Sarkozy: EU Must Re-Create National Borders; Cannot Permit "Welfare Tourism"

Nicolas Sarkozy, probably running for the UMP nomination for President of France in 2017, is taking a critical position on the current rules of the EU's "Schengen area," in which people may freely move from country to country without having to secure leave from any government to immigrate.

The problem, as Sarkozy sees it, is that such a system permits immigrants to simply shop for which Schengen-area country has the most generous welfare benefits, and then flock to that country, thus depleting that country's treasury.

I wonder which country in the Schengen area has the most generous welfare benefits and thus attracts the most immigrants?

Nicolas Sarkozy entered the political fray ahead of European elections today, describing current EU immigration policies as “an abject failure” and calling for the bloc’s visa-free Schengen area to be rewritten.

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"Europe is not meant to organise social and migratory dumping, almost systematically at the expense of France," he warned.

I'm a Euroskeptic but France does realize it can handle this problem internally, right?

Designed to foster the free movement of people and goods, the Schengen area comprises 26 European countries that have abolished passport or any other type of border control in-between their common borders.

Non-EU countries like Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland are part of the area, but EU members Britain, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Ireland and Romania are not.

Sarkozy is still pro-EU, though:

However, he warned against the rise of populist anti-EU sentiment, saying the bloc protects its citizens from the "ideological veering off course of governments and majority parties.

"If the European Union broke up centuries-old hatred and conflicts of interest would resurface more violently."

"We must correct its excesses but as a project it must be preserved."

What a poisonous idea -- we have to give power to far-away masters because we can't be trusted with it ourselves.

Sarkozy is probably only offering this tepid criticism of the EU to co-opt the rising "extremist" National Front (FN), which is decidedly more anti-EU.

posted by Ace at 05:41 PM

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