Romania and Bulgaria controls lifted

[Jimbuna]

With the qualification rules to benefit entitlement having recently been tightened up I'm not so sure we will witness a mass migration into the UK.

My main concern is the effect it will have on the unemployment market, especially for those in lower paid work.

Only time will tell.

Citizens of Romania and Bulgaria can work without restrictions across the European Union from Wednesday.

Transitional controls were imposed by some member states on nationals of the two countries - the poorest in the bloc - when they joined the EU in 2007.

Their rights to work and claim benefits were limited for their first seven years of EU membership.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25565302

[Oberon]

POSITION OVERRUN STOP THOUSANDS OF THEM STOP DAILY EXPRESS WAS RIGHT STOP ONLY THE GHOST OF DIANA CAN SAVE US NOW STOP END

[Jimbuna]

LOL...this will surely cement the NMW in areas such as Norfolk/East Anglia.

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by Jimbuna

LOL...this will surely cement the NMW in areas such as Norfolk/East Anglia.

Cement? The area is virtually constructed from it! Still, I've seen a good cross section of native work ethic vs Eastern European work ethic and to be quite honest if what I've seen is anything to go by, we've no-one to blame but ourselves if the unemployment market dries up for the natives.
After all, how many British do you see willing to get up at 3am in the frost and cold to pick Brussel Sprouts?

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Oberon

Cement? The area is virtually constructed from it! Still, I've seen a good cross section of native work ethic vs Eastern European work ethic and to be quite honest if what I've seen is anything to go by, we've no-one to blame but ourselves if the unemployment market dries up for the natives.
After all, how many British do you see willing to get up at 3am in the frost and cold to pick Brussel Sprouts?

That is very true but you and I both know that is not how a sizeable majority of the voters will see it come the next election.

IMHO unemployment will match austerity in the forthcoming political debates.

The people have the scapegoat they needed to cry foul and blame others for a predicament many of them are actually partly the causation factor to.

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by Jimbuna

That is very true but you and I both know that is not how a sizeable majority of the voters will see it come the next election.

IMHO unemployment will match austerity in the forthcoming political debates.

The people have the scapegoat they needed to cry foul and blame others for a predicament many of them are actually partly the causation factor to.

That is exactly what worries me, the scapegoating of an entire subsection of society for political reasons. At the risk of Godwinning the thread so early in the day, it smacks of the vilification of the Jews in Europe in the 1930s, and we all know what that lead to. Whilst I would be surprised to see British concentration camps in my lifetime (even though we invented them) I do have my concerns on it increasing the rate of hate crimes against Eastern Europeans and those who 'look a bit foreign', in a manner similar to the small wave of violence against mosques that occurred after the murder of Lee Rigby, and that such hatred will be gleefully stoked by the media, desperate for rolling news and headlines, and by the politicians for cheap vote scoring.

[STEED]

Romania looks like they bought this on themselves judging from the book I'm reading. If Romania stayed out of the war they could have well been better off. Here is the few lines from "Death on the Don"...

Romania possessed one of the largest oil production and refinery complexes in the world.

Goes on about US investment and how all the oil sites...

pumped more than 600,000 metric tonnes of oil out of the ground every month. This incredible bounty was more than Germany, Italy, Hungary,Slovakia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Finland, Spain and Japan produced combined,

[Oberon]

Originally Posted by STEED

If Romania stayed out of the war

Bordered by Nazi Germany on one side and the Soviet Union on the other, they had about as much chance of staying out of the war as Hitler had of being cast as Shylock in the Third Reichs annual production of Merchant of Venice.