Not just workers” “

The introduction of a “green card” for immigrants legally entitled to work in the EU and a European “labour exchange” to provide a clearing house for the supply and demand of manpower from abroad: these are just some of the proposals contained in the Green Paper on “economic migration” presented in recent days by the European Commissioner for justice Franco Frattini, and adopted at Strasbourg by the Commission in the attempt to harmonize the immigration rules in the 25 member countries. We asked for a comment from Peter Verhaeghe , immigration expert of Caritas Europe. Europe is once again discussing a common policy on immigration. Is this a step forward? “We already had a document of this type in 2001, but unfortunately we have to recognize that we’ve made little progress since then. The tendency is to avoid discussion of the phenomenon of regular immigration. That’s why it’s a good thing that the European Commission is proposing a debate. But the situation is blocked from the political point of view. Each member state continues to have its personal policy on the management of migratory flows. And there’s no will to find common solutions at the European level. As we have seen with the European Constitutional Treaty, everything that concerns justice and internal affairs passes through the procedure of co-decision. But this does not happen as regards the problems of regular migration. A paradox is thus created: while measures may be taken on irregular immigration, the procedure of unanimity continues to be used for regular immigration”. So each country will continue to decide for itself on immigration quotas? And what do you think of the proposed “green card” and “labour exchange”? “Each country has its own policy and it won’t be easy to achieve a common European policy. Nor are the admission procedures that permit the labour market to react rapidly to any demand for foreign workers very realistic. It could be the case, for example, that today there’s a need for manpower in the building industry, but that there will no longer be any such need in six months’ time… So what should we do: send everyone home, or wait and see? It’s not so easy, because what we are dealing with are not just workers but persons. We need instead to place immigration in a wider context, not just limited to work. Besides, a policy of immigration that is reduced to establishing minimum entry quotas is not the only solution to solving the problem of irregular immigration. Opening up the ways of immigration helps to solve the problem of irregular immigration but it does not completely solve it”. It is estimated that Europe will have a need for 20 million immigrants, as a labour force, by 2030. Realistic figures? “For decades discussions have been raging between academics and sociologists, to plan the quantity of immigrants Europe needs to cope with the demographic crisis. There are opposing tendencies: those who think it is natural to reduce the number of inhabitants in the EU; and others who say that on the contrary we need fresh blood, more immigrants, because with an ageing population many Europeans will have a need for treatment and care, and there’ll be less workers and less contributors to the pension systems. I think the truth probably lies somewhere between these two extremes. Because if we want to maintain the population of the EU at high levels, absurdly high immigration would be necessary, and that is not realistic, because it’s not just a question of numbers: we also need to take into account the attitude of society and whether it is willing to accept new arrivals or not. In this regard it has been proposed that immigration should be encouraged from Eastern Europe to avoid too many cultural conflicts, but in this case too, if we use the argument of demographic trends, there’s a downside: Russia, for example, would as a result lose a third of its population by 2050. According to this criterion, we would then have to prevent at all costs any person of Russian origin from emigrating. In actual fact the situation is far more complicated than the figures might suggest”. What are your hopes? “The merit of this document is to re-launch a public debate that had been completely blocked. If we are lucky we might arrive at the next stage, with a new communication from the Commission and proposals and directives at the level of the European Union”.