

The case also illustrates the tortuous legal process faced by the government to deport serious foreign criminals, with the cost of the Gurung case thought to run into tens of thousands of pounds.

Mr Justice Blake, as Nicholas Blake QC, was previously a human rights barrister at Matrix Chambers, which is most closely associated with Cherie Blair, the wife of former prime minister Tony Blair. He was knighted in 2008 and appointed president of the Upper Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber in 2010. Previously he co-authored the legal textbook Immigration, Asylum and Human Rights.

In a judgment published at the end of last week, Mr Justice Blake allowed Milind Sanade, a male nurse from India, to remain in Britain despite being convicted of indecently assaulting a pregnant 21-year-old patient and asking “Does this feel good?”

The Home Office tried to remove Sanade at the end of his prison sentence under automatic deportation rules but Mr Justice Blake and a colleague upheld his second appeal under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which enshrines in law the right to a private or family life.

Sanade, of Chelmsford, is married with two children born in England. Yesterday his family were not at home, and neighbours said they had gone away.

Because Sanade has now been now struck off the nursing register and is under other restrictions which prevent him working unsupervised with women, the judges said: “He is more regulated in his future conduct in the United Kingdom than he would be in India. “Whilst we recognise that this was an offence involving gross breach of trust this is not criminal conduct at the higher end of the range of seriousness.”

Sanade, 36, said last night: “I’m just glad to put my sentence behind me. I’m sorry for what happened but I’ve served the time and now I should be here in the UK with my family.”

Other similar appeals considered by Mr Justice Blake at the same time, involving two Jamaican criminals each with children holding British nationality, were rejected.

SOURCE





Canada: As immigration booms, ethnic enclaves swell and segregate



More than 600 newcomers per day have arrived in Canada since 2006, and many of them have settled in neighbourhoods like Richmond, B.C. The once-quiet farming community on the south end of Vancouver is now home to North America’s second-largest Asian community — and Canada’s densest proportion of foreign-born residents. The city’s strip malls are a haven for dim sum. Richmond’s roads are replete with white delivery vans emblazoned with Chinese characters and massive 150-store Asian-friendly malls seemingly plucked right from downtown Shanghai.

While the Chinese who came to Canada in the opening days of Confederation settled into dense urban Chinatowns, recent Chinese immigrants now occupy large sprawling Chinalands: Large, self-contained and lined with restaurants and supermarkets offering the comforts of the old country. Indo-Canadians, South Asians and others can lay claim to similar booming settlements in the outskirts of Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto — and the resource-rich centres of the Prairies. And it is only the beginning. By 2030, according to Statistics Canada, more than 80% of Canada’s population growth is expected to depend on immigration. Ethnic enclaves are set to fill up faster and longer than ever before.

In almost every Canadian family tree, there is an ethnic enclave: Irish Catholics in Montreal’s St. Anne’s Ward, European Jews in Toronto’s Kensington Market or Ukrainians in the new farming villages of early 20th century Alberta. “People find their footing in these neighbourhoods … they pull comfort from these areas, especially women and elderly people,” said Sandeep Agrawal, a specialist in ethnic enclaves at Ryerson University.

In 1981, Canada had only six neighbourhoods with ethnic enclaves (neighbourhoods where more than 30% of the population is a visible minority). Now, that number has mushroomed to more than 260. In cities like Vancouver, home to nearly half of these enclaves, neighbourhoods are becoming increasingly defined by ethnicity. Unlike the racial ghettoes of the U.S. or France however, Canada’s ethnic communities are often shaped by choice. “People have made the decision voluntarily to move to these areas,” said Mr. Agrawal.

The enclaves of today may have more staying power than the Little Italys and Jewish quarters of years past, explained Mohammad Qadeer, professor emeritus of urban and regional planning at Queen’s University. “They will continue to draw new immigrants who will keep on arriving as far as the eye can see,” he wrote in an email to the Post. While Canada’s influx of Italians, Germans, Jews and Greeks largely ended after only 10 or 20 years, India, China and South Asia represent near-bottomless supplies of new Canadians — particularly as Canada’s immigrant needs are more potent than ever.

The vast majority of these enclaves are in the suburbs. “They’re going to where the land is cheaper and they’re going to where accommodation is available,” said Larry Beasley, former co-director of planning for the City of Vancouver.

And, economic mobility is not what it once was. Although many immigrant neighbourhoods are prosperous — the largely Chinese Toronto suburb of Markham, for example — newcomers arriving in Canada between 2000-2004 on average earned only 61 cents for every dollar earned by Canadian-born workers, according to a recent TD Economics Report. This, coupled with spiralling urban land prices, means that the newcomer of 2012 does not have nearly the economic freedom as the newcomer of 1992. “Although the term ‘ghettoes’ is rarely used in Canada, the concentration of immigrants into ethnic enclaves is similarly often caused by economic factors,” wrote Alex Lovell, a professor of geography at York University, in an email to the Post.

The result, critics fear, is that poorer, far-flung, constantly replenished enclaves have become more susceptible to isolation. Even better-off immigrants have tended to settle in prosperous suburbs filled largely with people of the same background, served by media and merchants focused on one community.

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, under whose watch more than a million newcomers have claimed Canadian citizenship, can often be seen mounting podiums at Chinese restaurants and Indian business associations calling for greater integration. “We don’t want to create a bunch of silo communities where kids grow up in a community that more resembles their parents’ country of origin than Canada,” he said in 2009.

In 2009, a planning firm hired by the city of Calgary ignited outrage when it called for the city to discourage “Asian’’ malls that cater only to a specific ethnic group” on the grounds that it “marginalized ethnic enclaves.” Amid a torrent of complaints from Calgary’s 67,000-strong Asian community, the city omitted the offending passage from the report. “I understand why certain people are concerned about it,” said Tom Leung, the firm’s Chinese-descent president told Postmedia in 2009. “I’m a very strong supporter of the Asian community. But we also have to take a look at the commercial realities.”

Mr. Leung need not have mentioned it. Behind the scenes, the wheels of integration were already spinning. This year, more than 6% of Calgary marriages will be interracial — higher than the national average. Notorious as a centre for white supremacist rallies and marches, in 2010 Calgary also became the first major Canadian city to elect a Muslim mayor, Naheed Nenshi. The son of Tanzanian immigrants, Mr. Nenshi came of age in Calgary’s minority-rich northeast quadrant.

At its height in the 1980s, the 10-block-long Greek section of Toronto’s Danforth Avenue was the largest Greektown in North America. Street merchants hawked spanakopita and lamb souvlaki outside Greek nightclubs and coffee shops — while Greek families filled the verandaed homes of the surrounding neighbourhood.

But lately, there are not a lot of Greeks left in Greektown. The sons and daughters of the Giannopolouses and the Rossos, well-versed in the language and steeped in Canadian culture, moved off to condos downtown and ranch houses in the suburbs — if they have even stayed in Toronto at all.

Every year, the four-lane avenue sees another Greek restaurant or cafe close up shop, soon replaced by a sushi restaurant or a high-end clothing boutique. Some are driven out by rising rents, others close their doors simply because a Canadian-born son has refused to take up the family business. As one Danforth business owner told blogTO.com last March, “I’m afraid the only thing still Greek in a couple of years will just be the signs.”

“As a planner, you’re always sorry when character dissipates,” said Mr. Beasley. “We all love the character of an ethnic area, but to some extent it’s a sign of social dysfunction rather than a sign of social integration,” he said.

