Britain is much more European than anybody thought
-Some 5m EU citizens want to stay in the UK

英国比任何人想象的都更“欧盟化”
——大约500万欧盟公民希望留在英国
原创翻译:龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处




新闻:

Shortly after the Brexit vote in June 2016, a group of distraught Europeans gathered in a Bristol pub. They decided on the spot to create an organisation to lobby for eu citizens in Britain. Wanting to convey that group’s weight, they took the then-official estimate of its size, and called their outfit the3million. Now, says Maike Bohn, one of the founders, “we need to rebrand.”

2016年6月英国脱欧公投后不久,一群心烦意乱的欧洲人聚集在布里斯托尔的一家酒吧。他们当场决定成立一个组织,为在英国的欧盟公民游说。为了表达这个团体的分量,他们对当时的官方规模进行了估计,并称他们的团体叫“这300万”(the3million)。如今,该团体创始人之一的迈克·博恩表示,“我们需要重塑品牌。”

June 30th was the deadline for citizens of European countries, who used to be able to move freely to and from Britain, to apply for settled status. At the last count 5.6m applications had been received, from about 5m people (some applied more than once, for various reasons). Some nationalities proved far larger than official statisticians had thought. Romanians, the second-biggest European group in Britain after Poles, filed 918,000 applications by the end of March—about twice as many as their estimated population in 2019. Italians, who made 501,000 applications, were also twice as numerous as expected. Charities that work with eu citizens say they are sure there was a surge of applications in June.

6月30日是欧洲国家公民申请定居身份的最后期限,他们过去可以自由出入英国。据最新统计,共收到560万份申请,来自约500万人(由于各种原因,有些人申请了不止一次)。一些国家的申请人口比官方统计学家认为的要多。罗马尼亚人是继波兰人之后在英国的第二大欧洲群体,截至3月底,罗马尼亚人提交了91.8万份申请,约为2019年估计人口的两倍。意大利人递交了50.1万份申请,人数也是预期的两倍。与欧盟公民合作的慈善机构表示,他们确信6月份申请人数激增。
原创翻译:龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处


So huge is the task of processing these applications that some fear disaster. Many European settlers in Britain seem not to have realised that they must apply on behalf of their children: only 15% of applications are for under-18s, which seems low. And whereas some eu countries have given identity cards to British citizens, Britain has recorded people’s status nowhere except on a central database. If a landlord or an employer is unable or unwilling to access it, rights will be lost.

处理这些申请的任务是如此之大,以至于有些人担心会发生灾难。许多在英国的欧洲移民似乎没有意识到他们必须代表他们的孩子申请:只有15%的申请是针对18岁以下的人,这看起来很低。尽管一些欧盟国家已经给英国公民发放了身份证,但英国除了在中央数据库中记录人们的身份之外什么也没有。如果业主或雇主不能或不愿雇用他们,权利就会丧失。
原创翻译:龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处


But the inevitable snarl-ups and injustices should not distract completely from what Britain has done. The Home Office, a department known for sloppiness and obduracy, has processed the great majority of applications swiftly and generously. As of May 31st only 2% had been rejected. About half of the successful applicants have been given settled status; the rest, mostly newer arrivals, are “pre-settled” and will be able to upgrade in time. “It has worked, and thank goodness it has worked,” says Alberto Costa, a Conservative mp whose Italian parents went through the process.

但是不可避免的混乱和不公正不应该完全分散英国所做的事情。以马虎和顽固著称的内政部迅速而慷慨地处理了绝大多数的申请。截至5月31日,只有2%被拒绝。约有一半的成功申请人获得定居地位;其他的大部分是新到的,是“预先预定”的,并且可以及时升级。保守党议员阿尔贝托·科斯塔说:“这招奏效了,谢天谢地,奏效了。”他的意大利父母也经历了这一过程。

Some of the Europeans who have already been granted settled status left during the coronavirus pandemic and may not return. Britain nonetheless finds itself with many more European settlers than the 3.5m-4.1m the government expected. To put the 5m into context, the censuses in 2011 of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales found 1.5m people of Indian descent, 1.2m people of Pakistani descent and 1.9m black people, not including those of mixed race.

一些已经获得定居身份的欧洲人在大流行期间离开,可能不会回来了。尽管如此,英国发现自己的欧洲移民比政府预计的350万到410万要多得多。把这500万人放在大背景下看,2011年英格兰、北爱尔兰、苏格兰和威尔士的人口普查发现,有150万人是印度血统,120万人是巴基斯坦血统,还有190万人是黑人,这还不包括混血儿。

For now, Britain’s European settlers are mostly youthful. Overall, 19% of British people are aged 65 or older. By the end of March only 2% of applications for settled status came from Europeans in that age group. But over time the European immigrants and their descendants will come to resemble everyone else. “They will grow old here,” says Catherine Barnard of uk in a Changing Europe, a think-tank.

