Spain migration: Sánchez names integration the key test

Spain's plan to regularise 1,200,000 migrants brings a bigger question into focus: how to integrate them. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez calls integration the country's main migration challenge. In an interview on Jordi Wild's The Wild Project podcast, reported by Europa Press on 13 November, he says he is not afraid to debate security.

Sánchez says crime rates have risen with immigration but remain low compared with France and Germany.

Jobs and the people arriving

Of the migrants covered by the regularisation plan, 500,000 already work and pay social security contributions, Sánchez says. He argues that they are not taking jobs from Spanish nationals, pointing to a fall in the unemployment rate among nationals. He also credits migration with 25% of Spain's economic growth.

Sánchez says 40% of migrants arriving in Spain come from Europe and another 40% from Latin America. At Wild's request, fact-checkers Iván Muñoz and Javier Collado name Colombia, Morocco and Venezuela as the most common countries of origin. Sánchez agrees with Wild that the share from Morocco is high.

Ceuta's reception places

Turning to the large number of arrivals in Ceuta, Spain, this summer, Sánchez says the country increased temporary reception capacity to more than 7,000 places. He says the situation there is moving back towards normality.

Border control and migrants' rights are not at odds, Sánchez argues. People arriving must have access to the procedures for asylum and international protection, he says, with particular care for children. He says most of those who entered Ceuta were minors.

Topics: Migration

Source: Europa Press / Mallorca.com