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Post by Bonobo on Mar 23, 2008 20:32:47 GMT 1
I have no problems with poles working here if they come here to better their family life back home and the UK allows this then the poles can only be commended must be hard to leave your family for months on end.I watched a pro gramme on TV recently called"The Poles are Coming" It was centered around Peterborough it portrayed how hard working and loyal the Poles are . On interviewing local English they claimed they could not get work because of the Poles one was offered a job picking butternut squash he walked away saying he would rather be on benefits even though he said he would do any type of work.Such i s the mentality of British youth today many believe they are owed a living for some reason so if a nation of people arrive to work hard then this is no problem fortunately for me i have a secure job but for others they will have to improve their game plan. Franciszek, it is very clever of you to mention this famous programme. Many people saw it and I must say they generally have a similar opinion. What was the programme about? commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/ros_taylor/2008/03/the_poles_have_come.htmlThe presenter, Tim Samuels, spent much of the documentary in Gdansk and Peterborough, where the Polish community is now big enough to boast its own website. There he found a school where only one pupil spoke English as first language, where a GP had to employ translators for hundreds of new patients, and where the local youth complained that Poles were taking their jobs but turned down the opportunity to pick butternut squash for £7 an hour. Let's hope the £60m Alistair Darling announced today to equip the jobless for the workplace prepares them for a job they find more congenial.Yet, there are voices which oppose the supposition (or even accusation) that the British don`t want to work. Picking butternut squash is paid £7 per hour. It is really low for such a hard work and the local Brits sneer at such pay. Why so low? Because migrants are quite satisfied with it. Having migrant labour at their disposal, employers tend to lower wages. If there were no immigrants, employers would have to rise wages, making them attractive enough for natives. Isn`t it natural for some Brits to say that Poles and other immigrants steal their jobs? Here are some of these opposing statements from the forum on the cited above site: Refusing top work for pitiful wage is a sign of the innate class consciousness of working class in this geographical entity, a working class that gave us the Chartists, the levellers, one of the first Labour parties, trade unions, socialist suffragettes, the vote, the welfare state etc.
One of the saddest comments on the BBC site is from a local fenlander:"I'm English and I live in Lincolnshire and I know lots of people who struggle to find a job that is even at min-wage for a good 40hrs a week. If someone was to offer me a job for 7 pounds an hour picking up vegatables I would be in my work clothes right away no matter who the employer is."
He goes on to suggest that the BBC deliberately sought out people who didn't want to work. |
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 23, 2008 21:10:05 GMT 1
It also highlighted Poland's shortage of their own labour how bad is this situation? i would be interested to know Yes, there is a serious shortage of labour and companies have been complaining they are running out of workers. The overall economic situation is excellent, production has grown by 15% last year again, but advertisements about vacancies remain unanswered. It is a totally new situation because not long ago the official unemployment was 15%, people begged for work and were glad to have any. Now the roles have reversed - companies beg head hunters for labour. The average pay in Poland has risen 10% in the last year and is still up. To find specialists, employers must offer a really attractive salary. However, companies had brought it on their heads themselves. Their low pay policy and treating workers like cheap slaves resulted in Poles migrating to the West. I have been observing it and wondering how it will end. Salaries and wages can`t increase more or it will cause serious disturbances in economy. Currently the ruling politicians are thinking of opening the labour market for foreign workers: Chinese, Vietnamese, Ukrainians. When it happens, we might experience the same problem that Brits have nowadays. Cheap migrant labour who works more efficiently than natives for less money. How will Poles behave? Will they accuse foreigners of stealing their jobs and provoking employers to cut down on pay? |
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Post by franciszek on Mar 26, 2008 22:06:24 GMT 1
Very interesting will discuss this more with colleagues and get back to you thanks for how to tips logged on to photobucket. Will try quotes when i get my head round it.
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Post by valpomike on Mar 26, 2008 22:10:30 GMT 1
Polish people have come into the U.S.A. for over a hundred years, and this has been good for all, them and us.
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 26, 2008 23:05:31 GMT 1
Polish people have come into the U.S.A. for over a hundred years, and this has been good for all, them and us. Yes, it`s true but for the last 30 years the American authorities have been cutting down on the influx of Poles into the USA. E.g., the requirement to have a visa is still in force. |
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Post by franciszek on Mar 27, 2008 0:40:43 GMT 1
My local store sells Polish food because the community demands it .This is great for me because i can buy my boy Polish food teach him about Poland and some body else has a job every ones a winner.Polish people in the UK make the country i have always said that iam not English but iam half polish if there is such a thing but hey thats what iam.going to try and send photos soon thanks again for salt mines
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 27, 2008 21:24:04 GMT 1
My local store sells Polish food because the community demands it .This is great for me because i can buy my boy Polish food What food exactly? Tripes, for example? yes, it would be nice to see some photos. |
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Post by franciszek on Mar 27, 2008 21:49:43 GMT 1
What food exactly? Tripes, for example? no just simple stuff like jams,biscuits,cearals etc,my dad used to eat tripe couldnt stomach it myself (forgive the pun) but there are more Polish stores in town that i hope to check out this year |
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Post by franciszek on Mar 27, 2008 21:54:38 GMT 1
yes, it would be nice to see some photos. this will take a bit of time need to find the best photos and exactly how to do it printed your guide off so should be able to do it |
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 30, 2008 21:18:07 GMT 1
It seems that Poles are starting to cease stealing jobs. They are returning home, at least more are coming back than going to Britain. ft.onet.pl/0,8176,uk_labour_fears_as_migrants_go_home,artykul_ft.html Excerpt The number of eastern and central European workers registering to work in Britain fell last year for the first since their countries joined the European Union in 2004. Polish workers who came to Britain in large waves over the past four years are also being attracted home by rising wages and job opportunities in Poland.
