Per la libertà di movimento, per i diritti di cittadinanza

Rosanna Marcato – Venice Council citizenship right promotion and immigration services

Asylum right in UK

Polis Asyl is a European network promoted by ECRE and CIR in order to face the serious and widespread asylum seekers difficult situation. Asylum seekers are increasing in number all over Europe. Focused especially in big cities the solving of the problem makes dialogue on possible solutions necessary in order to reach EU government and to create the so called European armony in asylum policies.
A meeting took place in London November 7-8, Venice Council was there because of the experience gained in spite of the fact that Venice is not a capital.
Greater London Authority presented a document to the cities invited (Rome, Venice, Madrid, Paris, London, Berlin, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Helsinki, Praha and Budapest).

The paper centres four main issues:
– the way cities can produce positive inputs inside EU,
– how EU is treating asylum policies,
– how single cities can reach a common view on fundamental issues,
– how to promote an effective common strategy to be carried out within EU.

Debate focused the fact that each state, even the ones holding a strong asylum tradition and a decent first accomdation system, is choosing closing policies and is lowering accomodation standards.
European Commision, from 1999 Tampere meeting on, is trying to promote common strategies in order to even asylum seekers treatments by 2004. The aim is to establish a European system based on the application of Geneva convention.
Harmonization could be brought about in two levels: measures that could make accomodation system even and a uniform juridical endorsement. Nothing on integration is ever said, probably because European treaties leave no space to this matter. Anyway rights and services helping integration out such as schooling, training are included in many Commision proposals.
On accomodation standards matters, cities are interested in solving awaiting asylum status recognition periods, in fact when asylum seekers are left alone cities suffer from problems connected to exclusion as it happens in many areas where structures inequacy and the enlargement of the phenomenon produces negative effects.
Another important issue is the need to determine juridical status and proceedings. Achnur is at the moment trying to establish a unique asylum situation throughout Europe, where protection should be the same as well (such as humanitarian protection), where rights such as family rejoining are basically the same. Financial helps granted by EU are extremely important, too. Those helps are actually low but changes should be encouraged.
Some numbers make the situation understandable, London hosts 350.000 refugees – the real number is unknown, Berlin 96.000 refugees and 7.000 asylum seekers, Paris 12.000 asylum seekers, Amsterdam 3.000 asylum seekers and 8.000 refugees, Stockholm 1.700 asylum seekers.
The proposal coming out from the Polis Asyl meeting is a cities declaration on asylum seekers and refugees accomodation and integration, preparing a common view on fundamental issues which is to be given to each city own mps. The final idea is to build a qualified workshop inviting authorities who hold power to decide within states and Eu in order to let them know all cities problems on the matter.
This meeting taking place in London showed how Italy, despite the lack of laws and financial helps, managed to develop – the PNA – an interesting to other EU members accomodation model, integration and voluntary repatriation spending the little European financial helps into structural intervention.
The work done in Italy could be the idea of a more direct city councils involvement into the national and European asylum policies because of its services and its role in the creation of local accomodation and integration standards.
We therefore came back from London with some hope, in fact we were confirmed that what we have so far done is something real in finding solutions in Italy and in constructing a common path in which our ideas antipate similar local European cities interventions. Throughout Europe the state chooses asylum policies and there’s no local freedom.
Italy is an exception where the opposite happens, this fact made it clear that problems need to be locally solved creating within a general common system territorial solutions.
Sometimes being the last can allow the enactment of new survival strategies. We shouldn’t anyway forget that we are only at the beginning of a long path that must be walked on a European scale.