Mr. Beasley points to the famous Chinatowns of the West Coast: Dense urban areas in Vancouver and Victoria fronted by ceremonial gates, hung with lanterns and peppered with mysterious alleys, basement cafes and winding former opium dens. They are “physically vivid” sectors of the city, but they are also the scars of ethnic segregation, said Mr. Beasley. In early 20th century British Columbia, Chinese were blocked from high-earning professions and had their children sent to separate schools. Locked out by mainstream society, their culture turned in upon itself and flourished.

But even these storied downtown landmarks may not be Chinese forever. “They’re all looking for alternative destinies for these neighbourhoods,” said Mr. Beasley, referring to the neighbourhood’s modern-day Chinese-Canadian owners. “They’re not saying ‘we’re holding this as Chinatown,’” he said.

Chinalands may share the same fate sooner than we think. In China and India, surging economies are increasingly absorbing the engineering and high-tech talent that once left to find work in Canada. Meanwhile, the Eurozone crisis is promising fresh waves of Irish, Icelandic and Greeks. Since 2009, Filipinos — to the tune of 30,000 per year — have trumped even the Chinese in Canadian citizenship oaths.

Within 15 years, even the daunting Chinese landscapes of Richmond could well be gentrified with hipsters and yuppies — or emblazoned with the text of some African or South American newcomer. Already, the neighbourhood’s veterans are pining to move on. “I’d like a more typical North American city and lifestyle, with not so many Chinese people,” Richmond resident Jeremy Lau, who came to Canada from Hong Kong in 1993, told Postmedia in October.

As it should be, said Mr. Beasley. “Ethnic neighbourhoods are a joy when you have them, and it’s a joy when you don’t have to have them,” he said.

SOURCE



11 February, 2012

The Hispanic vote

The article below argues that the Hispanic vote is up for grabs given disappointment with Obama. It ignores the fact that the GOP would alienate its base if it were more sympathetic to illegals.

So I think this election is really about turnout. Either a lot of Hispanics will stay home or a lot of conservatives will stay home. The stage is set for it to be Hispanics.

Although President Obama garnered overwhelming Latino support in the 2008 election, many Latino leaders have expressed concern with the president’s lack of zeal in fulfilling campaign promises (a recurring, disappointing theme across the entire demographic spectrum of Obama voters, including myself). One of the president’s pledges during the ’08 campaign that resonated with many Hispanic voters: a promise for comprehensive immigration reform that would include providing millions of undocumented Latinos, currently living in the United States, a path towards American citizenship or some type of legal status.

Truth be told, under President Obama’s administration deportations have risen by 30 percent than under his predecessor. As leaders of the traditionally liberal, Latino voting blocs in the West and Northeast began to ingest those numbers, the administration felt compelled last summer to reveal that ICE was now going to prioritize the deportation of convicted felons rather than focusing on the now infamous abuelitas that Newt Gingrich sought to protect from deportation during the Florida debates.

Common sense and a hint of political savvy would indicate that the door is ajar — enough for Republicans to barge in and press Obama on this issue, thereby courting moderate Latino voters and theoretically attracting more Latino votes, particularly in key states like Nevada, Colorado and New Mexico. Unfortunately, the immigration issue in the Republican primary debates had been reduced to echoing layers of jingoistic buzz words and simplistic rhetoric. This not only falls well short of holistically addressing the complex quandary of illegal immigration but also risks alienating Latino Republicans who are discouraged by their party’s shortsightedness.

Former state legislator Juan Carlos Zapata, a Republican, insightfully pointed out to me this week that “one of the major issues being ignored in the immigration debate is the significant economic contribution that the ‘illegal’ population already makes and could potentially increase if they were afforded a path to legal status. . . . On the flip side of that,” the Colombian American added, “no candidate is addressing the feasibility of rounding up over 11 million people and deporting them. What are those figures in terms of costs?”

Granted, in Florida, immigration status does not resonate that prominently as a campaign issue as it does in other parts of the country. That’s mostly because Puerto Ricans, who are concentrated in central Florida, are U.S. citizens at birth. Cuban immigrants, concentrated in South Florida, are granted political exile status and receive preferential treatment over all other nationalities in terms of their accessibility to American citizenship.

The Cuban Adjustment Act is an outdated, unfair Cold War-era relic. I’m hard pressed to believe that the bulk of Cubans arriving on our shores today are political refugees when one day and a year after attaining permanent U.S. residency many are hopping flights to visit Cuba, the very country that was so politically intolerable that they left it — but that is a different issue ripe for another day.

Raquel Regalado, a Cuban-American Republican and member of the Miami Dade School Board, says she’s concerned about the stance her party is taking on immigration because it does not tackle the real-life consequences of immigrants living in the shadows. “By not comprehensively addressing the issue of immigration, the problem seeps into most facets of our governing infrastructure — healthcare, education, you name it.”

Regalado and Zapata are among a cadre of Hispanic Republicans pressing their party leaders to cool it on the hurtful immigrant bashing and work on attracting Latino voters.

SOURCE





Immigration critics say governer is welcoming ‘illegal aliens’ to Florida

A Florida immigration restrictionist group put up a billboard this week saying Gov. Rick Scott is welcoming “illegal aliens” to Florida. Located near the Georgia border, the billboard reads: “Welcome Illegal Aliens: We offer jobs, free health care, education and welfare. Thank Governor Scott.”

Floridians for Immigration Enforcement, the group responsible for the billboard, writes: “This is a wakeup call for Florida Governor Rick Scott who promised Floridians he would work to get mandatory E-Verify enacted to protect our legal workers. He has remained silent and has failed to use the power of the Governor’s office to help get E-Verify enacted.” E-Verify is the electronic federal database used to verify if a job applicant is authorized to work in the U.S.

Floridians for Immigration Enforcement adds that it is time for Scott to fulfill his campaign promise and make E-Verify mandatory for all Florida employers, asking, “Will Florida Republican Leadership AGAIN Block E-Verify?” The group writes that state Rep. Gayle Harrell‘s bill filed early January that would require every private employer to use E-Verify “has yet to have a hearing in either the House or Senate.”

One of Scott’s first acts as governor was to sign an executive order requiring that all state agencies — and all companies that enter contracts with state agencies — use E-Verify to check the employment elligibility of their workers. Last May, Scott quietly issued another executive order which supersedes the one signed in January 2011. Scott said in August 2011 that the federal government needs to do its job: Secure the border, implement a national immigration policy and create a work visa program that actually works.

That same month, when he spoke at a conservative gathering, Scott delivered the same message adding that, “I tried to get an [immigration] bill passed last year. It got through the Senate. It didn’t make it through the House. It will happen this session.”

Immigrant advocate groups, opposed to measures like E-Verify, said this week that the employment authorization program is included in highly controversial immigration “attrition through enforcement” state laws in Alabama, Arizona and Georgia.

Opponents of E-Verify during Florida’s 2011 legislative session included business groups like the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Associated Industries of Florida, the Florida Chamber of Commerce and the Florida Fruit and Vegetable Association.

SOURCE



10 February, 2012

Immigration and Customs Enforcement Hires Officer to Chat With Detainees

In a time when America’s immigration system is swamped – when illegal immigrants are routinely caught and released, many of whom are dangerous – it seems that one of ICE’s top priorities is public relations with illegal immigration advocates. Yesterday, Andrew Lorenzen-Strait announced via the Department of Homeland Security website that he had been named ICE’s “first-ever public advocate.”

