The Uk Attracts Twice As Many Immigrants Than France

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2562534/UK-Europes-destination-immigrants-We-attract-twice-France.html

Now I wonder why, can it be the weather, the vast number of vacant jobs, the food, I wonder why?

[sandyRoe]

There was once a time when the sun never set on the British Empire. Many of the people coming now will speak English because of that colonial experience and a few might even consider England as their spiritual home.

[Gromit]

Until the financial crash, the UK was booming and economic migrants came for jobs. We were doing far better than France in the noughties which is why we were more attractive to EU migrants. Though the crash ended all that, we weathered the storm better than Spain or Greece where unemployment soared.

[RandyMarsh]

Britain today is a powerhouse of ideas, experiments, imagination.

[ummmm]

The people are very tolerant...

[sandyRoe]

Well, most of them...

[Gromit]

The Daily Mail website has crashed.

[ummmm]

oh nooooooooo...

[Gromit]

RandyMarsh

If

[anneasquith]

definitely the weather :) or maybe the French are more '' full up'' than Britain ?

[RandyMarsh]

Mushy peas and gravy.

[Gromit]

The UK already had a sizable Polish community of people who settled here after World War II. There are many Polish Clubs and communities. That would be a deciding factor for Polish economic migrants choosing between Britain and France.

[sp1814]

AOG

Part of the reason will be because of our burgeoning IT industry, and the City. London in particular is a huge international financial centre, with hundreds of investment banks, insurance companies, futures traders etc...all of whom have an international presence and whom have staff coming into (and going out of) the country on short term contracts.

In addition to this, we are a key destination for Eastern Europeans who want to work in the services, domestic, building trades.

Over the past eight years, we've had our house renovated/redecorated twice, and had electricians, plumbers, carpenters etc round - and on most occasions, the accent we hear is Eastern European.

I assume (without much knowledge of the economies of other European countries) that we offer decent salaries for skilled workers.

Perhaps our economy is that much more stable?

[youngmafbog]

Nothing to do with our over generous benefits system of course.

[FredPuli43]

Why choose France for the comparison? Why not Spain or Germany, or would that spoil the headline ?

[slaney]

These figures are from Eurostat and published in March of last year. There is an update due next month, and it will be interesting to see if there is any change.

http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/Migration_and_migrant_population_statistics

If instead of concentrating on one year (2011) one looks at the totals, there is a somewhat different picture...
"In absolute terms, the largest numbers of non-nationals living in the EU on 1 January 2012 were found in Germany (7.4 million persons), Spain (5.5 million), Italy (4.8 million), the United Kingdom (4.8 million) and France (3.8 million)"

[Prudie]

The French must be a factor

[FredPuli43]

Slaney, don't do that. You are spoiling the Daily Mail's message, using facts like that :)

[slaney]

Sorry Fred - I usually just let it lie...:)

[jno]

I think it's the food. Where else can you not only become a banker with million-pound bonuses but spend it on fish and chips?

[joeluke]

France is just a stopping off point for foreigners on their way to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow

AKA the UK