Chris Kaufman, a national secretary responsible for agricultural workers at Unite, Britain’s biggest union, says: “Large numbers of migrant workers from the enlarged EU have been keeping the food industry ticking over for several years, because they have been prepared to work for the exceptionally low wages paid by the industry. But that pool of workers is shrinking, as hard-working migrants return home.”My former student who spent 2 years in Britain has just come back. He used to work as a builder, a very hefty guy he is, now he says he is going to get comparable wages, taking into consideration that British pound has dropped its exchange rate to Polish currency and living costs are still much lower in Poland. |
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Post by ozzy on Mar 30, 2008 22:02:40 GMT 1
That's right. I used to work in England during the holiday breaks but this year I decided to take a rest in Mazury and then find a job here, in Poland. Going abroad is no longer so profitable..
The last time I spent summer in Poland was 4 years ago
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Post by Bonobo on Apr 2, 2008 20:35:49 GMT 1
That's right. I used to work in England during the holiday breaks but this year I decided to take a rest in Mazury and then find a job here, in Poland. Going abroad is no longer so profitable.. The last time I spent summer in Poland was 4 years ago How about teaching? You are a student at the college. Don`t you have a job already? In a school and private lessons? PS. Yesterday my students told me they were not going to learn English as hard as they used to because with pound value dropping, it is senseless to go abroad to look for work, so they have lost their motivation. Of course they were joking in retaliation to the pressure I have incessantly exerted on them to learn the language. Partly, they were correct. The British pound is worth about 4.5 Polish zlotys now and still going down. www.money.pl/u/chart_NBP.php?waluta=789&date_from=-00-00&date_to=-00-00&period=36 months ago it was 6.50. Poles working abroad are crying. Some of them are coming back. |
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Post by Bonobo on Apr 9, 2008 21:45:57 GMT 1
An interesting article about Polish culture in Britian and how it breaks stereotypes about Polish workers and that sort. www.newstatesman.com/200803190029
Forget the jokes about Polish plumbers, cleaners and drivers who have lost their way - it's time to challenge such unthinking stereotypes. Perhaps you would like to think instead of Copernicus and Chopin, or of Czeslaw Milosz and Wislawa Szymborska, who were both Nobel laureates for literature at the end of the 20th century.
Or consider that since the country acceded to the EU in 2004, Polish cultural events in the UK have doubled in number each year, with 2008 looking busier than ever. On 28 February, the Kraków-based composer Krzysztof Penderecki premiered a new symphony at the Barbican with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. "Breaking the Rules", the British Library's exhibition of European avant-garde art from the early 20th century, boasts a substantial Polish section. The sixth Polish Film Festival, which opens in London on 10 April, will be the biggest yet. And many Polish writers are being translated into English.
"London is founded on the fetish of the box office," says Pawel Potoroczyn, director of the Polish Cultural Institute, with its headquarters in the West End. "Now that they're vying for the Polish pound, people are also beginning to wonder: 'What is Polish culture like? Polish cuisine?' And even, 'What is it like to be Polish?' People are trying to pronounce our names in the correct way, and that was not happening a couple of years ago. There has been a major shift in attitude."Polish culture site in Britain www.polishculture.org.uk/Events www.polishculture.org.uk/in_uk.php |
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Post by Bonobo on Oct 24, 2008 20:43:56 GMT 1
A new trend can be observed: Poles are coming back. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1080161/They-came-biggest-migrations-history-But-credit-crunch-bites-mass-exodus-Polish-workers-begins.html
They came in one of the biggest migrations in history. But as the credit crunch bites, the mass exodus of our Polish workers begins
By Victoria Moore
Last updated at 7:52 AM on 24th October 2008
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The pile of luggage at stand 20 in Victoria Coach Station in London is enormous.
There are old rucksacks and lurid holdalls, tatty boxes and dusty black suitcases spread out on the Tarmac, a mountain of worldly goods waiting to be loaded on the daily 3.30pm bus bound for Poland.
Inside it's rather warm and fusty, and 25-year-old David Dziergas is already hunkered down in his seat, preparing for the long haul of a 28-hour journey that will take him through France, Belgium, Holland, Germany and finally back to his home-town of Zywiec.
Homeward bound: Polish workers are returning home in their tens of thousands
When he gets there, he says, he won't be coming back. 'What's the point? I came to England a year ago for the same reason as everyone else - to earn money. But with the exchange rate so poor, you can't save enough to make it worth being away from your home country.
'I've already got a job back home - I'm going to be working for the Polish police. I won't be paid any more than I am over here, but in Poland life is cheaper, so what I do have will go further.'
He's not the only worker who has decided to give up on Britain and head back home.
The Polish government believes that over the next year, 400,000 Poles currently living and working here will make the same choice as David. Actually though, the exodus has already started.
Tens of thousands of Poles who had settled here are already thought to have returned home, driven back in part by the economic crisis.
'It's a significant trend,' agrees Michael Dembinski, head of policy at the British Polish Chamber of Commerce in Warsaw, 'although, at the moment, it's more of a trickle than a flood.'
Construction trade: Polish workers have found plenty of job opportunities on construction sites in Britain
He thinks two main factors are encouraging people to leave. 'First, the weak pound. On average, a Pole living in Britain saves about £500 a month to send back to their family.
'In 2004, that was worth about 3,500 zlotys. Now it's less than 2,500, and if you're working a long week but your family are receiving 30 per cent less, then that makes you think twice about whether being separated from them is worth it.
'Second, things are improving back in Poland: unemployment in the cities has fallen and the economy hasn't been hit as badly by the credit crunch.'
Wages in Poland have also been rising faster than they have in the UK, with the average monthly salary doubling to ?660 in the past few years.
This may still be less than Poles can earn in Britain, but the lower cost of living makes the prospect of a return look increasingly like a good idea.
On the bus, Pieter Kourelis, a quietly-spoken man with greying hair and not much English, says this is precisely why he has made the decision to go back after four years working as a pizza delivery man in Worthing.