His job will be to “serve as a point of contact for individuals, including those in immigration proceedings, NGOs, and other community and advocacy groups, who have concerns, questions, recommendations or important issues they would like to raise.”

This new role, says Lorenzen-Strait, will help ICE “focus the agency’s immigration enforcement resources on sensible priorities” – code for doing less, since the Obama Administration consistently makes a big deal out of the notion that most illegal immigrants aren’t dangerous and therefore should be left to their own devices – and “implement policies and processes that priorities the health and safety of detainees in our custody.” And he has one more job, according to ICE Enforcement Director John Morton: he’ll have to explain to all of us why ICE lets illegal immigrants off the hook.

What did Lorenzen-Strait used to do? He’s been with ICE since 2008. Before that, he was a pro bono attorney in Maryland, doing child advocacy and divorce work via Community Legal Services. How does that qualify you for working in immigration, exactly? And then there’s the question of money spent. It’s more and more obvious these days that working for the government is the quickest road to a healthy paycheck – and Lorenzen-Strait’s salary proves it. In 2010, he was paid $112,224 by the feds. We can only imagine that the salary has risen since then. Not bad for being a public relations officer who does nothing to actually enforce immigration law.

We’re constantly hearing that the government has trouble finding places to cut spending. This seems like a good place to start.

SOURCE





Australia: $1bn to keep "asylum-seekers" in detention

THE Federal Government has been handed a $1 billion bill for the running of Australia's detention centres.

Foreign-owned global security company Serco secretly renegotiated its contract with the Department of Immigration just before Christmas.

The new four-year contract to manage immigration detention centres - including Maribyrnong in Melbourne - has quadrupled from the original figure of $280 million.

The Opposition labelled the blowout a failed "stimulus program" for asylum seekers. The number of detention centres has increased from 12 to 20 under Labor.

While the centres accommodate visa overstayers and illegal workers, the Government admits they make up a small number compared with asylum seekers.

"When Labor came to office there were just four people in detention who had arrived illegally by boat," Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said. "After four years of policy failures on our borders, this grew to more than 5600."

The variation to the contract with Serco - from 2009 to 2014 - was made on December 2 last year. It had been revalued in July last year to $712 million, meaning the cost blowout in the past nine months is almost $400 million.

"The original contract did not cover the number of sites we have now expanded to," Immigration Department spokesman Sandi Logan said. "It has been driven by a simple reason - the expansion in the number of centres in the network."

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen said the new contract would not affect the Budget.

Greens senator Sarah Hansen-Young said boat people should be immediately released from detention into the community.

SOURCE



9 February, 2012

Fed appeals court halts deportation of 7 immigrants, puts new immigration directive to test

The 9th Circus thinks a memo is a law

A federal appeals court has put the Obama administration’s new immigration directive to the test by halting the deportation of seven immigrants alleged to be in the country illegally.

In a 2-1 ruling on Monday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals demanded the Obama administration explain whether the immigrants can avoid deportation because of two memos released last year by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement director John Morton urging prosecutors to use “discretion” when deciding whether to pursue immigration cases.

Morton’s initial memo in June said prosecutors should take into account such factors as U.S. military service, criminal records, family ties and length of stay in the country when deciding whether to start formal deportation proceedings against undocumented immigrants. He issued another in November explaining further how to implement the guidelines.

Since then, though, immigration advocates and lawyers have been complaining that prosecutors have been too slow to call off deportation proceedings of immigrants meeting the criteria. The advocates view the appeals court’s rulings as a call to action.

“There is a real concern that the (June) memo is not being utilized to its full extent,” said Laura Lichter, the next president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “It sounded great at the time, but we are waiting for real progress.”

The court ordered the Obama administration to make a prosecution decision on seven people in five cases by March 19. The immigrants involved all appeared to have clean criminal records and appeared to meet the criteria of the memos, the appeals court judges concluded. The same three-judge panel had previously upheld deportation orders of all seven of the immigrants before Judges William Canby Jr. and Raymond Fisher agreed to reconsider the cases Monday in light of the new memos.

The identical two-paragraph order halting deportation proceedings in the five cases prompted a blistering dissent from Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain and charges of “judicial activism” from a prominent Republican congressman.

“The Ninth Circuit’s decision to put five deportation cases on hold is an overreach of judicial authority and shows the inherent danger in the Obama administration’s backdoor amnesty policies,” said Rep. Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican who chairs the House’s Judiciary Committee. “The Ninth Circuit has a history of legislating from the bench and now they have turned the Obama administration’s prosecutorial discretion guidelines into an excuse for their judicial activism.”

O’Scannlain chided Judges Canby and Fisher for issuing an order he called an “audacious ruling” and said the judges lacked the authority to make such demands of prosecutors.

“The memoranda cited by the majority offer only internal guidance within the executive branch and squarely disclaim any suggestion that they might create any rights or benefits enforceable by the judiciary,” O’Scannlain wrote.

The American Immigration Lawyers Association says a survey it conducted in November showed that ICE’s 28 offices were applying the new guidelines in varying degrees, causing confusion for immigrants, their attorneys and even prosecutors handling the cases. The Association claimed that many of the offices weren’t using the guidelines at all.

The Obama administration says it wants to focus deportation proceedings on gang members, criminals and others thought to be more dangerous than pregnant woman, students and long-time residents with no criminal history.

ICE officials declined comment, other than to say Wednesday that “the agency is currently working with the Department of Justice to draft an appropriate response, which will be filed in due course with the court.”

SOURCE






California immigration crackdown campaign to enlist American Legion members

Continuing a 93-year fight to control immigration, American Legion leaders are rallying military veterans to convince California voters they should require police to enforce federal immigration law.

"This country is for people who are here legally, who are born here, not for people who came here illegally, who kind of snuck in," said Bill Siler, adjutant of California's American Legion branch.

The Concord resident is co-sponsoring an initiative to keep it that way and plans to enlist help from the 88,780 Legionnaires statewide to help collect the more than half-million signatures needed to put it on the November ballot.

Although better known for its veteran advocacy, devotion to flag etiquette, baseball leagues and patriotic youth programs, the American Legion has lobbied for stricter immigration rules since its founding after World War I.

The group in 1920 won 75 percent of the vote for its first California proposition, strengthening state laws denying Japanese immigrants the right to own land.

The Legion then helped persuade Congress to pass national immigration quotas in 1924 and has sought immigration moratoriums and heightened enforcement every decade since.

"The American Legion, since its inception in 1919, has expressed concern that legal and illegal immigrants arriving in this country in large numbers would be unable to effectively assimilate into our society unless numerical quotas were established and enforced,"

This latest California volley aims, in part, to block liberal Bay Area counties from interfering with federal immigration prerogatives. It would require all counties to fully enforce Secure Communities, the network that alerts immigration agents whenever police book a deportable immigrant at a city or county jail.

"If they go to jail, it takes our taxpayer money to keep them here," Siler said. "If they are here illegally, they should be deported."

The measure would also deny driver's licenses to undocumented immigrants, which is already California law but in danger, according to proponents. And it would order sheriffs of the 20 counties with the worst cross-border gang activity to devote more resources to immigration enforcement.

Hundreds of the veterans voted to support it at their state convention in June.

