REGINE Regularisations in Europe Final Report - European ...

8 Policy Options
OPTION 1: REGULATION OF REGULARISATION ACTIVITIES OF MEMBER
STATES
Description: Such a proposal for a directive or regulation would set common standards for
regularisation across the EU
Option 1a: Blanket ban on mass regularisations
Rationale and possible impact: In the context of freedom of movement and the gradual emergence
of a common labour market, it is sometimes asserted that large-scale regularisation programmes
potentially negatively affect other Member States, contribute to unsolicited secondary movements of
regularised migrants and unintentionally regularise third country nationals who are illegal residents of
another Member States. Such programmes are also thought likely to provoke new illegal immigration
from third countries. This, one could argue, undermines the common position of EU Member States to
combat illegal migration and breaches the principle of solidarity on which policies on migration are
based. However, there is little evidence to support the claim that regularised immigrants are likely to
move on to other Member States as any legal status granted under regularisation schemes is confined
to a single Member State.
There is limited evidence that regularisation in one Member State has led to immigration of irregular
immigrants from (or transiting) other Member States, although the magnitude of in-migration is likely
to be small. 336 Not unsurprisingly, regularisation programmes (or rumours about pending
regularisation programmes) are likely to reduce voluntary returns of failed migrants, 337 but are
unlikely to have an overall effect on returns. However, there is hardly any evidence for a pull effect
from third countries, although pull effects might be more important for selected groups of immigrants.
Thus it is not obvious why such a strong measure is warranted. In addition, such a proposal ignores
possible rationales for regularisation programmes and would reduce the flexibility available to
Member States in responding to particular problems. If implemented, a blanket ban is likely to have
unexpected effects (e.g. de facto regularisations as in Italy 2006, rise in asylum applications and
increased costs for the asylum system, increase in the irregular migrant population, increased informal
employment etc.). A ban on large-scale regularisations would still permit the operation of individual,
temporary and humanitarian mechanisms. However, the implementation costs of these are high, and
mostly unknown: ruling out this policy option would severely limit Member States’ policy options in
their management of the problem.
336 In order to prevent unsolicited inflows of irregular immigrants from other Member States, Belgium, for
example, temporarily reinstalled border controls during its 2000 regularisation programme (MS response
Belgium).
337 According to a memorandum by the Belgian minister responsible for migration and asylum, persistent
rumours about an imminent regularisation programme is, along with other factors (notably the most recent
enlargement of the European Union and the accession of Bulgaria and Romania) a major reason for the decline
of voluntary returns from 2006 to 2007 (see Chambre des Représentants de Belgique, Note de Politique
Générale de la Ministre de la Politique de Migrations et d’Asile. 21 Avril 2008, DOC 52 0995/020, p.12).
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