A Star reader’s letter on 18 August described Sheffield as a ‘City of Scum’ and “…being swamped and drowned by immigrants…”. This is so wrong on so many levels. The only ones drowning are desperate men, women and children trying to escape war and persecution primarily in Syria, Afghanistan and Eritrea. According to Britain’s Refugee Council, since 2011 the number of refugees in the UK has fallen from 193,600 to 117,161. With the UK population at 65 million, refugees account for less than 0.2% of us. Please, can we stop whipping ourselves into a rage about immigrants – we are not being swamped. In the first 6 months of 2015, about 172,000 applied in Germany out of 400,000 asylum applications lodged across EU member states. The UK received fewer than 9,500 applicants. By the year end Germany expects around 800,000 applicants and is now calling on all EU countries to take a fair share. This is clearly a major humanitarian issue, but one which can be matched if the will can be found for a cooperative European wide response.
Stewart Kemp
Ecclesall ward Green Party
Let’s take a poll on IF we want any more imigrants in Sheffield
Sorry I didn’t hear that – did you say NO to a poll. We can obviously afford to so why not ?
Surprise surprise !
OK, I’ve launched a new poll. I think we’ll find Sheffield people are mostly compassionate and want to help people fleeing from the war in Syria.
i welcome the chance to show our humanity to others in need wherever they are from. It is the right thing to do. It’s about time people realised that the problems our society has are a result of an uncaring government who simply do not care about its people and nothing to do with people fleeing war and persecution. Refugees will make a positive contribution to our country not a negative one but only if we embrace them and not demonise them. We need to stand up and show our politicians that we want to do what is morally right regardless of whether it is difficult or not.
I’ve voted yes. The government is very happy at refugees being used as a scapegoat by all the evil tabloid newspapers so it doesn’t have to take responsibility for what essentially is its own fault. They turn people against the most vulnerable people in society, not the richest and the most abhorrent. I can assure those of you that spout abuse about refugees would most definitely run to another country if you were having your life threatened, being raped and beaten.