The current form of the EU’s upcoming Migration Pact “dismisses national democracy, is costly and harmful to member states’ sovereignty, [resulting] in more migration and insecurity in Europe,” conservative MEPs argued at the first press conference of the newly-founded Cross-Party Migration Policy Working Group in Brussels on Wednesday, April 26th.
“We consider this an existential issue with massive ramifications for all of Europe,” the press statement, signed by nine MEPs from various parliamentary groups. reads. However, by raising enough awareness, they hope to get the member states to ultimately alter the fate of the pact during the Council negotiations later this year.
The concerned MEPs—belonging to the ECR and ID groups—came together specifically to address the controversial migration package adopted by the plenary last week after a compromise on the text was approved in the European Parliament’s civil liberties committee.
As we reported then, the conservative MEPs who voted against the package believed it would only make illegal migration into Europe easier and raised frequent criticism against one particular provision that would allow the Commission to continue mandating migrant redistribution, also known as the migrant quota system.
Counterproposals on the Table
In his introduction, Swedish MEP Charlie Weimers (ECR), outlined the purpose of the working group: not only to protest the current implementation of the Migration Pact but to also develop alternative recommendations for the Parliament ahead of the trilateral negotiations between the EU institutions as well as for individual member states. As Weimers promised:
We will campaign at the member states against an open borders migration pact and the European Parliament’s left wing’s version of the migration pact, [and] we will write counter proposals for legislative texts that can be introduced in the future negotiations
As an example, Weimers brought up the Swedish government, which—largely due to internal political pressure—announced a few days ago that it will not accept the current form of the Migration Pact. Therefore, the EU member states will either reach an acceptable agreement in the Council or some countries will have to be allowed to walk away with Danish-style opt-outs that would guarantee that the new rules don’t apply to them.
At their first meeting on the same day, the policy group identified the main dangers of the pact, including “in particular, the mandatory [migrant] quotas and the power transfer from member states to Brussels.”
While it’s true that the text would allow the compulsory redistribution of migrants only after the previously established “voluntary solidarity mechanism” has been exhausted, that doesn’t mean it won’t happen. In fact, “it will be pretty soon, to be honest,” Weimers noted, reminding the room that solidarity pledges are rare and often not fulfilled, with only 500 migrants relocated out of the 8,000 that countries vowed to take in last year.
Nevertheless, the members of the policy group promised to “do everything [they] can to stop this left-wing compromise of the European Parliament” and to assist national governments to also do so on their own terms, Weimers underlined. He later added that by raising awareness among the European electorate, they can realistically expect to get enough national governments on their side to make a difference in the end.
“We are very hopeful to move things in the right direction,” he added.
What’s Really Behind the Pact
“The promise of European integration was to abolish internal borders and protect external borders,” Belgian MEP Tom Vandendriessche said, picking up the thread. But by failing to fulfill that promise, the EU created an asylum crisis to which the only solution it offers is the same as always: ever-closer union—which always means more bureaucrats and less democracy.
According to him, however, the Migration Pact wasn’t even designed with this crisis in mind, but rather as the solution to another problem: falling birthrates and consequent labor shortages.
“It is a plan constructed to force migration in Europe to repopulate” the continent, Vandendriessche said, adding that the Commission is talking about bringing in millions of both low- and high-skilled workers per year.
This notion was echoed by the Romanian Cristian Terheș as well, who said that even if Europe needs more workers, it should be up to the sovereign decision of the member states to invite labor through legal channels instead of centrally incentivizing illegal ones.
“It is easy for these bureaucrats in Brussels to impose on us Utopian solutions,” Terheș added, “but at the end of the day, it is up to each one of us to defend our borders, to defend our nations, and to defend our rights.” The most obvious solution, he said, is also the most democratic one, going toward the 2024 European elections:
It is important for the people of Europe to understand what is happening here. We have a majority in this parliament who clearly do not care about their rights. My call to all is to replace this political majority before they replace all of us.
One-Syllable Solutions: Walls and Laws
The MEPs agreed that the only way to guarantee a safe future for Europe is to find both physical and legal ways to secure the external borders.
In the physical sense, European member states should continue to push for central EU funds for border fences, as many already have done during previous Council negotiations. As MEPs Balázs Hidvéghi, Angel Dzhambazki, and Kosma Złotowski pointed out: their experiences in Hungary, Bulgaria, and Poland, respectively, clearly show that border walls are the most effective way of eliminating illegal crossings.
For places without a land border, such as the countries of the Mediterranean, the policy group also has a solid recommendation. “The only one proven way to stop deaths at sea: the Australian model,” Weimers explained to The European Conservative after the briefing, referring to the Pacific country’s explicitly stated law that bans people from ever traveling there or applying for asylum after being caught during an illegal entry attempt.
“The Australians got right,” the MEP said. “They know not to reward illegal migration. And that’s what Europe should follow.”
Of course, no protective infrastructure or no-return policy can withhold the increased migratory pressure if the current legal incentives remain in place. Therefore, any new law should start with making the definitive distinction between refugees and economic migrants.
“Asylum is misused as a gateway for migration,” Vandendriessche said, adding that “it is basically a business model for human smugglers.”
According to the Hungarian Balázs Hidvéghi, the EU’s failure to make this distinction—and thus providing economic migrants with legal protection and financial assistance that should only go to refugees—Brussels is creating a set of pull factors that further incentivize illegal migration.
We need ”to create a situation in Europe where legality is restored,” Hidvéghi said, pointing out that tolerating the fact that human smugglers and economic migrants abuse the European asylum system not only puts European communities at risk, but “also limits the European countries’ ability to help real refugees.”
Ultimately, of course, this all comes down to the age-old question of sovereignty. As Hidvéghi said:
There is a constant mixing of the two categories: a refugee and an economic migrant. Member countries have the right to decide about economic migration. It’s a member state competence, not something that Brussels or the EU institutions should decide. And those differences must be made and must be respected.
The Elephant in the Room: Where is the EPP?
When looking at the Migration Pact, one expects to see a classical left-right divide running through Parliament. However, the members of the cross-party policy group all come from either the ECR or the ID, which raises the question: where is the EPP?
While it’s true that all leftist parliamentary groups voted in favor of the proposal last week, they were joined by the center-right European People’s Party as well, the largest parliamentary group in Brussels. In fact, the EPP not only supports but is the main champion of the pact, with one of its MEPs responsible for submitting the version that was adopted last week.
Unfortunately, unless pressured by their electorate, there is little chance of future cooperation between the EPP and the policy group, Weimers told The European Conservative after the event.
The EPP chose to negotiate with the center-left (with the socialists and the liberals primarily, but also with the greens), thus excluding us from any possible compromise [in the EP]. That made it impossible for us to be as constructive as we wanted to [be].
What we hope now is that the EPP realizes that if they include mandatory migrant quotas in the future Migration Pact, they will insert conflict right into the heart of the European Union, and they will create problems that their own governments will have to deal with.
[Nonetheless,] many of our parties have a good, constructive dialogue with the EPP parties in our own member states and we intend to use that influence to further a realistic approach.