"Hopefully they'll be the ones to get out the signatures to get it on the ballot," Siler said. If not, "I guess that will be the end of it."

Initiative author and co-sponsor Ted Hilton of San Diego has been drafting immigration control ballot measures since the early 1990s.

Voters have not been supportive of such drives in recent years.

* Hilton's 2009 proposal to revoke automatic citizenship for the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants failed to find enough signatures.

* A Belmont Republican's 2010 initiative modeled on Arizona's immigration crackdown found too few voters willing to put it on the ballot.

* Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, R-Claremont, last month fell about 57,000 signatures short of qualifying a measure to revoke a law allowing financial aid for undocumented college students.
But none of those had a veterans organization promising heavy involvement.

"We have over 490 posts, local units up and down the state," said Siler, a 69-year-old Vietnam War Navy veteran who joined the American Legion 33 years ago and has managed the California branch for six years.

The Secretary of State's Office on Jan. 31 cleared the initiative for circulation. Proponents need 504,760 registered voters -- almost six times the Legion's declining statewide membership -- to sign the petition by June 28.

They call it the Protection Against Transnational Gangs Act and say it may block Santa Clara, Santa Cruz and San Francisco counties from refusing to hold some immigrant inmates for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

"The criminal element, certainly they're going to go to states where there are more sanctuary ordinances or to counties with policies like Santa Clara County," Hilton said.

Most immigrants living in the U.S. illegally are neither gang members nor criminals and to call the immigration initiative an anti-gang measure may confuse voters about what it would actually do, said Pratheepan Gulasekaram, a Santa Clara University law school professor.

"It's a very shrewd move. Who doesn't want there to be less gang activity?" Gulasekaram said. The added enforcement would cost millions of dollars annually, according to the state's independent analysis.

Joining Siler and Hilton as a sponsor is conservative stalwart Tirso del Junco, an 86-year-old retired surgeon who led the California Republican Party in the early 1980s and was a University of California regent. He plans to tout the measure at the Feb. 24 through 25 statewide GOP convention in Burlingame.

It will be a tough sell even if the measure makes the ballot, Gulasekaram said.

"This sort of stuff tends to get passed only when you have the right partisan conditions, when you have a Republican-dominated electorate and a Republican-dominated Legislature, which we don't have in California."

SOURCE



8 February, 2012

Killer's 'family life' plea is thrown out meaning Nepalese thug CAN be removed from Britain

Judges have quashed a notorious ruling which allowed a Nepalese killer with no wife or children to stay in the UK to protect his right to a family life. Campaigners hope the ruling in the case of Rocky Gurung will be the first step towards restoring some common sense to the country’s deportation and human rights laws.

Gurung was one of a group of thugs who killed an innocent man by throwing him into the Thames on a drunken night out. The victim, Bishal Gurung – no relation – was the son of a hero Gurkha.

The Home Secretary wanted to remove the killer from the UK once he had served his jail sentence for what the trial judge called ‘wanton and inexcusable violence’. But, in a judgment that provoked outrage, the Upper Tribunal of the asylum and immigration court ruled that deporting Gurung would breach Article 8 of Labour’s Human Rights Act – the right to a family life.

His parents live in Britain, and he successfully argued that if he were deported, his father would have to go with him to look after him, breaking up his family here.

Critics said it marked an alarming extension in the scope of Article 8, which is blocking more than one deportation every day.

Now, the three senior Appeal Court judges have overturned the tribunal’s verdict.

They said the tribunal seemed to have spent its time looking for reasons why they shouldn’t deport Gurung, now 23. A different panel will look at the case afresh. Gurung will remain here while it is considered.

Last night, the verdict was welcomed by Tory Dominic Raab, the MP who represents the victim’s family. He said: ‘This ruling highlights the shambles in our deportation system. The immigration tribunal allows far too many serious criminals to avoid deportation on inflated human rights grounds.’

The Appeal Court judgment describes Gurung, who was given indefinite leave to remain in Britain in 2005, as a ‘physically fit and intellectually sound young man who had lived in Nepal in the past’. It went on: ‘There was no objective need for his father to return with him, save perhaps briefly, if he was now deported there.’

Bishal Gurung, 23, was a waiter whose father served with the Gurkhas for 16 years. In April 2008, Bishal was chased along the Embankment in London by up to 15 men before being forced to the ground and kicked repeatedly in the head, then hurled into the Thames.

Following a trial in 2009, Rocky Gurung was convicted of manslaughter, along with an associate, and jailed for three years.

SOURCE





Recent posts at CIS below

See here for the blog. The CIS main page is here.

1. Is President Obama Right About Engineers? Significant Numbers Unemployed or Underemployed (Memorandum)

2. Mr. President, we must not allow an engineer gap! (Op-ed)

3. Proposal: Let's Let the Spouses Help Finance the 'Best and the Brightest' (Blog)

4. Abuses in Summer Work Travel Program Extend far Beyond Hershey and CETUSA (Blog)

5. Attrition Through Enforcement: A Workable Plan (Blog)

6. Another Precinct Reporting – Cayman Islands Ups Investments Needed for Visas (Blog)

7. The Kansas Amnesty Plan (Blog)

8. When Lobbyists Write Bills (Blog)

9. The Food Stamp Program Rewards Households with Illegal Aliens (Blog)

10. More Drivel from the Crank (Blog)

11. The President and a Senator Join the H-1B Controversy (Blog)

12. Fact-Free Fact Check on H-1B (Blog)

13. Case History: The Complications Once Deportation Is Ordered (Blog)

14. Jorge Ramos and Mitt Romney's Nationality (Blog)

15. We're Still Waiting (Blog)

16. Alien Workers Who Do Not Pay FICA in the Islands and on the Mainland (Blog)



7 February, 2012

Singapore crackdown gets results

Focusing on those likely to be sympathetic to illegals

The number of immigration offenders arrested continued its steady decline, as the number of overstayers and illegal immigrants caught last year fell.

However, attempts at smuggling in contraband items at the checkpoints reached a record high last year, according to numbers released by the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) yesterday.

The number of illegal immigrants arrested fell 35 per cent from 1,430 in 2010 to 930 last year, while the number of overstayers registered a decline of 23 per cent, from 2,830 in 2010 to 2,180 last year.

Overall, the number of immigration offenders fell from 5,560 in 2009 to 3,110 last year.

The ICA said the number of immigration offenders arrested has been steadily declining since 2001, thanks to "thorough examinations and tightened security" at the checkpoints.

The number of vehicles seized for conveying immigration offenders has also generally been on a downward trend since 2001, and dropped by more than half from 18 in 2010 to seven last year.

Also down was the number of people caught harbouring and employing immigration offenders last year, dropping by almost half from 77 in 2010 to 40. Similarly, the number of employers arrested also fell from 26 in 2010 to 23 last year.

The ICA said it has adopted a more focused approach to reach out on harbouring, targeting housing agents, grassroots leaders, students as well as senior citizens.

SOURCE





Greece to build £2.5million six-mile razor wire wall to block worst illegal immigration route into Europe

The busiest crossing point for illegal immigrants into Europe is set to be blocked with a new £2.5million razor wire wall. Greek authorities plan to erect the six mile, 13ft high double fence, on an area bordering Turkey which sees an average of 245 people per day crossing illegally, the EU's border agency Frontex's figures show. And according to latest estimates, around 90 per cent of all illegal immigrants into the EU have come through Greece.