'In England, everything is expensive and it's hard to get a proper job. I was made redundant and couldn't find new work, so I thought I'd go back where things are easier now.'
It's not long since the traffic was virtually all in the opposite direction. Poland became a fully-fledged member of the EU in 2004 and soon after the borders opened thousands like David and Pieter joined what is thought to be the biggest ever migration between two European countries.
They came to earn money, and the estimated 1.2 million Polish citizens who arrived brought with them good temperaments, a willingness to work hard and skills that were sorely needed.
Back in Poland, there were complaints that the country had been drained of talent as doctors, dentists and other professionals booked one-way seats on the increasing number of coaches bound for Britain, and took advantage of cheap flights to come in search of their fortune.
Work offers: Job adverts for Polish workers in Kings Newsagents in west London
Britain was the lucky beneficiary of a host of new talent.
In almost no time the Polish plumber - polite, cheap and reliable - became a modern social cliche.
Others were gratefully received on construction sites and in cafes and restaurants. But although the money might have been good, many of these economic migrants are, like Joanna Sobocinka, ludicrously over- qualified for the work they are doing.
Joanna, a pretty, dark-haired 27-year-old, is at Stansted Airport, checking in for a flight to Szczecin in northern Poland.
She has a masters degree in engineering, but for the past two years has been working as a waitress, then as a restaurant team leader at Butlins in Skegness.
No wonder she can't wait to get back to the forests and lakes of her own country.
Earning ?1,000 a month, she has been able to make some savings, but, she says, the deteriorating value of the pound is one of the factors behind her decision to return permanently.
Another reason is that neither she nor her new husband have found life in Britain as amenable as they had hoped. 'Some people have problems with your nationality,' she says nervously, keen not to cause offence.
'They're happy to skive and let you do their work for them. My husband has had worse: people have been very unpleasant to him and day in, day out, it gets you down.
'Now that things in Poland are looking up, we'll make our life there.
' By a neat twist of symmetry, the same thing that made it possible for Poles to come here is now propelling them back: the EU. 'Funds from the EU have financed a big building boom,' according to the British Polish Chamber of Commerce's Dembinski.
'And we need construction workers for these projects. The situation isn't so good in rural Poland - there are still areas where unemployment is 20 to 30 per cent - but some of the cities are gasping for labour: accountants, builders, call centre operators...'
And as these workers return home, there is a serious possibility that their absence could leave Britain with a labour shortage.
Their absence is already being felt by one food processing company in Carlisle that employs 750 people, of which 350 used to be Poles, until they began going home.
The agricultural sector will also feel it when the tap of Polish workers is turned off.
The bus back to Poland is full of those who come over for the season to give their finances a quick shot by doing anything from one to six months of work grading potatoes, picking and sorting apples, working in asparagus canning factories, or on cauliflower farms.
Many of those I speak to say they are in their fourth or fifth season, but they are not sure whether or not they will be back next year. 'It all depends,' they say, 'on the job market back home and the strength of the pound.'
At the moment, some of them can still earn here in a week what it would take them a month to gain in Poland. But if the pound falls much further, covering their costs will be much harder.
It's likely to be the construction companies - who need skilled workers for projects such as the stadiums needed for the Olympic Games in 2012 - who will have the biggest problem. Not to mention those of us desperate to have work done on our houses.
'A year ago, we had no problem finding new employees,' says Czeslaw Kruszelmnici, whose North London painting, decorating and building company employs 35 to 40 men, many of them Poles.
The good life?: Polish workers enjoy Tyskie beer in a London pub. Now many have decided to return home
'But things have changed. You have to look harder to find people, there's no longer a flood of them knocking on your door asking for work.
'I think some people have realised that England isn't quite the promised land, where money would pour into your back pocket, that they thought it might be.'
Then there's the fact that the Polish workforce is thought to contribute ?1.9billion a year to the British Treasury.
Indeed, at Victoria Coach Station I encounter one Pole, Greg, 31, who left Britain last December and has just come back for a few days 'to sort out my taxes. Why did I come here? I was just making money. I liked it in Britain, but my wife wasn't so happy. She's not used to all the different ethnicities so we went back.'
Others, however, like Kinga, 31, who lives in Wood Green, North London, and works as a pastry chef, are still making up their minds.
'I don't really like it that much here,' she tells me, ' but I'm still not convinced there are enough jobs to go back to in Poland. Perhaps, one day. If I can find a decent job.'
Meanwhile, there is another side to this exodus. There are concerns that Poland is not prepared for the possibility of a reverse migration, of British people moving east to look for work.
Typical of these is John Neville, who emigrated to Poland after being made redundant from a photographic company in Soho, London, and failing to find new work.
Now he lives and works in Krakow, 'a beautiful city, which I am enjoying enormously.'
When we thought the Polish plumber had become as much a part of British working life as the White Van Man, who would have believed that the exodus is now going the other way? |
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Post by Bonobo on Oct 24, 2008 21:30:24 GMT 1
Another article. I decided to highlight those parts of the text which I think are important:
Polish immigrants leaving Britain: What the Poles did for us
Britain's Polish workers are heading home in search of a better life – and it's our loss, says Harry de Quetteville.
By Harry de Quetteville
Last Updated: 9:53PM BST 23 Oct 2008
Polish manual workers wait on a street corner for casual employment in west London
It's early afternoon at Victoria Coach Station, and crowds stare intently at screens listing departure times to domestic destinations near and far, discussing what flavour snacks might best pass the time on a trip to Gloucester.
But at the station's furthest extreme, Gate 20, the conversations run along different lines. The language of choice, with its crumpled mass of consonants, is Polish, and the final stop is not Walsall but Warsaw.
The 1.30pm bus to Poland takes more than 26 hours to reach its destination – an agonising marathon of motorways and confined, marauding children. But those queuing in the grim waiting room don't mind. They are heading home, back to the land they left years ago to make their fortunes in the brave new world of a border-free EU.
