Sangatte: A False Crisis

Liza Schuster is T. H. Marshall Fellow in the sociology department at the London School of Economics. Her book, The Use and Abuse of Political Asylum in Britain and Germany, is published by Frank Cass in 2003.

On 2 December 2002, Britain’s home secretary, David Blunkett, announced that France had agreed to close the holding camp for asylum-seekers at Sangatte, near the northern Channel port of Calais. In exchange, Britain would accept one thousand Iraqis and two hundred Afghans who had been registered in Sangatte. It was hoped that the closure of the camp would see fewer people drawn to the area as a stepping-stone for entry to Britain.

 

However, the Sangatte camp was a solution to a particular problem, rather than a problem itself. It was originally opened in September 1999 to offer shelter to people who were already in France’s northern ports, sleeping rough while they waited to cross the Channel. In summer 2001 it became front-page news in Britain, occasionally receding, but always returning until in December 2002 the camp was closed, dismantled and handed back to Eurotunnel, the British–French company which operates the Channel Tunnel and from which Sangatte had been leased. This article describes the construction of a “crisis” around the shelter at Sangatte and considers its role and significance in relation to British migration policy and race relations.

Prologue

During the winter of 1998–9, a number of Kosovans arrived in the area around Calais hoping to travel on to Britain. In response to the visible plight of these people, a night shelter was opened so that they would have somewhere to sleep. It opened just after the crisis in Kosovo had ended, and although Kosovans were being sent back from Britain, in France there was less pressure for them to return. The opening of a shelter for some two hundred Kosovans, including fifty-nine children, was initially a humanitarian response that excited little opposition or notice in France. There was local support for the initiative, with volunteers turning up to help clean the shelter and play with the children. As more migrants arrived, local non-governmental organisations (NGOs) demanded somewhere that was better suited to their needs, in particular the needs of the families with children.

 

A few miles from Calais, at the coastal town of Sangatte, was a large hangar that originally housed the huge equipment used to dig the Channel Tunnel—the undersea rail link between Britain and France. On 24 September 1999, the hangar was requisitioned from its owners, Eurotunnel, and approximately half the space was opened as a shelter, initially for about four hundred people. Some portable cabins were provided inside the hangar for families; others slept in tents. Conditions in the camp were very basic, offering just a roof over one’s head, no heating, showers for which there were enormous queues, toilets and basic meals twice a day. According to a report compiled by the International Federation of Human Rights Leagues (FIDH), by June 2002 conditions had deteriorated and the noise and stench inside the hangar had become unbearable.

 

The camp was run by the French Red Cross, which maintained an open-door policy until November 2002, when it agreed to register those already present so that it could refuse admittance to newcomers. Although there was usually a police presence around the camp, the movement of residents was not restricted during most of Sangatte’s existence; the police would merely bring them back to the camp when they failed in their attempts to cross the Channel. The costs of running the camp, including wages for thirty-five staff, were borne by the population and migration section of the French Labour and Solidarity Ministry.

 

For the first eighteen months after it opened its doors, Sangatte received little attention from the public, the media or the government. Over the following three years, the Kosovans who were its original inhabitants were joined by nationals of other countries, mostly Iraqi Kurds and Afghans, but there were also a few people from eastern Europe and Africa. Numbers increased from the initial few hundreds to over a thousand by summer 2001, and often reaching sixteen hundred during the following year. Every afternoon, most of those in the camp, including women and children, would head to Calais or to Eurotunnel’s nearby rail depot at Coquelles and attempt to cross the Channel by boarding lorries, ferries or trains. Most would fail, and try again repeatedly. Each night some would succeed, to be replaced in the camp by new arrivals.

 

This very local development, the opening of a shelter to house people en route to Britain, needs to be understood within broader contexts. Migration was a perennial feature of the British political agenda throughout the twentieth century, and figured prominently in election campaigns in both France and Britain. There is a long British history, too, of local campaigns against particular groups of migrants, be they Jews, Commonwealth immigrants, refugees or asylum-seekers. The campaign to close Sangatte was part of a larger and longer war being waged against the entry of undocumented migrants into Britain, France and other European countries. Although most legal channels for entry into Britain (family reunification, labour migration) are strictly regulated, by the 1990s the perception that the government had lost control of the asylum system had become entrenched.

