I visited the calais jungle with an interpreter. Ask me anything.

I went down with a charity that gives out food, toiletries etc.
I in all spent about a day there and was accompanied by an interpreter so i asked the locals pretty much every question I could even think of. So yh, people always ask about it, so whatever u want to know. Ask away!

Did you really speak to any of 'the locals'? Did you speak to any of the lorry drivers? How had the migrants' attitudes changed since the Brexit result?

1. when i said locals i meant the people in the jungle, sorry not the french locals of calais. 2.No, i did not get to speak to the lorry drivers either.3. No one knew anything about the brexit vote or what it even means. And when i talked to them about teresa may they didn't have a clue who she was either.

Which charity did you go with? What was the biggest thing you leant from your trip? Have you changed any of your opinions as a result of your visit?

Where did these people predominantly come from?
How did they get to Europe? What was that like?
Did you ask why they were attempting to access the UK rather than any other safe country in Europe?
In your opinion was their reason for doing this valid/reasonable?

1.Most travel from North Africa to sicily where they then pass through Italy, this is why most of the residents called me bambino, which is italian for child. Just a word they picked up. They talked about being very scared during the trip across water, and how they all quickly realised it wasnt drinkable.
2. They wanted to go to the UK, because they said as when they saw images on television, on their phones. The UK seemed like the place to be, they had heard stories about all the money and how everyone was happy. Then when they got to calais, the idea of people allowing them to pass through europe but couldn't get to the UK, made them think. That this place must be amazing if it is protected. Furthermore all the french people they saw were police that would round them and up and sometimes use tear gas. Whenever they saw an english person, they were from a charity, and would bring great gifts they described. A combination of all these things make England seem like heaven.
3. I'll leave that up to you

Could you give a bit more detail about how/why you went there, what charity and so on? What did the camp look like?

Thanks for the response. They're an interesting set of reasons for coming to the UK and I hadn't really considered these things. I assumed it was primarily what you first said, about money, but the other points are reasonable from their perspective. But from the perspective of a European, it seems as though the rest of Europe doesn't have a very good image. Maybe other European countries should be offering to take people in, rather than leaving it to the UK to sort out. The migrant crisis over the last year is not a crisis is everybody is spread around equally. In my town we have 22 Syrian refugees. Not exactly a crisis in a town of over 50,000! I think the Catholic church said that the "crisis" would be entirely managed if each parish took in one family. That's probably the only time I'll agree with the position of the Catholic church.

Yh i think accepting refugees is a reasonable position which i understand. The only confusion comes when people forget refugee includes those fleeing natural disasters, such as droughts. Which makes most of Africa potential refugees. Is it a viable scenario for 1.2 billion people to move to Europe. If people are allowed to move, will it just encourage more movement. The fact that many are stopped at calais has left many thinking they will just claim asylum in germany, france and some are even applying for asylum in canada. I want to be a very welcoming and kind person, but a solution to this problem can be very difficult!
Do we say we only accept refugees from conflict and persecution. I don't know. Lots to think about!

There is certainly a limit to the number of people who can come here, but the thing that a lot of people forget is that fleeing natural disasters or conflict is temporary. Draught is not permanent. War is not permanent. Once the threat is not an issue then there is no reason for asylum seekers to be in their temporary place of residence so the reasonable thing to do is for governments to pay for them to return to their homes (and potentially help them rebuild their homes if they have been destroyed). That policy becomes infinitely more challenging when asylum seekers start having children, as many countries will accept babies born in their country to be citizens. Forcing children to resettle in a new country is not something I'd want to do.

It's not an easy situation at all, and every policy will have flaws. We have some kind of duty to help people when we can, but we cannot give everything to everyone who asks for it forever. Some middle ground has to be found.

Were you culturally enriched

Once the threat is not an issue then there is no reason for asylum seekers to be in their temporary place of residence so the reasonable thing to do is for governments to pay for them to return to their homes (and potentially help them rebuild their homes if they have been destroyed