Some are off on short breaks and holidays, or to hand over in person the fruits of their labours in Britain – rolls of £20 notes stuffed deep into trouser pockets or hidden away in giant suitcases pushed far into the coach's undercarriage. These will come back.
But then there are people such as 21-year-old Krzysztof Doszko. He, too, came to make his fortune in Britain earlier this year, following in the footsteps of millions of other Poles who have come since their country joined the EU in 2004. He, too, wanted to exchange the frustrations and poor job prospects of his rural community near the eastern Polish city of Lublin for comparatively high-earning employment here.
"But," he confides, perched upon his suitcase as he waits for what will be his last bus back to Poland, "it didn't work out like that. I wanted to stay longer. But I am going home."
He is not alone. The Polish government is being warned by its economic advisers that up to a third – 400,000 – of Britain's Polish population could follow Krzysztof in the next 12 months.
Increased prosperity in Poland and the prospect of a severe recession in Britain mean that the economic gap between the two countries is closing fast. The dream of fast cars, fast living and fast fortunes is as attractive as ever but, for many Poles, the odds of achieving it here are lengthening fast.
For Krzysztof, there was little glamour at the potato farm in Cambridgeshire where he ended up, working back-breaking, 12-hour days for the minimum wage. "I worked a very hard job," he says.
Once, even such a low hourly rate translated to a substantial sum when saved and sent back home to Poland. No longer. The pound has slumped against the Polish zloty. Where Polish labourers working here could once depend on an exchange rate of seven zlotys to the pound, they now get about 4.7. Earlier this year, it hovered around just four. Coupled with average wages nearly doubling back in Poland, the incentive to remain has disappeared.
"Life is better in Poland now," says 32-year-old Dani Gryniewicz, who worked with Krzysztof on the potato farm and is also heading home. "I wanted to find a good job for my family, back in Poland, where I left my two children. But now, my husband in Poland has a better job and earns almost the same as I do here. So why stay?"
Many aren't. Because of the EU's open borders, we don't have the figures to prove that an exodus is under way. But the statistics that do exist show a huge downward trend in the numbers of new Polish immigrants to these shores. In the second quarter of the year, 32,000 new workers from Poland signed up to the Home Office's registration scheme. Over the past three months, the total decreased to 25,000.
"In 2007, the number of Poles coming over was more than 150,000," says Robert Szaniawski, from the Polish embassy in London. "In 2008, we estimate fewer than 100,000." He believes "a much higher number" are going back: "If there is a chance to find a good job back home, they will, since our economy is growing and unemployment is rising here. Back in Poland, the banks are not in crisis. People are buying new homes, they need plumbers there."
This dramatic reversal of fortune has not come about solely because of the recent cataclysm in the financial sector, and its knock-on effects on the rest of the economy. According to Chris Watts, a Briton who has lived in Poland since 1993, the "tipping point" came earlier this year. He has spent the past three years exporting Polish bus drivers to local authorities from Devon to Scotland, all desperately short of staff on their transport networks. In that time, 400 drivers and 20 mechanics have come over.
"At the beginning there were so many applications that we were swamped," he says. "And that was just recruiting in two small regions of Poland. We had 100 applications for every 20 jobs.
"Until autumn 2007, the number of applicants was still high. Then the exchange rate went beneath five zlotys to the pound and applications dropped off. Some successful applicants even resigned.
"This March, for the first time, we reached the tipping point, with more vacancies than applications. Since then, we have had another change. Because of the economic crisis in the UK, the vacancies have dried up, too, so the whole business has come to an end. We have simply stopped the process."
Poles are not coming any more. The era of cheap credit is over, and cheap bathroom and kitchen installations have had their day. Like those transport authorities who came to rely on Polish drivers, we must all now learn to do without the vast numbers of immigrants whose arrival we so feared when the Eastern European bloc joined in 2004.
It will be quite a learning curve. For what, as the Monty Python team might have once said, have the Poles done for us? Apart from providing workers for the construction boom that fuelled our economy for the past few years, of course. And sending over qualified doctors and nurses for the NHS. And coming to the rescue of our agriculture, with cheap labourers such as Krzysztof picking and packing.
But apart from the economy and the NHS and the farms, what have the Poles done for us? We may find out, as we try to build Olympic venues without them (they could well be back home building football stadia for the 2012 European championships instead). For my suspicion is that if Seb Coe and his merry men have to go back to local efforts, all might not be well: "Olympic Stadium, guv? Yeah, we can do that for you. No problem. When d'you wan' it for? 2012? Ooh, guv. Not sure about that." [Sound of sucking teeth] "I could probably get it done by 2035."
Then again, perhaps not. For while there can be no doubt that many Poles are going, they are not taking everything with them. A little Polish attitude, for one thing, will endure.
"Culture is a thing that always stays behind," says Joerg Tittel from the Polish Cultural Institute. "Polish culture means hard work. Also, family and personal relationships are very important. It's a far less cynical society than here. We [Poles] are importing old-school notions that history has proven work rather well."
Indeed, one can argue that Poles have brought with them something far more important than just a way with the towel-rail: a no-nonsense ethic that mines a deep nostalgia in Britain for an age of hard-working, Hovis-delivering simplicity. In an age of financial products so complex that even the bankers don't understand them, that outlook is sure to grow more popular still.
"The Polish influx was like importing our parents' generation into today's UK," says Paul Statham, professor of sociology at Bristol University. "It has been about values – a mass arrival of people with traditional values that have been eroded here."
Allied with "a Catholic way of viewing the world, with family and community values at its centre", Prof Statham argues that Poles have effected a "basic cultural trend".
"Simple things like being treated politely in bars and restaurants had all but disappeared before Poles arrived in large numbers to work here. Now that has changed and will remain changed. Britain is changing itself."