 

In the 1990s, Britain’s Conservative government had put in place a number of instruments for dealing with the movement of undocumented migrants travelling from France. The measures included safe-third-country provisions, which rule that someone travelling through a country in which her life is not at risk, with the intention of seeking asylum elsewhere, should be returned to that country. France is generally held to be such a country, and individuals arriving from France who were intercepted would usually be returned.

 

The European instrument that allocates responsibility for examining an asylum application is the 1990 Dublin Convention, which confers such responsibility on the country of first entry, except in certain specific circumstances. However, France’s administrative prefectures are reluctant to allow people to make a claim of asylum, and the Dublin Convention is an unwieldy and excessively bureaucratic instrument for assigning responsibility. Besides these legal difficulties, British control was undermined practically by the fact that most asylum-seekers on being returned to France would simply try again to reach Britain at the earliest opportunity. Furthermore, not everyone who enters Britain outside the legal migration channels goes on to claim asylum. If they don’t, it is possible for them to remain in Britain for long periods without coming to the attention of the authorities.

Why Britain?

One of the most frequently asked questions in relation to Sangatte was why people staying there didn’t apply for asylum in France if they were fleeing persecution. After all, France is a signatory of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and has a history of granting asylum at least as long as that of Britain. It also prides itself on being the birthplace of human rights.

 

The fact that people were travelling through other European countries, where they could have applied for asylum, to get to Britain was translated in many British minds into the idea that Britain was the “most attractive asylum destination in Europe”. This was the line pursued by Britain’s tabloid newspapers without exception, and also by some of the broadsheets, strengthening the perception that Britain was under siege.

 

The sense of crisis was compounded by accusations that France was making no effort to prevent migrants from heading for Britain, and that in fact it was quite happy to see them leave French shores. Reports by FIDH and other NGOs alleged a French policy of dissuading people from making asylum claims. Eurotunnel also accused the French authorities of inaction on asylum-seekers. In February 2002, during its second appeal to the French courts to annul the requisition order allowing the Sangatte camp to be opened, Eurotunnel showed video footage of crowds of immigrants storming the compound over Christmas 2001 as the French police looked on.

 

Although most of the British press and some Conservative members of Parliament argue that migrants prefer Britain because it is a “soft touch”, that is, gives generous welfare benefits and is unable to deport those who do not have permission to remain, the reality is more complex. It is true that conditions for asylum-seekers in France are very difficult. For a start, applying for asylum is something of a challenge. People wishing to claim asylum from within France (rather than at the border) must first go to the relevant prefecture. They are asked to return for an appointment when they will be allowed to make their application. This may not be for up to nine months. Once the application has been made, the file is sent to the refugee and stateless person protection office to be examined, a process that usually takes between eighteen and twenty-four months, but can take up to forty-five months.

 

Those who have made an application are entitled to a monthly allowance of 280–305 euros (approximately £190) for the first twelve months. Only around 15 per cent are entitled to be housed in an accommodation centre, but these centres are usually full and, as in Britain, there is strong local resistance to proposals to open new ones. Importantly, in France asylum-seekers are not allowed to work. The French authorities and the French press continually attributed the preference of Sangatte’s inhabitants for Britain to this single factor.

 

Another argument used to explain why those at Sangatte wanted to get to Britain was the difference in recognition rates. However, while the percentage of those granted refugee status in France is low (approximately 10 per cent), it is actually about the same as in Britain. The number of those granted the lesser status of asile territoriale—an exceptional status accorded to certain nationals, particularly Algerians—also tends to be about 10 per cent. In Britain, the percentage of those granted the similar status of having “exceptional leave to remain” is usually a little higher.

 

Unofficial and informal surveys of the Sangatte camp residents indicate that less than 1 per cent had claimed asylum in France. But tens of thousand of people do apply for asylum in France each year: Sangatte’s residents were not representative of either undocumented migrants or asylum-seekers in France generally. They were a group of people who wanted to go to Britain, so naturally they did not apply for asylum in France. Although there are fewer asylum-seekers in France than in Britain (the French figure was less than half the British one in 2001), it seems likely that the number of undocumented migrants (or sans papiers) is much higher in France than in Britain: that is, people choose to stay in France even though they do not or cannot claim asylum. It is hard to compare numbers because although there have been regularisation programmes in France that allow one to estimate very roughly the size of the undocumented population, there has been no similar programme in Britain.