Once inside Europe's visa-free Schengen zone, people are free to travel unchecked through internal borders, and many travel on to the UK.

Greece has been warned that failure to step up border controls would leave the country at risk of being expelled from the Schengen zone.

Speaking to reporters while inaugurating a new police command centre on the border, Public Order Minister Christos Papoutsis told reporters: 'This is an opportunity for us to send a clear message ... to all the EU, that Greece is fully compliant with its border commitments.' 'Traffickers should know that this route will be closed to them. Their life is about to get much harder.'

Papoutsis said work on the fence which will stretch between the villages of Kastanies and Nea Vyssa in the Evros border region, near the north eastern town of Orestiada, would begin next month. It should be linked to a network of fixed night-vision cameras providing real-time footage to the new command center.

Most of Greece's 125-mile border with Turkey is delineated by the Evros River - called the Meric River in Turkey - but the fence will cover a short stretch where the two countries are divided by land.

Greece is already receiving emergency assistance at the Evros border from the EU border protection agency, Frontex.

Despite police efforts to seal the border, illegal immigrants continued to walk across. Three men spotted walking across the frontier in torrential rain told The Associated Press that they had come from strife-torn Syria. 'We've been walking for seven days,' said one of the men, who only identified himself as Said, 24, but gave no other details. 'I'm trying to reach an uncle of mine who lives in Hungary.'

Mr Papoutsis' plans for a strengthened border have been controversial in the past with the European Commission critcising them as a 'short-term measure' that did not deal with the root of the problem. Last year he had said the wall was a necessary measure after more than 100,000 people illegally entered the Mediterranean nation in the previous 12 months.

He added: 'The Greek public has reached its limit in taking in illegal immigrants. We are absolutely determined on this issue. Greece can’t take it anymore.'

SOURCE



6 February, 2012

A line of would-be immigrants? There isn’t one

The following is an interesting and reasonable setting-out of the existing legal position but I think that both sides of politics envisage new Federal legislation

IN THE VENOMOUS debate over illegal immigration, there is a point of agreement between President Obama and some of his would-be Republican rivals, including former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney. They’d like to see undocumented immigrants “get to the back of the line” for citizenship. Unfortunately, that convergence of views distorts rather than illuminates the debate.

Granted, Mr. Obama and Mr. Romney have different ideas of how the “line” would work. The president doesn’t seem inclined to force unauthorized immigrants to leave the country before applying for legal status. Mr. Romney thinks it would be nice if they somehow “self deported,” then lined up back home for legal re-entry to America. In the end, the distinction is meaningless — because there is no line, not even a relevant visa category, for millions of immigrants.

Here’s why. A large majority of the 11 million illegal immigrants are unskilled or low-skilled Mexicans. Many of them have no relatives over age 18 who are either U.S. citizens or permanent residents in possession of green cards.

That makes them ineligible for any realistic visa category. They are barred in most cases from employment-based visas, which favor skilled and well-educated applicants, and from family-based visas, which require applicants to have spouses, parents or siblings who are U.S. citizens or hold green cards. (Even the “line” for those visas often takes 15 to 20 years or more.) There is simply no immigrant visa category for which most unskilled Mexicans qualify and no realistic prospect they could be legally admitted to the United States. About half of the unauthorized adults in the country are Mexicans who probably have no category for admission, according to Pew Hispanic Center senior demographer Jeffrey S. Passel.

However, there will continue to be a demand for their labor. At least 7 million illegal immigrants are in the American work force, in many cases doing jobs most Americans consider too dirty or unsuited to their educational attainment. (A half-century ago, about half of American men dropped out of high school to seek unskilled work; today just 10 percent do.)

There is a tiny number of “other worker” immigrant visas for which Mexicans may apply. But those applications take several years and require employer sponsorship. And no employer would go through the time and expense of sponsorship for an unskilled worker.

It is possible to argue that the United States should shift away from family-based visa preferences toward employment-based ones or that it should create a new category of visas for skilled or unskilled “fortune seekers,” who, like millions before them, want to come to America because of its record of rewarding hard work and hustle.

Likewise, we would like to see an improved guest worker program, one that offered American employers some reasonable prospect of filling jobs with adequate numbers of immigrant employees in a timely way. But as things stand now, those things don’t exist.

On the campaign trail, it may sound tough or fair or common-sensical to demand that illegal immigrants “get to the back of the line.” In fact, it is a convenient fiction, a trope designed more to obfuscate than resolve a policy mess that politicians find too hard to tackle.

SOURCE





SC goes to court of appeal over immigration law

On December 22, 2011, a judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina issued a preliminary injunction blocking the enforcement of key provisions of the South Carolina immigration statute. Last month, South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson (left) filed papers in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals requesting that court reverse the lower court’s ruling.

Wilson represents the Palmetto State in its defense of the immigration law passed last year. The challenge to the law’s constitutionality was filed by a group of civil rights organizations and the U.S. Department of Justice.

Of the 20 sections of the South Carolina law, four of them were challenged and, since the ruling handed down in December by District Court Richard Gergel, are now temporarily enjoined from being carried out. These four include provisions which that state criminal sanctions for: “harboring and transporting of unlawfully present persons”; “failure to carry alien registration materials”; “the creation of fraudulent identification documents”; and the directive to state and local law enforcement officials to “determine the immigration status of certain persons encountered in routine traffic stops and other contacts in which there is a ‘reasonable suspicion’ that the person may be in the United States unlawfully.”

The civil rights groups challenging the law argue that enforcement of the law requires de facto racial profiling. The Justice Department argues that the Constitution places all power over the establishment of immigration policy in the hands of the federal government and that the legislature of South Carolina is thus preempted from passing legislation in that area of the law.

The argument is that once the feds have “occupied the field” of this or that area of the law or policy, no other government (state or local) may trespass therein. In short, the Obama administration insists that the federal government has such a compelling interest in establishing laws and policies in a certain area, any legislation in that area passed by another entity (the legislature of South Carolina in this case) would interfere with the enforcement of the federal statutes.

According to the complaint filed by the Justice Department, the South Carolina law, if enforced, would unlawfully conflict with federal immigration statutes and would contribute to a patchwork of state and local laws many of which would contradict currently operative federal immigration policies and principles.

Specifically, the filing claims: "In our constitutional system, the federal government has preeminent authority to regulate immigration matters and to conduct foreign relations. This authority derives from the Constitution and numerous acts of Congress."

Nowhere, however, has the government been able to point to the exact location in the Constitution where there is found exclusive congressional authority to regulate immigration.

The enumeration in the Constitution of specific powers delegated to the federal government is the cornerstone of American political theory and of the constitutional Republic established in 1787. The basic definition of enumerated powers is that the best limitation on power is to not give it in the first place. Powers, as understood by Madison, Jefferson, et al., were only legitimate if they had been granted to the government by the people and written specifically in the document through which the governed gave life to the government — the Constitution.

More HERE



5 February, 2012

Is President Obama Right about Engineers?

Significant Numbers Unemployed or Underemployed

During a recent video chat session, President Obama told a woman that he could not understand why her engineer husband was unemployed because “industry tells me that they don’t have enough highly skilled engineers.” However, data from the American Community Survey collected by the Census Bureau show that there are a total of 1.8 million U.S.-born individuals with engineering degrees who are either unemployed, out of the labor market, or not working as engineers. This is true for those with many different types of engineering degrees.