So farewell, fair Poles. Thank you for the economy (while we still had one) and the healthcare, and the farmwork. But most of all, thank you for a reminder of the good old days. As the recession bites, they will look better and better.
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 6, 2009 20:37:46 GMT 1
BNP uses Polish Spitfire in anti-immigration poster
BNP bosses have been ridiculed for using a Polish Spitfire to front a campaign calling for Eastern European immigrants to be barred from Britain.
The BNP poster featuring a Polish-flown Spitfire
The party's 2009 European Elections poster shows a nostalgic picture of a Second World War fighter plane under the slogan "Battle for Britain".
But RAF history experts have identified the iconic Romeo Foxtrot Delta Plane as belonging not to Britons but to a group of Polish pilots instead.
The plane was actually flown by the celebrated 303 Squadron of the RAF – made up of Polish airmen rescued from France shortly before Nazi occupation.
BNP party chiefs defended their use of the image and insisted they knew all about the background.
However, John Hemming, MP for Yardley, Birmingham, blasted the far right party for using the image to front a campaign which includes stemming immigration from Poland.
He said: "The BNP often get confused and this happens because they haven't done their research. This is just another example of them getting it wrong.
"They have a policy to send Polish people back to Poland – yet they are fronting their latest campaign using this plane.
"It is absurd to make claims about Englishness and Britishness fronted by this image.
"It's obvious they just picked an image at random and they are really clutching at straws if they say this was deliberate."
Simon Darby, spokesperson for the British National Party, said that the plane was a symbol of the Battle of Britain and represented the economic struggle the country is facing at the moment.
He said: "It's not like the BNP are against Polish people as a nation. We are against Polish people coming over here and undercutting British workers.
"I mean how would the Polish people feel if their government started letting in millions of Vietnamese and letting them work for three bowls of rice a day.
"That's exactly what it's like over here at the moment - our government has let far too many people in."
During the Battle of Britain the Poles shot down 203 Luftwaffe aircraft – around 12 per cent of total German losses.
A spokesperson at the Royal Air Force museum said: "The Spitfire in the poster can be identified as belonging to 303 Squadron of the Polish Air Force by the code letters 'RF' painted in front of the RAF roundel.
"303 Squadron operated Spitfires from Northolt, Kirton-in-Lindsey, Coltishall and other RAF stations in the UK between 1941 and 1945 after flying Hurricanes in the Battle of Britain."
The 303 Squadron was the most effective Polish squadron during the Second World War.
Its pilots were the only representatives of the Polish Army invited to the London Victory Parade in 1946.
But they refused the invitation because no other Polish units were invited.www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/4935429/BNP-uses-Polish-Spitfire-in-anti-immigration-poster.htmlwww.tvn24.pl/12691,1589121,0,1,brytyjska-prawica-sklada-hold-polskim-lotnikom,wiadomosc.html |
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 6, 2009 21:25:23 GMT 1
Poles build tent city on banks of UK river
Created: 03.03.2009 13:40
Around 30 homeless Poles, who have lost their jobs and do not have a right to welfare benefits, have built a ‘tent city’ on the muddy banks of the Witham River in Lincoln, central England.
Unemployment rates amongst Polish immigrants to the UK is increasing rapidly. Employees from the Lincoln-based charity Catch 22 report that the number of homeless Poles have doubled in the past six months.
Marysia Filip, a native Pole working at the charity, is quoted by the local paper as saying “If they are lucky, they have a tent. If not, they sleep in bushes.”
According to Charlotte McHugh of the Priory Centre, another local charity organization, not all immigrants are legally living in the country. Many of them have overstayed visas. As such, without valid documents, they are not eligible for any sort of state aid.
“While I do not think that everyone who comes to England has a right to welfare benefits, there are some living situations that are simply intolerable – especially when people have nothing to eat. I’m not asking for a change in the law, but that does not change the fact that we have a difficult problem here,” Mc Hugh stated.
According to Jan Mokrzycki, director of the Federation of Poles in Great Britain, the homeless Poles are largely those who have always lived on society’s margins.
“As well, they are those who have lost work due to the financial crisis. The situation is difficult everywhere and there is little home for improvement right now,” Mokrzycki added.
Estimates by the Federation show that there are about 4,000 homeless Poles living in London, the capital of the country. (mmj)
www.polskieradio.pl/thenews/foreignaffairs/artykul103496_poles_build_tent_city_on_banks_of_uk_river.html
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 29, 2009 21:45:06 GMT 1
Poland frets over foreign workers as economy slows
Karolina Slowikowska
WARSAW, March 16 (Reuters) - Trade unions in Poland are calling for restrictions on some foreign workers, partly to make room for thousands of Polish workers expected to lose their jobs in other parts of the crisis-hit European Union.
Tens of thousands of workers from nearby ex-Soviet republics such as Ukraine flocked to Poland during the boom years which are now ending as world economic crisis takes hold.
Demand was particularly strong after Poland joined the EU in 2004, triggering an exodus of at least one million Poles to western Europe, mostly Britain and Ireland, in search of better-paid jobs there.
"The Polish government should consider limiting the inflow of foreigners because there cannot be wage and employment 'dumping'," said Jan Guz, head of the OPPZ union which has more than 1 million members.
"We are not talking about Germans or other European Union citizens ... We are talking of Ukrainians, Belarussians, Chinese ... Employers tend to pick them because they work for peanuts," he told Reuters.
The union's concerns mirror those of other countries. In Britain, protesters demanding 'British jobs for British workers' have complained about foreigners, including Poles, undercutting the local workforce by accepting lower wages.
Poland's labour ministry says up to 10,000 Ukrainians and Belarussians are employed legally here at present but says it does not know how many more may be working on the black market.
Many urban middle-class Poles employ Ukrainians and Belarussians as baby-sitters, cleaners or for other menial work.