目前,英国的欧洲移民大多是年轻人。总体而言,英国65岁及以上人口占19%。到3月底,只有2%的定居身份申请来自这个年龄段的欧洲人。但随着时间的推移,欧洲移民及其后代将变得和其他人一样。“他们会在这里变老,”来自英国智囊团“变化中的欧洲”的凯瑟琳·巴纳德说。

They live everywhere—at least, some do. Immigrants from the eastern European and Baltic countries that joined the eu in 2004 settled across the United Kingdom. Small towns that had barely seen an immigrant before sprouted Lithuanian and Polish stores. By contrast, western and southern Europeans are concentrated in cities, as are the Bulgarians and Romanians who mostly arrived after 2013. Just 19% of the Poles who applied for settled status by the end of March live in London, compared with 34% of Romanians, 46% of Italians and 54% of French applicants.

他们生活在各地——至少有些是这样。2004年加入欧盟的东欧和波罗的海国家的移民在英国各地定居。在立陶宛和波兰商店出现之前,这些小镇几乎没有移民。相比之下,西欧和南欧人主要集中在城市,保加利亚人和罗马尼亚人也是如此,他们大多在2013年之后来到这里。在三月底申请定居身份的波兰人中,只有19%住在伦敦,相比之下,罗马尼亚有34%,意大利有46%,法国有54%。

Most European adults who were living in Britain before the end of 2020 can vote in local elections, and in elections to the Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh parliaments. That gives them some clout. They will gain more if they become citizens. “If even a third become British, it’s really a political force,” says Alexandra Bulat, who came to Britain from Romania and is now a Cambridgeshire county councillor.

大多数在2020年底之前居住在英国的欧洲成年人都可以参加地方选举,以及北爱尔兰、苏格兰和威尔士的议会选举。这给了他们一些影响力。如果他们成为了英国公民,他们将获得更多。亚历山德拉·布拉特从罗马尼亚来到英国,现在是剑桥郡的县议员。

Whether that happens, and how quickly, is the crucial question for the future of British politics. Until a few years ago European settlers seldom became citizens. They had lots of rights in Britain, and came from rich, stable countries that they did not fear to return to. But the Brexit vote caused a surge in citizenship applications. eu citizens accounted for 34% of applicants in the first quarter of this year, a big increase from just 4% in the first quarter of 2010.

这是否会发生,以及多快发生,是英国政治未来的关键问题。直到几年前,欧洲移民还很少成为公民。他们在英国享有很多权利,而且来自富裕、稳定的国家,他们不怕回到这些国家。但是英国脱欧公投导致了申请公民身份的激增。今年第一季度,欧盟公民占申请人数的34%,比2010年第一季度的4%大幅增长。

Applying for British citizenship is expensive, at £1,330 ($1,840) per adult. Some people have been deterred from applying by an obscure requirement about health insurance. And a few European countries, such as Germany and Lithuania, frown on dual citizenship. Nonetheless, many migrants will eventually get round to it, especially if their children grow up in Britain. And the more alarming stories they hear about the bureaucratic mistreatment of Europeans from July 1st, the more they will feel compelled to protect their rights by becoming British.

申请英国公民身份的费用很高,每个成年人需要1330英镑(1840美元)。一些人因为一个关于健康保险的模糊要求而不敢申请。一些欧洲国家,比如德国和立陶宛,反对双重国籍。尽管如此,许多移民最终还是会接受它,尤其是如果他们的孩子在英国长大的话。从7月1日起,他们听到的有关欧洲人受到官僚虐待的令人担忧的故事越多,他们就越觉得有必要通过成为英国人来保护自己的权利。

Strangely, most national politicians are ignoring this enormous pool of potential voters. Hundreds of Labour Party activists have written to their leader, Sir Keir Starmer, calling the party’s near-silence over eu citizens’ rights “inexcusable”—to little effect. Although Mr Costa lobbies tirelessly, the Conservative Party engages even less with eu citizens’ groups than it did a few years ago. “There’s no effort,” says Ms Bohn of the3million.

奇怪的是,大多数国家的政客都忽视了这一庞大的潜在选民群体。数以百计的工党积极分子已经写信给他们的领袖凯依尔·斯塔莫爵士,称工党在欧盟公民权利问题上的近乎沉默是“不可原谅的”,而且收效甚微。尽管科斯塔先生不知疲倦地游说,保守党与欧盟公民团体的接触比几年前更少了。“这300万”的博恩说:“根本没有用。”
原创翻译:龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.cn 转载请注明出处


The big exception is the Scottish National Party. Its leaders speak frequently and effusively about eu citizens in Scotland. In early 2020 the Scottish Parliament, which was and is dominated by the snp, proclaimed that it had protected their voting rights. The British government quietly announced on June 17th this year that it would do similarly. unxists might suspect that the snp is trying to attract new voters to the independence cause and draw a cultural dividing line between internationalist Scots and xenophobic little Englanders. They would do better to copy the nationalists by appealing to the five million. Everybody wants to be wanted.

苏格兰民族党是个例外。其领导人经常热情洋溢地谈论苏格兰的欧盟公民。2020年初,由苏格兰民族党主导的苏格兰议会宣布,它保护了苏格兰人的投票权。今年6月17日,英国政府悄然宣布也将采取类似措施。统一主义者可能会怀疑,苏格兰民族党正试图吸引新的选民支持独立事业,并在国际主义者苏格兰人和排外的小英格兰人之间划出一条文化分界线。他们通过仿效民族主义者的做法,吸引这500万人的群体会做得更好。每个人都想被需要。