Syrian refugee crisis.
#1083
BE Enthusiast




Joined: Apr 2008
Posts: 303











Victoria, the capital of BC, is about to face its own Syrian refugee crisis. The vacancy rate for rental accommodation is very low, rents are high, and it was very hard to find anywhere to house a few privately sponsored migrants who arrived a few weeks ago. Now 200 government sponsored migrants have landed there with another 200 due to arrive shortly. With the city struggling to cope with at least a hundred homeless camped out, bringing in this influx with no housing for them is utterly irresponsible.
#1084
Part Time Poster









Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 4,219
From: Worcestershire











Talking to a colleague based in Turkey all media is shutdown on this, and any info is being passed around by Whatsapp and facebook
#1085
Victoria, the capital of BC, is about to face its own Syrian refugee crisis. The vacancy rate for rental accommodation is very low, rents are high, and it was very hard to find anywhere to house a few privately sponsored migrants who arrived a few weeks ago. Now 200 government sponsored migrants have landed there with another 200 due to arrive shortly. With the city struggling to cope with at least a hundred homeless camped out, bringing in this influx with no housing for them is utterly irresponsible.
#1086
Quite what the solution to all of this is?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/12162824/Anyone-who-think-Westerners-are-flocking-to-Isil-because-of-the-Iraq-war-is-a-fantasist.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/12162824/Anyone-who-think-Westerners-are-flocking-to-Isil-because-of-the-Iraq-war-is-a-fantasist.html
#1087
BE Enthusiast




Joined: Apr 2008
Posts: 303











Apart from Nanaimo and Victoria,towns on Vancouver Island are small. Because of the mild climate, several are primarily retirement communities. There is very little industry, and rental housing is not easy to find. Any migrants that have come here have been small families privately sponsored, usually by church groups. Accommodating large groups of government sponsored migrants would be extremely difficult anywhere on the island, especially after federal funding for towns doing so will end in March 2017. Homeless people tend to gravitate to coastal BC and we have a problem in my area dealing with the 200 plus homeless already here. I don't think that sending migrants to any community where there is little work and no adequate housing is a solution any more than pretending that packing large families into hotel rooms for several months is humanitarian. Our resources would be much better directed to helping migrant camps in Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey to develop into well-serviced small towns. They are already moving in that direction. Statistics show that few migrants there have any great interest in coming to a country far from their own, with a brutal climate, and where they don't speak either official language.
#1088
Apart from Nanaimo and Victoria,towns on Vancouver Island are small. Because of the mild climate, several are primarily retirement communities. There is very little industry, and rental housing is not easy to find. Any migrants that have come here have been small families privately sponsored, usually by church groups. Accommodating large groups of government sponsored migrants would be extremely difficult anywhere on the island, especially after federal funding for towns doing so will end in March 2017. Homeless people tend to gravitate to coastal BC and we have a problem in my area dealing with the 200 plus homeless already here. I don't think that sending migrants to any community where there is little work and no adequate housing is a solution any more than pretending that packing large families into hotel rooms for several months is humanitarian. Our resources would be much better directed to helping migrant camps in Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey to develop into well-serviced small towns. They are already moving in that direction. Statistics show that few migrants there have any great interest in coming to a country far from their own, with a brutal climate, and where they don't speak either official language.
Article in this week's Economist explains that most asylum seekers in the UK are being sent to Stockon etc, where housing is more affordable. They often languish there for many many years.
#1089
Or is Stockon some refugee camp which has been under-reported in the UK press?
#1090
Not a camp, but a coordinated policy of placing refugees in a low cost geographic area.
http://www.economist.com/news/britai...ginal-benefits
Last edited by Shard; Feb 18th 2016 at 10:18 am. Reason: Add link
#1091
Thread Starter
Lost in BE Cyberspace










Joined: Nov 2011
Posts: 21,578
From: Somewhere between Vancouver & St Johns











The North West are allegedly taking in 1/4 of the refugees.
The South East are taking in approx 333 refugees.
These figures are in relation to the 20,000 Syrian refugees only and not others.
#1092
BE Enthusiast




Joined: Apr 2008
Posts: 303











The problem about trying to place migrants in a low-cost area is that they don't want to stay there. As soon as they can, they move to bigger centres where there are more people of their own culture. Some very recent articles report that migrants are starting to trickle back from Europe,e.g., from Finland to Iraq because they don't like the weather,the culture, and are failing to get the economic benefits they came for. Even the Canadian PM with his "sunny ways" can't change the climate in Canada so instead of bungling around trying to bend language requirements and to make something work which patently isn't, the Canadian government needs to take some lessons from Europe and to face up to the difference between humanitarianism and humbug (nothing to do with Scrooge, just false or deceptive behaviour).
#1093
Absurdly warm in Regina and no snow so good refugee weather this year! It rained a bit today.
Last edited by caretaker; Feb 18th 2016 at 12:09 pm. Reason: We don' need no steenking reasons.
#1094
I'm sure I posted a link to the wintry conditions in the refugee camps that the arrivals in Canada experienced for a couple of years or more.
This isn't the one but it will suffice.
Syrian refugees caught in winter's grip – in pictures | Global development | The Guardian
This isn't the one but it will suffice.
Syrian refugees caught in winter's grip – in pictures | Global development | The Guardian
#1095
BE Enthusiast





Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 605











This is an interesting development. Norway is introducing legislation to allow the Norwegian government to deny asylum to asylum seekers (even if their claim is valid) contrary to international law in "force majeure" circumstances. Other aspects in the bill allow them to deny Asylum to people who do not come direct from the conflict area.
Norwegian government: We will abandon international law if Sweden collapses
original interview
Norge vil bryde folkeretten og afvise flygtninge i krisetilfælde - Nationalt | www.b.dk
Norwegian government: We will abandon international law if Sweden collapses
original interview
Norge vil bryde folkeretten og afvise flygtninge i krisetilfælde - Nationalt | www.b.dk
Last edited by paw339; Feb 22nd 2016 at 11:05 am.