‘Pull’ Factors

Migrants who make their way to Calais and elsewhere on the northern French coast are not drawn to Britain in the expectation of welfare benefits or housing. More important “pull” factors are social networks such as friends and family, the prospect of work, English as the national language, and the persistent belief that Britain is a place where human rights are respected. Certainly, there are differences between the two countries. It is easier to enter the asylum process in Britain. For example, migrants asking for asylum at a police station in London, say, will be directed to the immigration and nationality department in Croydon. There, they will also be informed about their entitlement to accommodation and support, minimal though these provisions are. (However, there is also the possibility that they will be held for up to a year in a detention centre resembling a prison, whereas in France asylum claimants cannot be held longer than twenty days.)

 

During the period Sangatte was open, asylum applicants in Britain were likely to be housed by a local authority (depending on when and under what circumstances they entered the country) or by the National Asylum Support System, which would also issue a voucher.¹ For a while this voucher was exchangeable only for goods in certain shops, but it later became exchangeable for cash. Most importantly, until November 2002, asylum applicants could after six months apply for, and would usually be granted, a work permit. Though many asylum‑seekers found it difficult to get properly documented work, for most this was a secondary consideration: the key fact was that they would be able to work and earn money to send home. This was the view of France’s interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, who in May 2002 argued that Britain must shoulder some of the responsibility for the situation. He claimed immigrants were drawn to Britain by the promise of work and more lax identity rules than obtained in France. (Regarding this last point, although the existence of identity cards in France may make life more difficult for migrants, it has not stopped them from coming and settling there.)

 

These, then, are the reasons that most migrants are drawn to Britain: networks of friends, family and contacts, the possibility of work, the knowledge of or desire to learn English and the belief, however erroneous, that in England they will be treated fairly. Unable to enter via airports because of visa restrictions, some try to enter via the Channel ports, of which Calais is the most significant embarkation point. This is because of the Channel Tunnel and the ferry port, and the volume of traffic through each, which makes more than a cursory immigration check impossible. The people trying to enter Britain this way know that if they keep trying they will eventually succeed. When Sangatte was open, the maximum number of migrants it accommodated was 1,650, but it was estimated that up to 65,000 people passed through its doors en route to England. Given that many people tried and failed repeatedly, such figures should be treated with caution. However, this was the heart of the “crisis”: thousands of illegal immigrants were attempting to enter Britain, and Sangatte was facilitating this process at best and acting as a magnet at worst.

A ‘Crisis’ Is Born

Although the camp had entered British public consciousness to an extent in 2000, it was with the start of the election season in 2001 that the Sangatte “crisis” really took off. Recognising that fines alone would not suffice to curb the number of people seeking to enter Britain outside legal migration channels, in February 2001 the then home secretary, Jack Straw, floated the idea of processing the claims of asylum-seekers close to their region of origin so that only recognised refugees would be allowed to enter Europe.

 

The opposition Conservatives were criticised during the campaign for making election issues of migration and asylum, but Straw himself turned up the heat following the arrival in France of nine hundred shipwrecked Kurds in the middle of February. He announced that he had telephoned his French counterpart, Daniel Vaillant, to remind him that the Dublin Convention obliged France, as the first EU country the Kurds had entered, to process their claims. Moreover, Britain would be entitled to send back to France any of the Kurds who crossed the Channel. Clearly, the British government was determined that in the coming election it was going to be seen to be tough on unwanted migration; and since there was a perception that France was indifferent to Britain’s alleged illegal entry problems, this meant being seen to be tough with the French.

