“Better deport”
Paris wants to deport unwanted migrants
12/06/2022, 8:46 p.m
Since Le Pen has been the largest opposition faction in France, asylum policy has been higher on the agenda. The government is now introducing a law that will make it easier for skilled workers to get a stay. Refugees without papers should have to leave the country immediately.
France’s government is planning a new migration law: It should make it easier to deport undocumented migrants and at the same time simplify employment in sectors with a shortage of staff. “It’s about better integration and better deportation,” Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said on France Info. Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne said at the opening of the debate that France “must be able to say who we want to take in” and “who we don’t want to take in”. “Zero immigration” is “neither desirable nor possible, nor more realistic than unregulated immigration,” Borne added.
In the future, the government wants to immediately ask rejected asylum seekers to leave the country without waiting for a possible objection. The asylum procedure should be shortened in principle. “We want those who work, not those who steal,” Darmanin said.
On the other hand, migrants who work in occupations with a shortage of skilled workers should be able to get a residence permit more easily. However, many details are still open, said Darmanin. “How many years should they have been in the country? Do we need quotas? The text hasn’t said anything about that yet,” Darmanin said. “We need a policy of toughness and humanity that corresponds to our values,” said French President Emmanuel Macron in an interview with the newspaper “Le Parisien” at the weekend.
Le Pen doubts its effectiveness
The right-wing opposition criticizes the government’s ideas as too lax. “In every legislative period there is a new major law, if not two. This will not change the situation either, or rather make it worse,” emphasized Marine Le Pen, leader of the right-wing populist Rassemblement National (RN). Believed that immigration in France was “out of control”. Conservative Republicans warned that “mass legalization” could occur. For their part, about 20 aid organizations criticized a “spiral of oppression”. “The planned measures threaten to curtail the rights of foreigners even further,” it said in a statement. France has passed almost 30 immigration laws since 1980.
The numbers make it clear how little the laws that have been in force for a long time are being followed. Last year, France asked 122,000 migrants to leave the country. Only 17,000 of them left the country voluntarily or because they were deported. The number of deportations has become an issue again in recent weeks after an Algerian woman who should have left the country was accused of killing a 12-year-old.
The bill is scheduled to be debated in the National Assembly in early 2023. Macron only introduced an immigration law in 2019 that was intended to speed up the asylum process. Since the Le Pen RN formed the largest opposition faction in the National Assembly in April, the issue of immigration has received increased attention.