Though Poland's economy remains more robust than many amid the global recession, foreign workers say they have started to feel the change of climate. "There is much less work now," said Oksana, 32, a Ukrainian who works in Poland legally as a nanny for two children.
"There also seems to be more competition for (menial) jobs from Polish women who live in villages around Warsaw. And that's something new ... And there are still Ukrainians coming in. It is simply much worse in Ukraine. There are no jobs there."
Ukraine, which is not in the EU, has been hammered by the global crisis due to its heavy reliance on exports of steel and chemicals, with industrial output down more than 30 per cent. By contrast, Poland still expects to see modest growth this year.
POLES RETURNING?
"We need to find more jobs here in Poland because many Poles will be coming home (from western Europe)," said Guz.
Many Poles in Britain and Ireland found work in sectors such as construction which have been especially hard hit during the recession now afflicting most of Europe.
Migration statistics within the 27-nation EU are imprecise because of free movement of people across national borders.
However, a recent poll in Ireland showed a third of that country's estimated 200,000 Polish immigrants plan to leave Ireland within a year, though not necessarily to go home.
Unemployment in Poland edged up to 10.9 percent in February, according to labour ministry data published last week, up from around 9 percent in 2008 but still only about half the level seen as recently as 2004.
Warsaw, vibrant capital of the EU's largest ex-communist member state, has been largely immune to the slowdown so far, with unemployment of barely two percent, or 22,000 people. But the city of two million is also starting to feel the chill wind.
"There is a slowdown. We feel it. And Warsaw is reacting. But it is a reaction Warsaw-style, small, and generally just an indication of what is happening in the rest of the country," said Urszula Morawska from the Warsaw labour office.
Some 15 companies have signalled group layoffs and almost 2,000 people could lose their jobs as a result, she said.
Warsaw-based car plant FSO may have to fire about 650 people out of its current workforce of 2,500 because virtually all of its production is exported, mostly to eastern European markets such as Ukraine.
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Post by valpomike on Mar 30, 2009 2:19:39 GMT 1
Tell us more on the car plant in Warsaw, like what kind of car do they make? What is the name of it, and can you show some photo's of it, Please.
Mike
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Post by Bonobo on Mar 30, 2009 22:14:34 GMT 1
Tell us more on the car plant in Warsaw, like what kind of car do they make? What is the name of it, and can you show some photo's of it, Please. Mike FSO en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabryka_Samochod%C3%B3w_Osobowych
The beginnings
The FSO plant was established in 1951 by the Polish government in Żerań on Warsaw's eastern bank of the river Vistula, to produce automobiles for post World War II Poland. The first FSO car was the Warszawa, manufactured under the Soviet GAZ-M20 Pobeda licence.
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Post by Bonobo on Apr 24, 2009 20:50:08 GMT 1
Poles in Britain - a story of change, hardship and success
DPA
4/22/09
London - The windows of Ewa Michalik's restaurant in central London are plastered with newspaper praise for her exquisite cuisine and the authentic Polish atmosphere of her Patio Restaurant. "Polish food is quite fashionable now," Ewa says with a broad smile as the diners pile in. Her restaurant in the district of Shepherd's Bush - an area once dominated by Irish pubs - has won top awards for its Red Borscht with Meat Dumplings and Duck à la Polonaise.
Even though the recession is having an effect on business and rents are stiff, Ewa says she has no regrets about leaving Krakow in her native Poland to come to London for a new life.
Her hard work has been rewarded with success, a house in the countryside where she grows garden herbs for the Patio chef, and a small flat in Krakow where she goes for visits and holidays.
"It would be very boring there for me now," said Ewa, who believes that the recession in Poland will be "much longer" than in the western half of Europe.
When she last flew from Krakow, she observed, there were "more airport staff than passengers" at the airport that used to overflow with Poles boarding budget flights to Britain and Ireland.
Just a few hundred metres from the Patio restaurant, a long queue of men in pullovers and jeans jackets snakes around the red brick building of St Saviours Church, where the Upper Room charity offers a soup kitchen for migrant workers who have fallen on hard times.
Of the 100 or so adults who come to the soup kitchen every day, only a few are women, and 60 per cent are Polish, explained project manager Bruce Marquart.
His award-winning project, which "started off with a few tables and tinned soup," has now become "one of the largest restaurants around here - which is free," he jokes.
There are no signs on the door and the Upper Room's services are listed only in Homeless Journals.
The men who pile in have lost their jobs and tend to sleep in "abandoned buildings" as police stop them from sleeping rough in the city's many parks.
The number of those coming to the Upper Room "shot up suddenly" since the middle of 2008, said Marquart. "It used to be like a dinner party with between 30 to 40 people, now with up to 100 a day its an operation."
The rise in numbers occurred when "construction jobs dried up," said Marquart. "The poorest people get hit first."
Piotr, 47, proudly pulls his CV out of a black case, identifying him as a crane operator, welder, mechanic, truck driver and electrician.
Having lost his job as a driver in a dispute over not being paid, he is looking for work to feed his wife and two children back home. Meanwhile, he is studying English and sleeping in his car.
The men in the soup kitchen belong to a growing community of East Europeans sleeping rough in London, accounting for around 20 per cent of the estimated homeless population of 3,000 in the city.
Local councils and charities, such as the Barka Foundation and the British government's Thames Reach project, are operating government- funded repatriation schemes under which those willing to return home will be supplied with a one-way bus or air ticket. Up to 500 people are sent home this way each year.
Official government figures for 2008 showed that the number of East European migrants in Britain dropped to its lowest point since 2004, with statistics suggesting that almost half of the estimated one million migrants - mainly Poles - who came to work in Britain since 2004 have gone home.
The flow of Polish and other economic migrants from Eastern Europe fell by more than 40 per cent, immigration figures published in February showed.
The number of work applications dropped to 29,000 in the last three months of 2008 - coinciding with the onset of the recession in Britain. In the same period of 2007, there had been 53,000 work applications.