 

Eurotunnel emphasised Sangatte’s potential involvement, warning that the camp would be unable to cope with the influx of another nine hundred asylum-seekers. Nonetheless, at this stage the British Home Office was not interested in Sangatte itself. The Conservatives, however, supported Eurotunnel in its concerns about the camp. In March 2001, Michael Howard, a former Conservative home secretary, told BBC radio that “I have visited the centre at Sangatte and it exists simply and solely to provide food and shelter for people who want to enter this country illegally”. Now firmly on the campaign agenda, Sangatte made the headlines again when in April the then shadow home secretary, Anne Widdecombe, was refused entry to the shelter by the Red Cross. She supported the demands of the freight associations and Eurotunnel that the camp be closed, and accused the French government of “looking the other way” while the Sangatte migrants “smuggled” themselves into Britain. For her part, immigration minister Barbara Roche praised Eurotunnel for its efforts before announcing new penalties on rail companies that failed to prevent stowaways from boarding freight wagons. The penalties, she said, should help stem the flow of migrants breaking into the terminal.

 

The election campaign had helped focus attention on Sangatte and the issue of asylum-seekers, and both remained in the public eye after the voting was over. Following the 2001 election, David Blunkett took charge at the Home Office. Within days he announced new proposals to open channels for legal migration and a crackdown on trafficking in people. Observers had long warned that the emphasis on tightening migration controls and announcing further measures against asylum-seekers would lead to a rise in racism and racist attacks. The summer of 2001 saw the murder of Firsat Dag, a Kurdish asylum-seeker in Glasgow, and a massive rise in attacks on asylum-seekers, especially in the dispersal areas.

 

These events received very little media coverage in comparison with Sangatte and the eruption of riots in northern English towns involving the children and grandchildren of older migrants. The juxtaposition of the riots, which had been provoked by racists, with Sangatte seemed to galvanise the home secretary, but rather than address the racism and the social and economic conditions that lay at the root of the violence, Blunkett focused instead on migration controls and the need for minorities to integrate, thus seemingly legitimising the fears and prejudices of many of those watching the arrivals from across the Channel.

 

Throughout the summer of 2001, the British media carried reports of Sangatte residents risking their lives by trying to walk through the tunnel or swim the Channel with the aid of airbeds. These reports frequently used military metaphors such as “assault” and “invasion” to describe the migrants’ attempted entry to Britain. On occasion, the tunnel had to be closed because there were migrants on foot in it. At the end of July, the increasing obstacles and longer waiting periods facing those trying to get to Britain led to tensions between different groups in Sangatte and resulted in fights and brawls, in one of which fifteen people were injured and taken to hospital. The frustration of those staying at the camp, who were finding it more difficult to cross the Channel, was growing.

London Shifts Stance

The policy of pressurising the companies whose trains and trucks were being used by the migrants was stepped up. Blunkett planned to impose financial penalties on Eurotunnel as well from October 2001, even though German hauliers were intending to challenge the legality of the fines and most British firms had not paid them, but were waiting for their appeals to be heard. By this point, the fines levied amounted to approximately £12 million. Eurotunnel launched a major offensive against Blunkett’s proposals.

 

On 15 August 2001, Eurotunnel initiated a legal challenge against the British government’s plans and six days later went to the French courts to challenge the legal basis for the camp at Sangatte. Eurotunnel sought the closure of the camp and its return to the company. Describing the situation as “urgent and intolerable”, Eurotunnel said it had stopped 18,500 “potential illegal immigrants” from reaching Britain in the first half of 2001 alone and demanded that the requisition order against Sangatte be suspended while judges considered the case for the centre’s closure. On 21 August, the Home Office said the government did not believe that closing Sangatte would solve the problem, as those determined to reach Britain would gather in Calais regardless. Events then accelerated and policy seemed to change remarkably quickly. On 2 September, Blunkett finally telephoned Vaillant in France to say that the camp was not helping the situation, to ask that it be closed and to arrange a meeting for 12 September. How was Blunkett persuaded to fall in with Eurotunnel and work towards the closure of Sangatte?