The 2010 American Community Survey shows:

* There are 101,000 U.S.-born individuals with an engineering degree who are unemployed.

* There are an additional 243,000 U.S.-born individuals under age 65 who have a degree in engineering but who are not in the labor market. This means they are not working nor are they looking for work, and are therefore not counted as unemployed.

* In addition to those unemployed and out of the labor force, there are an additional 1.47 million U.S.-born individuals who report they have an engineering degree and have a job, but do not work as engineers.

* President Obama specifically used the words “highly skilled.” In 2010, there were 25,000 unemployed U.S.-born individuals with engineering degrees who have a Master’s or PhD and another 68,000 with advanced degrees not in the labor force. There were also 489,000 U.S.-born individuals with graduate degrees who were working, but not as engineers.

* Relatively low pay and perhaps a strong bias on the part of some employers to hire foreign workers seems to have pushed many American engineers out their profession.

* There are many different types of engineering degrees. But unemployment, non-work, or working outside of your field is common for Americans with many different types of engineering degrees (View detailed employment figures for specific types of engineers).

* The key policy question for the United States is how many foreign engineers should be admitted in the future. Contrary to President Obama’s statement, the latest data from the Census Bureau indicate there is a very large supply of American-born engineers in the country. It would be better for the president to seek more diverse sources of information than simply relying on “industry” to determine what is going on in the U.S. labor market.

Data Source: Figures for the above analysis come from a Center for Immigration Studies analysis of the public-use file of the 2010 American Community Survey (ACS) collected by the U.S. Census Bureau. Figures on degrees and employment are based on self-reporting in the survey and have been rounded to their nearest thousand. The survey asks about undergraduate degrees, so some of the individuals who have a Master’s or PhD may not have their graduate degree in engineering. Also, those who indicated that they have a “professional degree” are not included in the discussion of those with Master’s and PhDs because a large share have law degrees. The 2010 data is the most recent ACS available.

The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. Contact: Steve Camarota, 202-466-8185, sac@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization




Japan has illegal immigration problems too

But tiny compared to most other prosperous countries

The number of foreign nationals detained by immigration officials for one year or more has dropped significantly since a more flexible approach was adopted in response to harsh criticism of long-term detentions, according to the Justice Ministry.

As of August, 167 foreigners at immigration facilities in Ibaraki, Osaka and Nagasaki prefectures had been held for at least six months, the ministry said Friday.

Many of them are believed to have overstayed their visas and were waiting to be deported or were seeking asylum in Japan.

Those who had been held for at least one year totaled 47, down sharply from 115 at the end of 2009. The ministry said that since July 2010 it has been actively releasing people who are subject to deportation when it sees no need to keep them in custody.

The United Nations in 2007 criticized Japan's long-term detention of immigrants and recommended shorter periods of confinement, following a rash of suicides and hunger strikes at domestic immigration centers.

Support groups and lawyer associations have repeatedly called on the government to make improvements in the treatment of detainees. They argue that people held at immigration centers receive poor medical care, even though some detainees are suffering from serious illnesses.

Faced with claims that it was taking too long to conduct asylum reviews, the Justice Ministry adopted a target of processing them within six months.

As a result, the number of cases without any decision to grant asylum after six months dropped to 35 as of March 31 last year, a dramatic drop from the 612 cases at the end of June 2010.

In terms of the time taken to review asylum cases, immigration officials spent an average of 12.6 months between July and September 2010 and 14.4 months between October and December 2010 per case. But the periods were curtailed to 4.7 months and 5.2 months in the same periods last year.

SOURCE



4 February, 2012

Supreme Court to hear Arizona immigration arguments April 25

The U.S. Supreme Court said on Friday it will hear arguments on April 25 on the power of states to adopt tough immigration laws, concluding the term's scheduled oral arguments with a major case pitting Arizona against the Obama administration.

The high court released on Friday its April calendar, listing immigration and other cases scheduled to be heard in its final argument sitting for the current term, which began in October and ends in late June.

At issue is whether federal immigration laws take precedence and pre-empt Arizona's controversial law that gives local police broad new powers to crack down on illegal immigrants.

The Supreme Court in December agreed to hear Arizona's appeal arguing the law should be allowed to take effect. It was expected that oral arguments would be held in late April, but the exact date was not known until Friday.

Election-year rulings in the immigration case and on President Barack Obama's sweeping healthcare overhaul are both expected by late June, in the middle of the president's campaign for re-election.

A decision upholding Arizona's law would be a legal and political setback for Obama, who has strongly criticized it. A decision striking down the law would be a defeat for Arizona Republican Governor Jan Brewer, who had a testy airport exchange with Obama last month.

The immigration arguments are expected to be the usual one hour.

The Supreme Court case is Arizona v. United States, No. 11-182.

SOURCE





Australia: Another sinking renews 'stop the boats' call

OPPOSITION immigration spokesman Scott Morrison says efforts in the Malaysia boat disaster are focused on "recovery and rescue". At least eight asylum seekers were found dead early yesterday after their boat capsized off southern Malaysia while en route to Australia. Grave fears are held for about six others who are missing. Thirteen people made it to shore.

"The effort at the moment always has to focus on recovery and rescue," Mr Morrison said in Sydney today.

He said the Coalition remained committed to its policy of reopening the detention centre on Nauru, the reintroduction of temporary protection visas (TPVs) and the towing of boats back to Indonesia. "That is the policy that's proven, that is the policy that's strong and that's the policy that should be restored to stop the boats," he said.

Mr Morrison said there would be no more talks with the Government about resurrecting the offshore processing of asylum seekers. "There is no further talks because the Government has refused to change the legislation," he said.

"The Government clearly has been seeking to do nothing other than trash the Nauru option with their ridiculous costings, which have been lampooned around the country. "They have no serious intention of destroying temporary protection visas, we know they won't turn the boats back."

This week's boat accident comes two months after more than 200 asylum seekers drowned when their vessel sank after leaving for Australia from East Java in Indonesia.

SOURCE



3 February, 2012

Migrants seeking a life in Britain will be asked: Can you make the country better?

Migrants seeking permission to enter Britain must prove they will ‘add to the quality of life’ and not become ‘dependent’ on state support, a minister will say today.

Immigration minister Damian Green will say it is time for a major overhaul of the system left behind by Labour.

He will tell an audience in London: ‘We need to know not just that the right numbers of people are coming here, but that the right people are coming here. People who will benefit Britain, not just those who will benefit by Britain.’

The minister will also criticise the idea of migrants coming to Britain to claim benefits, saying: ‘Importing economic dependency on the State is unacceptable. Bringing people to this country who can play no role in the life of this country is equally unacceptable.’

Mr Green will set out the case for becoming more ‘selective’ about which non-EU citizens are granted a visa to work, study or marry.

He says the debate so far has focused on the Government’s pledge to reduce net migration – the number entering the country, compared to those leaving – from 250,000 last year to the ‘tens of thousands’. But Mr Green argues it is now time also to focus on exactly who is coming here and what they have to contribute.

He will tell the Policy Exchange think-tank: ‘What we need is a national consensus on how we can make immigration work for Britain. We are evidently a long way from such a consensus but I want to start to build it.’

Mr Green, saying the country wants entrepreneurs and exceptional artistic and scientific talent, will add: ‘Britain does not need more migrant middle managers, any more than it needs unskilled labour.’

