East and Southeast EU migrants are forced to live in appalling and dangerous conditions Germany on the border with the Netherlands, under precarious employment contracts for Dutch people. Migrants, mainly from Poland and Romania, employed by Dutch meat factories were given shelter in Germany and were lured into the country under false promises.
According to the Ministry of Construction of the German region of North Rhine-Westphalia, living conditions were “so desolate that the lives of the residents were in danger”.
German and Dutch police raided the accommodations together with the Dutch Labor authorities.
The houses had no emergency exits and the heating system malfunctioned.
Some residents were also forced to live in storage areas.
Pagonis Pagonakis, who leads a project on labor rights for migrant workers within the EU, told EURACTIV that employment agencies benefit from loose Dutch labor laws.
He said: “They are exploiting the border location for their purposes and trying to maximize profits on both sides.”
He added that part of the problem is the EU’s freedom of movement, which makes it difficult for authorities to monitor workers’ working conditions.
The construction ministry of the German region of North Rhine-Westphalia added that authorities have also identified “flagrant violations of labor protection laws” such as minimum wages and working hours, as well as protections against dismissal.
Authorities from Germany and the Netherlands, in addition to Poland and Romania, collaborated on the recent raids.
The news comes as a small boat laden with migrants capsized after dark in the English Channel on Wednesday, killing four and mounting calls for the British government to do more to prevent people from risking their lives to destroy one of the world’s to cross the busiest shipping lanes.
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Helicopters and lifeboats raced from bases in southern England after authorities received reports of a small boat in trouble in the waters between Britain and France just after 3am local time.
The UK’s Press Association, citing government sources, said 43 people had been rescued, with more than 30 pulled from the water. The operation was co-ordinated by the UK Maritime and Coastguard Agency and involved personnel from both Britain and France.
It was not clear if more people were missing.
“The investigation is ongoing and we will provide more information in due course,” the government said in a statement. “This is truly a tragic incident.”
The British government is under pressure to stop the smugglers, who charge migrants thousands of dollars each to cross the Channel in flimsy inflatable boats, after at least 27 people died when their craft sank in November last year. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and his predecessors have even gone so far as to threaten to deport to Rwanda those who enter the country illegally in an effort to deter people from crossing.
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But numbers continue to rise as the prospect of work and education in Britain lures economic migrants as well as those fleeing war, persecution and famine. Some 44,000 people have made the trip so far this year, according to government figures, compared to 23,000 in the entire year before and 8,500 in 2020.
Sunak pledged on Tuesday to clear the backlog of asylum applications and announced new measures to reduce the number of migrants crossing the Channel.
The prime minister said he planned to introduce legislation early next year to ensure that people arriving illegally cannot stay in the country.
He also said he would add hundreds of employees to process asylum applications and clear the backlog, estimated at more than 143,000 pending applications, by the end of 2023. The additional staff will also focus on the rapid removal of Albanian migrants who have left a country come. Britain considers it safe, but is increasingly crossing the Channel, Sunak said.