Increasingly, the question is being asked in Britain what would happen if all the Poles went home.
The Institute for Public Policy Research predicted in a recent study that future migration patterns would be marked by "super mobility," with people temporarily migrating to one country before returning home or going elsewhere.
If the tide of East European migration turned dramatically, many critical sectors of the British economy, particularly in farming, food processing and the care sector, would suffer.
"We either import workers to pick our strawberries or import the strawberries from overseas," said researcher Naomi Pollard.
"After four years of debating whether too many migrants have arrived from the new EU member states, we may soon be asking what Britain can do to attract more workers from Eastern Europe and beyond," she said.
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Post by Bonobo on Apr 26, 2009 21:55:16 GMT 1
Belgium and Denmark opens labour market to Poles
thenews.pl
24.04.2009
Next week, people form Poland and other new EU member states will no longer need special permission to work in Belgium and Denmark.
Today, Emilie Rossion from the Belgian Ministry of Labour announced that the government in Brussels is not going to prolong restrictions for Eastern European countries.
Likewise, Denmark has decided to open its labour market next week. This means that Austria and Germany will remain the only states to keep labour restrictions for new EU members.
It is estimated that there are 100 000 Polish citizens currently in Belgium, although half of them are employed illegally. Men usually find job on construction sites, while women work as home helps.
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Post by tufta on Apr 27, 2009 10:05:54 GMT 1
Belgium and Denmark opens labour market to Poles
thenews.pl
24.04.2009
Next week, people form Poland and other new EU member states will no longer need special permission to work in Belgium and Denmark.
Today, Emilie Rossion from the Belgian Ministry of Labour announced that the government in Brussels is not going to prolong restrictions for Eastern European countries.
Likewise, Denmark has decided to open its labour market next week. This means that Austria and Germany will remain the only states to keep labour restrictions for new EU members.
It is estimated that there are 100 000 Polish citizens currently in Belgium, although half of them are employed illegally. Men usually find job on construction sites, while women work as home helps.The free passage of goods, worforce, people is the core of European Union. Unfortunately only on paper as protectionism of all kinds is alive and kicking in the Old European countries, with the largest Germany as the best example. |
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Post by Bonobo on Apr 27, 2009 22:13:33 GMT 1
The free passage of goods, worforce, people is the core of European Union. Unfortunately only on paper as protectionism of all kinds is alive and kicking in the Old European countries, with the largest Germany as the best example. Wait to see Polish apprehensive protectionist policy when Ukraine joins the EU in 10/15 years` time! ;D ;D ;D |
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Post by tufta on Apr 28, 2009 9:50:37 GMT 1
The free passage of goods, worforce, people is the core of European Union. Unfortunately only on paper as protectionism of all kinds is alive and kicking in the Old European countries, with the largest Germany as the best example. Wait to see Polish apprehensive protectionist policy when Ukraine joins the EU in 10/15 years` time! ;D ;D ;D Ifology  I am afraid the integration phase in Europe is coming to an end... What we see now is rather a slow disintegration. |
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Post by Bonobo on Apr 28, 2009 22:40:07 GMT 1
Wait to see Polish apprehensive protectionist policy when Ukraine joins the EU in 10/15 years` time! ;D ;D ;D Ifology I am afraid the integration phase in Europe is coming to an end... What we see now is rather a slow disintegration. I am an optimist. Ukraine will join EU in 10 years` time. |
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Post by tufta on Apr 29, 2009 16:41:58 GMT 1
Ifology I am afraid the integration phase in Europe is coming to an end... What we see now is rather a slow disintegration. I am an optimist. Ukraine will join EU in 10 years` time. Yes you are hehe |
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Post by tufta on May 5, 2009 8:38:21 GMT 1
As to the title of the thread.... Migrants boost EU economy, says studyBy Stefan Wagstyl in London
Published: April 30 2009 03:00 | Last updated: April 30 2009 03:00
Migration from eastern to western Europe is boosting the economy of the European Union by nearly €50bn ($65bn, £45bn) a year, or about 0.8 per cent of gross domestic product, according to a report sponsored by the European Commission published yesterday.continue reading at www.ft.com/cms/s/0/740ef048-3520-11de-940a-00144feabdc0.html |
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Post by tufta on May 5, 2009 8:42:15 GMT 1
and as to protectionist policies of today: Those selfish GermansApr 30th 2009
From The Economist print edition
As Germany becomes “normal”, it looks a bit more national and a bit less European
ON MAY 1st ten countries celebrate their fifth birthday as members of the European Union. It ought to be quite a party: the enlargement of 2004 to take in countries like Poland and Hungary marked a rare moment of strategic wisdom. Alas, the anniversary has already been overshadowed by an act of petty selfishness on the part of Germany.
The German government announced this week that it was keeping labour restrictions on workers from the eight east European countries that joined in 2004 (the other two new members, Cyprus and Malta, were tiddlers that escaped the restrictions). The controls were meant to fall away in 2009, but Germany invoked a clause allowing two more years in case of “serious labour-market disturbances”, or the threat of them. The idea that free movement by Poles or Slovaks would threaten “serious” disruption is nonsense. Germany still has shortages of skilled labour in some areas, and it hardly looks like El Dorado to hordes of unskilled migrants: the latest forecast is that the economy will shrink by 6% this year. The decision to keep labour controls is purely political. Germany faces elections to the European Parliament in June and a national poll in the autumn.
Only one other country, Austria, still keeps its labour market closed to the 2004 entrants. But nobody ever accused Austria of being visionary. Germany is meant to be different. More than any other country, it made EU expansion possible. As the union’s biggest paymaster, Germany agreed to foot the lion’s share of the bill. And it was the Germans who persuaded the reluctant French to expand the club. So is Germany now a “normal” (ie, selfish) country, more attuned to national than to European interests? That is a fashionable charge among federalists. As an example, they criticise the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, for her timid response to the economic crisis, for vetoing a common European fund to bail out banks and for resisting a joint EU stimulus.