A string of policy announcements are imminent from Home Secretary Theresa May.

New controls on the spouses of immigrants entering Britain will require them to prove they can speak a certain amount of English, and that they will not be reliant upon benefits. The family will be expected to show they have a household income of up to £26,000 a year.

In a separate move, foreign workers will not be permitted to remain unless they have special skills or investment capital.

Britain will have to find room for three million more people by 2025 even if not a single new immigrant comes here, official estimates revealed yesterday.

The population will grow relentlessly to nearly 65.3million by then, largely because of the impact on the birthrate of mass immigration over the past decade and a half.

Just finding somewhere to put the additional three million people would require three cities the size of Birmingham.

The continuing effects of the large-scale immigration under Labour were set out in Office for National Statistics projections of likely population levels. Without taking any new migrants into account, numbers are predicted to rise from the 2010 population estimate of 62,262,000 to 65,292,000 in 2025. If net migration is 200,000 a year, the 70million mark would be reached in 2027.

SOURCE






Immigration is not just a numbers game – it’s about culture, too

Immigration stirs strong passions. But in Britain the debate about it can be rather confused. During the last election, a friend canvassed a finger-jabbing gentleman who said that he would be voting Liberal Democrat because “Nick Clegg will kick out all the immigrants”.

Most people know the difference between Nick Clegg and Nick Griffin. But do we know what immigration policy we want? Most of us – though fewer than in recent years – back some immigration. Since 1997, the share of our workforce born outside the United Kingdom has doubled from 7 per cent to 14 per cent. Net immigration rose from zero in 1992 to nearly a quarter of a million last year, when half a million people arrived but only half that number left.

The Government is trying to control overall numbers. But voters also want people who will fit in and contribute. Yesterday, Damian Green, the Immigration Minister, gave a speech exploring how to make immigration rules do those two things. He floated the idea that economic migrants might have to earn some kind of minimum salary – perhaps between £31,000 and £49,000 a year.

In this respect, his speech reflects an important change of approach. The Labour administration argued that migration expanded the economy, and had no impact on jobs. The new Government says it is interested not in the total size of the economy, but in the living standards of current residents.

In January, a report from the Migration Advisory Committee looked at whether non-EU immigration improved the welfare of current residents. It concluded that this question was impossible to answer at the moment. How do you compare the effects on jobs, tax, spending, congestion and so on? The report did, however, challenge the idea that migration has no impact on the labour market.

In the long run, migrants don’t “take” anyone’s job. The economy creates new jobs all the time. But it can take a while for this to happen, particularly in a recession. The MAC found that between 2005 and 2010, Britain gained an extra 700,000 working-age migrants from outside the EU. It thought this had reduced the employment of natives by about 130,000. However, they said the same effect might not occur in a period of stronger growth. To put this in context, there are 25 million UK‑born workers, so migrants reduced native employment by half of 1 per cent.

Limiting economic migration to those with better-paying jobs is one way to try to make it more likely that the net effect of immigration is positive for living standards. You might expect migrants with well-paying jobs to have a better chance of fitting in, but other things might help with this, too. For example, the Government has introduced an English language test for spouses, and is considering a test of their attachment to the country. It is also considering a rule that would prevent people on low incomes from bringing spouses. But it is treading warily because of human rights law. Judges recently struck down rules banning spouses aged under 21 from settling in Britain, introduced in a bid to reduce forced marriages.

For most people, culture is as important as numbers. So shouldn’t government also have a policy of integration once people have arrived? English language tuition might help them fit in. What about supplementary schools that mix children with others outside their community? Could housing policy avoid people becoming ghettoised? What kind of public events help people integrate?

The “citizenship test” under Labour became a joke, because it presented being British as if it was mainly about claiming benefits and knowing where the European Parliament meets. But what is Britishness, anyway? While the debate about immigration is becoming more sophisticated, the debate about Britishness and belonging has barely started.

SOURCE



2 February, 2012

Confused? Ron Paul said he doesn't support illegal immigration and said people who break the law should be punished. But he said he opposes any effort to round people up and ship them away

Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul outlined his views on immigration Wednesday, saying he favors a compassionate policy that doesn't rely on "barbed-wire fences and guns on our border."

Paul spoke to several dozen people organized by Hispanics in Politics, Nevada's oldest Hispanic community group. The Texas congressman has scheduled several days of campaigning in Nevada before the state's caucuses Saturday.

Paul went into much greater detail on immigration policy than he has at most of his campaign stops. He typically steers clear of discussing rights for specific groups of people, insisting that his libertarian-leaning views apply to everyone as individuals.

But in Nevada, which is 26 percent Hispanic, Paul outlined an immigration policy far outside the Republican mainstream.

Paul blasted politicians who blame immigrants for causing the country's economic problems. He compared the situation to Nazi Germany's targeting of Jews in the 1930s.

"When things go badly, individuals look for scapegoats," Paul said. "Hispanics, the immigrants who have come in, are being used as scapegoats."

Paul said he doesn't support illegal immigration and said people who break the law should be punished. But he said he opposes any effort to round people up and ship them away.

"If an individual is found to be breaking the law, serious consideration should be given for them to return. But I would think 99 percent of people who come here come because they believe in the American dream," Paul said to applause.

Paul decried a punitive border policy, which said offended his belief in individual liberty.

"The one thing I have resisted and condemned: I do not believe that barbed-wire fences and guns on our border will solve any of our problems," he said.

Paul also said he was against laws that require immigrants to carry proof of legal status. He says he doesn't want to live in a country where people are required to carry identity papers.

"You say, `Well, this is only for illegals.' That's a bunch of baloney," Paul said. "How do you sort out illegals from legals? Unless you put papers and identification on everybody."

Hispanics in Nevada have favored Democrats over Republicans in recent election years -- a full 74 percent of Hispanics supported President Barack Obama in 2008 over GOP rival John McCain.

But Fernando Cortes, Paul's director of Hispanic outreach in Nevada, said many Hispanic voters had shown interest in Paul's message.

"They're always pandered to by the left and ignored by the right," Cortes said of Hispanic voters. "They're very motivated by the wanting of freedom back and a sound economy.

SOURCE




Alabama's Immigration Law to Cost State Millions in Lost Taxes, Study Says

These studies are only as good as the assumptions behind them. One wonders if the sharp drop in Alabama unemployment was factored in

Alabama's new immigration law is likely to cost the state tens of millions of dollars in lost taxes, says a new study.

The report by the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Alabama would cause 70,000 to 140,000 undocumented immigrants to lose jobs and would cost about $1.2 billion to $5.8 billion in the earnings of those immigrants as well as $56.7 million to $264.5 million in lost state income taxes and sales taxes.

"The cost is quite certain," said the center's director, Sam Addy. "It's simple economics. If you have more people you have a bigger economy, less people a smaller economy."

A sponsor of the immigration bill, Republican Rep. Micky Hammon of Decatur, disputed the report. "It's clear the study overestimates the negative and underestimates the positive to skew the result toward an agenda," he said. "If 40,000 illegal workers leave the state, they free up jobs that homegrown Alabamians are happy to have."

Hammon said the state's lower unemployment rate proves the immigration bill is working. "It doesn't take a PhD to see that since the law was signed unemployment has dropped from 10 percent to 8.1 percent," Hammon said. "In Marshall County, once a known hotbed for illegal immigration, unemployment has plunged from 10 percent in June to 6.9 percent last month." Statewide, the unemployment rate has dropped from 9.3 percent to 8.1 percent since January, 2011.