 

On the night of 29–30 August, forty-four people had been picked up several miles inside the tunnel, necessitating its closure overnight, and returned to Sangatte. Three hundred others had been picked up at the entrance. A Home Office spokeswoman responded with the standard line that ferry operators, road hauliers and freight-train companies were all liable for penalties if they failed to “take responsibility for putting in place effective measures to prevent people travelling to the UK illegally”. She added that the government saw “no reason why Eurotunnel should be treated any differently to anyone else”.² The next day, eighty people were intercepted by security guards after cutting through the Coquelles terminal’s perimeter fence and making their way to the train platforms. The Home Office again condemned Eurotunnel’s security measures as ineffective and stressed that it was the company’s “responsibility to make sure people do not get through to Britain from their tunnels”. A spokeswoman said the Home Office was doing “everything possible” to help Eurotunnel but the company was still failing to stem the flow of refugees.³ On 2 September, a further 100 people were found in the compound at Coquelles.

Press Hysteria

The British press went into a frenzy. Throughout August and September, every front page, broadsheet and tabloid alike, carried reports on Sangatte. Television crews, at the invitation of Eurotunnel, filmed dozens of young men and some women and children as they cut and crawled through the fences and ran along the railway tracks. Blunkett was attacked for not heeding the warnings and responding to the crisis sooner. The Daily Express, following an approach from Eurotunnel, demanded a strengthening of Britain’s borders. The tabloid ran headlines such as “Stop the Invasion”, “We Can’t Take Any More Asylum-Seekers”, “Asylum Invasion Reaches 12,000 a Month”, “Asylum: We’re Being Invaded” and “Refugees, Run For Your Life”. Another tabloid, the Daily Mail, took up the demands of a Conservative MP to send British troops to patrol the French coast. The opposition party maintained the pressure, with senior figures condemning the government’s handling of the crisis.

 

Given the coverage, one might have assumed that the number of asylum applications had increased sharply, and perhaps that during July, August and September there was a distinct bulge. Yet, as Table 1 shows, while the number of people applying in the third quarter of 2001 (July–September) increased by more than three thousand in comparison with the previous quarter, it was still considerably lower than the figures for the same period in both 2000 and 1999. The number of applications increased again in the last quarter of 2001 (by 355), but again it was lower than during the same period in the previous two years. Home Office figures do not indicate whether these increases were due to arrivals from across the Channel, let alone to arrivals specifically from Sangatte. 

 

 

 

 

Also revealing is a comparison of the total number of asylum applications in 1999, 2000 and 2001 (see Table 2). Overall, excluding dependants, the number of applications received in 2001 was 71,365, 12 per cent (8,950) down on 2000. If dependants are included, the drop is slightly less dramatic, 7 per cent (4,900), but nonetheless significant. In comparison with 1999, the difference in numbers is negligible—205 more than 1999 excluding dependants, 800 more including dependants. 

 

 

 

 

In other words, the numbers coming into Britain did not warrant the hysterical reaction of the press or policymakers. All that had changed was that the media spotlight had been focused on Sangatte and its residents, and the costs to the companies who brought the migrants to Britain had jumped significantly. Despite contributing an article to the Guardian in which he denied that the agenda would be set by the press, Blunkett was under pressure to be seen to do something. Closing the camp at Sangatte must have seemed the quickest and easiest way of appeasing his opponents, far easier than taking on the combined might of the media, Eurotunnel, the freight companies, the Conservative party and a public that believed what it read in the papers. Blunkett made a statement promising to get a grip on the situation and to work towards the closure of the camp. Eurotunnel had won half its battle. Now all that remained was to convince the French.

The Impact of 11 September

Following its first peak, the Sangatte crisis was increasingly affected by international developments. The 11 September attacks put Afghanistan centre-stage, and in his subsequent “axis of evil” speech President George W. Bush drew a link to Iraq. Most of Sangatte’s residents came from these two countries. Clearly, they saw the danger: in October 2001, the Afghans at the camp issued a statement that both condemned the suicide aeroplane hijackers and pleaded against attacks on the Afghan people. On 3 December 2001, the Daily Express carried an unsubstantiated story alleging that members of the al-Qaeda terrorist group appeared to be infiltrating Sangatte. Support for far-right parties was growing across Europe. In 2002, Pim Fortuyn’s anti-immigrant party came joint second in Holland’s general election, and Jean-Marie Le Pen reached the second round in France’s presidential contest. Although Le Pen was eventually defeated, he succeeded in frightening the French and British governments into even tougher anti-immigration stances: while campaigning, he had promised to use the French navy to deport the Sangatte camp residents.

