Daily Mail blows a gasket when British gov puts up illegal immigrants in fancy hotels

Migrants Adam, right, and Muhammad relax at the three-star Best Western Park Hall hotel in Lancashire

MAIL ON SUNDAY COMMENT: A nation being wrecked by its naive kindness
August 1, 2015

How can it have come to this, that British citizens, paying their own way in well-appointed hotels, find that they are sharing their accommodation with newly arrived migrants, in many cases here by illegal means, supplied with all they need by taxpayers’ money?

At the same time, The Mail on Sunday reveals the existence of a government website advertising the benefits available – again at the taxpayers’ expense – to anyone who can get here and claim to be a refugee. They can even apply for free spectacles, the better to fill in the forms for more benefits.

These facts are as astonishing to the new arrivals as they are to British citizens. That is why there is a perpetual camp at Calais, of people prepared to risk their lives to reach what they regard as the migrants’ El Dorado.

Who can blame them, who does blame them, when they can hope for such a welcome? The only surprise is that there are not more lithe young men and women trying to cut their way through the flimsy fences that guard the Eurotunnel terminal, or to weave past the ineffectual and uninterested French police.

But even more remarkable is the paralysis and fumbling of successive British governments – the current one no better than its forerunners, clearly groping for some cosmetic measures in the hope that it will all die down and they can go on holiday in peace.

They should not be allowed to get away with this. Someone should take charge, and firmly. The migrants are being placed in hotels because the proper reception centres are full, a clear sign that things have gone too far.

Much of Kent is at a standstill because of what can truly be called a crisis. Businesses all over Britain are suffering severe losses. But above all, the people of Britain are starting to feel that their country’s borders are no longer under control – that anyone who tries hard enough to get in, will do so, and then become a charge on the State.

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One can guess from this other August 1 report that The Daily Mail was just getting warmed up:

Free hotels for the Calais stowaways in soft touch Britain: Outrage as immigrants illegally entering UK get cooked meals and £35 cash a week within days of arrival

• Migrants given hotel room, three cooked meals a day and £35 cash a week
• Migrants get a double ensuite room, usually priced at £70 a night 
• The Home Office rushed out plans to strip failed asylum-seeking families of their benefits 

Hundreds of migrants who have smuggled themselves into Britain from Calais are being put up in hotels at taxpayers' expense.

Stowaways who have illegally entered the country on lorries or trains through the Channel Tunnel are being transported across England and given their own hotel room, three cooked meals a day and a cash allowance of £35 a week – all within days of entering the UK.

They are being accommodated in hotels boasting pools, gyms and spas even before claiming asylum, because official reception centres cannot cope with the recent surge in illegal arrivals.

But their presence has angered paying British guests, who have taken to posting reviews on TripAdvisor warning other holidaymakers that otherwise reputable hotels all over the UK have been turned into impromptu 'refugee camps'.

After a week of chaos in Calais that has seen thousands of migrants trying to sneak into Britain – and hundreds succeeding – critics said the decision to house new arrivals in hotels was further evidence that Ministers have lost control.

The Government pays private companies £150 million to accommodate would-be asylum seekers after they have been caught by the police entering the country illegally.

But private contractor Serco has admitted that 100 recent immigrants are staying in hotels as an emergency measure because the country's six dedicated immigration centres, built to accommodate 1,200 people, are already full.

Tory MP Alec Shelbrooke said: 'It is outrageous that asylum seekers are being put up in hotel rooms at public expense. It's this sort of soft touch that makes this country so attractive to migrants. The message should go out that they will be detained in disused military camps.'

In other developments last night:

• The Home Office rushed out plans to strip failed asylum-seeking families of their benefits, in a bid to stop Britain being seen as a soft touch.
• Another 300 migrants got through security fences in Calais in an attempt to board Eurotunnel trains. 
• David Cameron was under pressure to demand the French pay compensation to truckers suffering because of the chaos at the ports.
• Ministers warned all councils of a likely increase in asylum seekers needing accommodation.
• French authorities threatened to end security and passport checks as they accused the Prime Minister of 'outrageous provocation'.
• Downing Street announced new security measures, funding extra security guards fencing and CCTV for the Eurotunnel complex.

An investigation by this newspaper has found dozens of migrants are being put up in hotels in Lancashire, having made the perilous journey across the Mediterranean from Africa and the Middle East, and then through Europe.

After finding their way past French police and security guards and getting through the tunnel by train or lorry, the migrants were, they say, only briefly held by police before being handed over to Serco and put up in hotels.

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They have also been promised free legal aid, and once their asylum claim is being processed they will be entitled to free health care, education and housing potentially worth thousands.

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Lots more in the report....

Meanwhile, The Independent reported on Friday that Prime Minister David Cameron "admitted" the "Calais crisis" will last all summer. The paper also reported that the Mayor of Calais is extremely upset with PM Dave and the British in general, saying that the British had "sacrificed" Calais. 

Another Independent report on the migrant crisis has a chart showing the top 5 nationalities arriving by sea to Europe this year, with Syrians #1 at 34 percent.  Just a reminder to The Independent that there were no Syrians among those who rushed the Chunnel last week or at the Calais camps at  that time. 

Meanwhile, the BBC reported today that the British and French governments are urging the European Union to take concerted action to address the roots causes of the Calais migrant crisis:

In the Sunday Telegraph, Home Secretary Theresa May and her French counterpart Bernard Cazeneuve said the situation was a "global migration crisis".

Meanwhile, Pundita continues to recommend that British and French authorities try very hard to learn who orchestrated the massed assaults on the Chunnel.  As that French police officer I quoted twice last week noted, about 1,500 of the 2,000 or so  'migrants' crashing the gates had materialized on the French side seemingly out of nowhere.  It didn't seem they came from the camps in Calais.

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