The report found that the economic costs of the new law outweigh the benefits. The report listed benefits of the new law and saving state funds used to provide benefits to undocumented immigrants and making more employment opportunities available to legal residents. But the report said the costs to the state include hurting the state's economic development effort and the cost of implementing and enforcing the law.

The sponsor of the bill in the Senate, Sen. Scott Beason, R-Gardendale, said the study does not take into account that many immigrant workers send much of what the earn to family members back home. "It's our understanding that a tremendous amount goes out of state," Beason said. The study estimates that 20 percent of undocumented workers "send their earnings to their home countries."

SOURCE



1 February, 2012

The Immigrant Investor (EB-5) Visa

A Program that Is, and Deserves to Be, Failing

The EB-5 investor visa, which allows a foreigner to invest in the United States in exchange for Legal Permanent Residence, has seen its requirements watered down by the Department of Homeland Security and Congress in an attempt to increase use of the program. The standards have been so debased that a Wall Street real-estate project in lower Manhattan is successfully claiming to be in a 'depressed area' in order to garner investments through the program, as reported recently by the New York Times.

A new report from the Center for Immigration Studies finds the program inherently flawed, and calls for its elimination or, failing that, for significant reforms. The report, 'The Immigrant Investor (EB-5) Visa: A Program that Is, and Deserves to Be, Failing', discusses the program's design, operation, and results. Author David North is a CIS fellow who has studied the interaction of immigration and the U.S. economy for more than 30 years.

This examination of the EB-5 program shows that, despite massive promotional efforts:
There are comparatively few takers, and only a fraction of them complete the process and get green cards;

No one, citizens or aliens, middlemen or workers, or the economy generally, seems to be getting much out of the program;

Many of the investments turn out to be bad ones, some scandalous; and

Other immigrant-receiving nations run much more rational programs than we do, while securing more significant investments, proportionately, from aliens.

The above is a press release from from Center for Immigration Studies. 1522 K St. NW, Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 466-8185 fax: (202) 466-8076. Email: center@cis.org. Contact: Bryan Griffith, 202-466-8185, press@cis.org. The Center for Immigration Studies is an independent research institution which examines the impact of immigration on the United States. The Center for Immigration Studies is not affiliated with any other organization




Canadians Are Divided on the Actual Effect of Immigration

Younger respondents endorse the concept of the “mosaic” while middle-aged and older Canadians prefer the “melting pot”

People in Canada are split when assessing immigration, and only three-in-ten believe the country should continue to be a mosaic, a new Angus Reid Public Opinion poll has found.

In the online survey of a representative sample of 1,005 Canadian adults, 39 per cent of respondents believe that immigration is having a positive effect in Canada, while 39 per cent think it is having a negative effect.

Views on Legal and Illegal Immigration

Since September 2010, the proportion of Canadians who think immigration is having a positive effect in the country has increased by five points. Respondents aged 18-to-34 are more likely to regard immigration in a positive light (48%) than middle-aged Canadians (33%) and those over the age of 55 (39%).

Two-in-five Canadians (41%) think the number of legal immigrants who are allowed to relocate in Canada should decrease, including almost half of respondents aged 35-to-54 (46%).

The views of Canadians on illegal immigration have hardened over the past 14 months. Half of respondents (50%, +6 since September 2010) believe illegal immigrants in Canada take jobs away from Canadian workers. In addition, only 23 per cent of respondents would allow illegal immigrants to stay in Canada and eventually apply for citizenship, while 50 per cent think illegal immigrants should be required to leave their jobs and be deported.

Multiculturalism

Three-in-five Canadians (62%) think multiculturalism has been good for the country, including 72 per cent of respondents aged 18-to-34. However, more Canadians (58%) are likely to endorse the concept of the melting pot—immigrants assimilating and blending into Canadian society—than the mosaic (30%), where cultural differences within society are valuable and should be preserved.

At least one-in-four respondents believe Canada is an intolerant society towards Muslims (33%), Aboriginal Canadians (28%) and immigrants from South Asia, such as India and Pakistan (25%). A third of Canadians (32%) believe that racism is a significant problem in Canada, while 55 per cent disagree with this view.

Analysis

The proportion of Canadians who believe immigration is having a negative effect in the country is the lowest in the past four years. The main source of hostility appears to be illegal immigration, with half of Canadians calling for unlawful workers to return to their country of origin. This level of support for the deportation of illegal immigrants is 11 points lower than what was observed in Britain in December 2011, but seven points higher than in the United States in December 2010.

Younger Canadians are more likely to back the idea of a “path to citizenship” for illegal workers, but sizeable majorities of middle-aged and older respondents reject this idea.

The positive views on multiculturalism drop markedly with age, from 72 per cent for those aged 18-to-34, to 63 per cent among those aged 35-to-54, and to 50 per cent for those over the age of 55. Middle-aged and older Canadians are also more likely to support the concept of the melting pot than the mosaic.

SOURCE






Postings from Brisbane, Australia by John Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.) -- former member of the Australia-Soviet Friendship Society, former anarcho-capitalist and former member of the British Conservative party.


The "line" of this blog is that immigration should be SELECTIVE. That means that:

1). A national government should be in control of it. The U.S. and U.K. governments are not but the Australian government has shown that the government of a prosperous Western country can be. Up until its loss of office in 2007, the conservative Howard government had all but eliminated illegal immigration. The present Leftist government has however restarted the flow of illegals by repealing many of the Howard government regulations.

2). Selectivity should be based on "the content of a man's character, not on the color of his skin", as MLK said. To expand that a little: Immigrants should only be accepted if they as individuals seem likely to make a positive net contribution to the country. Many "refugees" would fail that test: Muslims and Africans particularly. Educational level should usually be a pretty fair proxy for the individual's likely value to the receiving country. There will, of course, be exceptions but it is nonetheless unlikely that a person who has not successfully completed High School will make a net positive contribution to a modern Western society.

3). Immigrants should be neither barred NOR ACCEPTED solely because they are of some particular ethnic origin. Blacks are vastly more likely to be criminal than are whites or Chinese, for instance, but some whites and some Chinese are criminal. It is the criminality that should matter, not the race.

4). The above ideas are not particularly blue-sky. They roughly describe the policies of the country where I live -- Australia. I am critical of Australian policy only insofar as the "refugee" category for admission is concerned. All governments have tended to admit as refugees many undesirables. It seems to me that more should be required of them before refugees are admitted -- for instance a higher level of education or a business background.

5). Perhaps the most amusing assertion in the immigration debate is that high-income countries like the USA and Britain NEED illegal immigrants to do low-paid menial work. "Who will pick our crops?" (etc.) is the cry. How odd it is then that Australians get all the normal services of a modern economy WITHOUT illegal immigrants! Yes: You usually CAN buy a lettuce in Australia for a dollar or thereabouts. And Australia IS a major exporter of primary products.

6). I am a libertarian conservative so I reject the "open door" policy favoured by many libertarians and many Leftists. Both those groups tend to have a love of simplistic generalizations that fail to deal with the complexity of the real world. It seems to me that if a person has the right to say whom he/she will have living with him/her in his/her own house, so a nation has the right to admit to living among them only those individuals whom they choose.

I can be reached on jonjayray@hotmail.com -- or leave a comment on any post. Abusive comments will be deleted.