 

The frenzy in the press across the Channel had not gone unremarked in France, although the majority view seemed to be that the problem was Britain’s. The French government was under no obligation to stop anyone leaving France and going wherever they wished. The camp at Sangatte was a humanitarian response to the visible needs of people who had been sleeping rough on the beach and on park benches in Calais and surrounding villages. It was also a means of maintaining some control over the situation. At least with the camp open, migrants were less visible and, from the perspective of the French police, less of a threat to public order.

 

Successive mayors of the small town of Sangatte had called for the camp to be closed, usually following outbreaks of violence there. Certainly, some of the local population also wanted it closed and took to the streets on at least one occasion. However, for the French authorities in Calais and Paris there was no question of closing it down. The deputy mayor of Calais, Jean Marc Ben, said closing the refugee camp would have no effect on stopping illegal immigration into Britain. “Calais has become a natural and inevitable crossing point. The problem is a political problem. France and Britain are passing the buck.”⁴ His perspective might have been coloured by a desire to keep the camp residents within the jurisdiction of his colleague at Sangatte, rather than on the streets of Calais.

 

The day after the 11 September attacks, Blunkett’s meeting with his French opposite number Vaillant went ahead. The result was an announcement that the Home Office would advise Eurotunnel on security at Coquelles, and that the French would become more active in intercepting people trying to board the trains. However, it was also declared that the real solution lay in harmonisation of asylum reception across the European Union, reform of the Dublin Convention and new measures to combat “asylum-shopping”—the practice of migrants in moving from one country to another until they find one prepared to give them protection. This was a compromise statement, reflecting the French position that it was up to Britain to harmonise its treatment of asylum-seekers with France’s, i.e., withdraw the right to work so as to make itself a less attractive destination, and Britain’s position that the Dublin Convention should serve to share out the burden of asylum-seekers.

 

The immediate consequence of the meeting was that security at Coquelles was stepped up, the Home Office sent 174 extra immigration officers to control the post and French plans to open a second Red Cross holding centre near the Channel ports were (temporarily) dropped. As a result of the tightened security at Coquelles, attempts by migrants to access the tunnel decreased, though pressure on the nearby Frethun freight yard intensified. At the end of October 2001, 300 people cut through the fence there in an attempt to board cross-Channel freight trains and 154 were taken into custody. In November, seventy-four managed to get through the tunnel via Frethun before being picked up in Folkestone. As soon as one route was sealed, another was sought.

 

The 11 September attacks provided Blunkett with the authority to introduce tough new asylum plans. Admittedly, these seemed to reflect some acknowledgement of the argument that without legal channels of entry, people would enter illegally and increasingly turn to traffickers. The new proposals permitted the entry of highly skilled and seasonal agricultural workers. But Blunkett also set about making Britain less attractive to asylum-seekers by curtailing their appeal rights, withdrawing the right to asylum of claimants suspected or convicted of terrorist activities, removing the automatic right to a bail hearing that had been introduced as recently as 1999, and cutting back social provisions even further.

The Closure of Sangatte

Eventually, in response to Britain’s above concessions and continuing pressure, France in September 2002 set a date for the closure of the Sangatte camp. It was agreed that with immediate effect the residents of the camp would be registered, that from 15 November no more new arrivals would be accepted and that by April 2003 the camp would be closed. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the International Organisation for Migration would play an advisory role and facilitate “voluntary” returns of Sangatte migrants to their home countries. France would offer 2,000 euros (£1,300) to those who agreed to go back, though there would also be forced repatriations if necessary.

 

At the beginning of November, in a last-minute display of sabre-rattling, British prime minister Tony Blair claimed that a series of parliamentary defeats inflicted on the government’s new asylum bill on human rights grounds jeopardised the closure of Sangatte.⁵ However, the next day France decided to close the camp to new arrivals ten days early. This immediately made it clear that Sangatte’s closure would resolve nothing. Within three days, the mayor of Calais, faced with dozens of people wandering the streets without food or shelter, was asking for the camp to readmit new arrivals. Local humanitarian groups accommodated some of the excluded migrants in a school, while about thirty others sought shelter in the local railway station. Between 70 and 100 new arrivals, mostly Iraqi migrants, occupied a church with the support of local campaign groups. The Iraqis wanted to be allowed to go Britain and refused or disbelieved the French government’s offer to consider their asylum claims.