Ms Merkel is from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), but her grand-coalition partner, the Social Democratic Party (SPD), also disappoints pro-Europeans. The SPD finance minister, Peer Steinbrück, spent months calling the economic crisis an “American problem”. Although he has conceded that euro-area countries might be bailed out before they go bust, he will not be drawn on how. Prominent federalists like Joschka Fischer, a former German foreign minister, have called on Germany to support joint euro-area bonds, though these might damage the country’s own high credit rating. Other examples offered by insiders include a European food bank for the poor, mooted at one summit. The SPD foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who will stand against Ms Merkel this autumn, shot the idea down, saying that each country should “take care of its own poor”.
One senior European politician comments that federalists have short memories. The true turning-point for Germany was 1998, he says, when Gerhard Schröder defeated the CDU’s Helmut Kohl for the chancellorship. During his campaign, Mr Schröder accused Mr Kohl of putting European interests ahead of German ones. He had a point: Mr Kohl pushed through the single currency even though most German voters opposed it, and nasty EU rows about money usually ended with Mr Kohl pulling out Germany’s chequebook. Mr Schröder was less community-minded, happy to shout, “Germany is not paying for this one,” at summits. It was under Mr Schröder that Germany began its quest for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, after years of seeking a single place for the EU.
Today the picture is mixed. Ms Merkel is less impatient at EU summits than Mr Schröder. But, unlike Mr Kohl, she brings no retinue of smaller countries as allies to every meeting. And despite the recent display of Franco-German unity at the G20 gathering in London, she neither trusts nor likes France’s Nicolas Sarkozy.
In search of German logic
Germany’s closed labour market may look like a detail amid global economic turmoil. But it matters. It represents a surrender to populist introspection and a betrayal of the logic of Europe’s open borders. That is a shame, as Germany has stood up for free trade and the EU’s internal market in other fields, slapping down protectionist proposals from France and taking it on the chin when domestic stimulus schemes like its car-scrapping bonus sucked in cars made in eastern Europe.
The labour restrictions are in truth a symptom of a deeper malaise. Tensions within the grand coalition define “everything” in EU affairs, complains a minister from a neighbouring country. Another sighs that “what we see now in Germany is less and less one government, and more and more two parties”.
This is perverting otherwise sound initiatives. At a foreign ministers’ meeting on April 27th, Germany sounded the alarm about instability in Ukraine, on the EU’s eastern border. German diplomats say privately that Russia is playing alarming games by issuing passports to Ukrainian citizens. Germany wants the EU to consider such steps as opening an EU office in Crimea, a part of Ukraine some Russian nationalists covet, or asking Russia to recognise Ukrainian territorial integrity. Coming from German diplomats, this amounts to welcome realism. But, notes an EU minister, concrete action to anchor Ukraine to the West and to Europe is limited by tensions in Berlin. The (CDU) interior minister will not hear of looser visa rules for Ukrainians as a carrot for good behaviour. The (SPD) finance minister opposes spending German money to prop up Ukraine’s economy.
Germany is not about to turn away from Europe. One senior figure concedes that the labour restrictions respond to “fears that are not so logical”. That is not good enough. Europe needs a bit of German logic to function. So does Germany.
www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13576107 |
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Post by Bonobo on Aug 23, 2009 21:34:40 GMT 1
Poland demands Britain protects its migrant workers from race attacks
Poland has called for the British Government to take urgent steps to tackle incidents of racist threats and attacks on its nationals living in Britain.
By Matthew Day in Warsaw
telegraph.co. uk
24 Jul 2009
In the letter to Ann Abraham, the parliamentary ombudsman and human rights watchdog, Poland's commissioner for civil rights protection expressed his "very serious" concern about a spate of threats and attacks against Poles this month.
"Racially motivated threats and attacks against Poles seem to be more and more common in the United Kingdom," wrote Janusz Kochanowski. "Polish citizens who benefit as migrant workers from the freedoms of movement and work in a European Union country are a subject of serious concern."
While recognising that the "British police seem to be very sensitive to racially motivated crime", Mr Kochanowski urged the British authorities to do more to protect his countrymen.
"A call for preventative rather than post facto measures is rather important," he wrote.
"Being far from exaggeration I would like to bring your attention to the incidents which from the perspective of fundamental rights protection in the EU are very serious."
The letter, which was also sent this week to Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe's commissioner for human rights and the EU's Fundamental Rights Agency, highlighted a number of recent incidents that have caused alarm both in Poland and among the hundreds of thousands of Poles living in the UK.
At the beginning of July, Combat 18 and Loyalist extremists were blamed for written threats delivered to the Polish Association in Northern Ireland.
"No sympathy for foreigners, get out of our Queen's country," said the text of the threat. "Other than that your building will be blown up. Keep Northern Ireland white. Northern Ireland is only for white British."
The warning has alarmed Poles and raised the spectre of attacks on a similar level to the violence that drove more than 100 Romanians from their homes in Belfast last month.
Mr Kochanowski has also drawn attention to a brutal attack carried out against 39-year-old Jaroslaw Janeczek in Aberdeen this month.
Mr Janeczek suffered serious internal and head injuries during a vicious attack, which police described as having a "racist element", by two men with pit bull terriers.
The incidents have highlighted fears in Poland that as the British economy sinks into the recession Poles working in Britain are set to face increasing resentment and hostility as unemployment grows.
Since Poland joined the EU in May 2004 over a million Poles have travelled to Britain in search of work, becoming in just a few years one of the country's largest ethnic minorities.
European Commission officials are also concerned that a backlash against East European migrants could lead to an increase in violent incidents.
"We are very worried to have seen rises in xenophobic attacks against European migrants," said an official.
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