 

Finally, on 2 December, the two governments announced that the camp would close at the end of the year, four months earlier than originally planned. Of the 1,600 people then present in the Sangatte shelter, 1,200 would be allowed to travel to Britain. One thousand Iraqis would be granted four-year work visas and two hundred Afghans would be allowed to join their relatives. France would process the asylum claims of the remaining four hundred and also of the three thousand other migrants in the Calais area who had registered at the Sangatte centre since it closed its doors to new residents the previous month.

 

Blunkett explained that the Iraqis were being given work permits and permission to stay so that they would not apply for asylum and become a burden on taxpayers. The irony is that most asylum-seekers in Britain, especially now that their right to work there has been abolished, would like just what he had granted the Iraqis: the security of knowing that they are safe for four years and may work and provide for their families. Instead, they are dispersed away from their communities to inadequate housing and are dependent on minimal income support from the state.

Problem Solved?

The handling of the Sangatte issue was notable for the way in which a consensus developed between the British government, the press, the public, road and rail transporters, and finally the French government, that Sangatte was a problem that had to be removed. If Sangatte was the problem, then presumably its closure must constitute the successful resolution of the crisis. Eurotunnel and the other freight companies that fought so hard to have it closed it no doubt do regard it as a success. In the short term, there may be a reduction in the number of migrants attempting to enter Britain via Calais, providing further “proof” that closing Sangatte was the right thing to do. However, days after Blunkett and Vaillant’s successor as French interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, made the final arrangements for the closure of the camp, twelve men and women were found sealed inside a container truck in Folkestone. This time all survived. It will not be long before other trucks are opened that contain corpses instead of living human beings.

 

Sangatte was only a temporary distraction. Thousands of people, but no one knows how many thousands, enter and will continue to enter Britain each year without going through legal migration channels. A proportion, no one knows how small or large, are caught and the rest are not. Some enter the asylum system and are provided with accommodation and support by government agencies, or by families and friends. Others remain outside official channels, without leave to remain and without work permits. Yet they find work and shelter and survive, some under better conditions than others. That people in these circumstances represent a challenge for the British government is true—but which challenge?

 

Successive governments have chosen to see these entrants and residents as a challenge to their sovereign right and duty to control Britain’s borders. The government tactics and strategies outlined above in relation to Sangatte were designed to meet just that challenge. On 18 June 2000, the bodies of fifty-eight Chinese men and women were found in the back of a truck at Dover. Since then, others have died crossing the Channel. Closing Sangatte, imposing more restrictions, will do nothing to stop the tally of deaths from growing. If anything, such measures will only make the risks greater. They may temporarily reduce the numbers coming via a particular route, but past experience, especially of the 1993, 1996 and 1999 Immigration and Asylum Acts, has shown that the number of entrants is far more sensitive to events outside Britain than it is to domestic legislation and regulation. Yet borders are so closely linked to issues of security and sovereignty that governments and ministers have to be seen to engage in the battle for control. Reframing the issue as one of concern for the welfare of all those resident within the jurisdiction of a state appears to be beyond the imagination and capability of the British government (and other European governments).

 

By focusing on Sangatte, the British (and French) governments created a false crisis and failed to identify and address the real challenges posed by undocumented migrants. These include the precarious existences most of them are forced to endure because of their undocumented and hence exploitable status. They also include the political, social and economic conditions in their countries of origin, which make staying in a bleak hangar in northern France, risking one’s life to cross the Channel, facing the hostility of the natives and the exploitation of traffickers and employers, all preferable to returning home.

 

Endnotes

1. The right to accommodation was subsequently removed from many asylum-seekers by the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act of 2002.

 

2. Mary O’Hara, “44 Caught in Channel Tunnel”, Guardian (London), 31 August 2001.

 

3. Mary O’Hara, “Home Office Condemns Eurotunnel’s Poor Security”, Guardian (London), 1 September 2001.

 

4. “French Refugee Centre Plans Attacked”, BBC News Online, 6 September 2024 [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1523483.stm].

 

5. The bill did eventually become law as the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act of 2002.