REGINE Regularisations in Europe Final Report - European ...

Thus, NGOs argue, Member States should have some flexibility in responding to irregular migration
and migration more generally. Antigone, a Greek NGO, emphasises that any legislation to be
developed on regularisations needs to be based on a ‘good practice’ model: “A common European
policy should take place only if the best practices (…) and the maximum standards of protection of
migrants could be guaranteed as a content of a possible EU directive on regularisation.” 257 In a similar
vein, another Greek NGO warns of developing strong regulations at the European level and instead
argues in favour of evaluatory structures: “The great variations between many EU Member States,
especially between North/South, create contradictions which often lead to compromises with the
result that important national measures are missed. Nevertheless, there is a need for common policies.
These policies should put great emphasis on the evaluation and the creation of structures which can be
registered and intervene where appropriate.” 258
Measures suggested by NGOs include: defining the legal status of regularised persons, providing
minimum standards for regularisation procedures, a permanent regularisation commission that would
be composed of various stakeholders (including the judiciary and NGOs), promotion of regularisation
mechanisms, exchange of experiences and best practices, the definition of basic regularisation
principles, strengthening access to international protection and improving the asylum procedure (for
example, by setting limits to the length of the procedures), and finally, agreements on regularisation
mechanisms for particularly vulnerable groups.
Generally, NGOs support a debate on regularisation policies on the European level – a debate in
which NGOs should have a crucial role. However, NGOs do not necessarily see a need for developing
strong legislative instruments on the EU level. As one Czech NGO argues; “issues related to
regularisation programs and mechanisms must be discussed at a European level – especially with
respect to the specific impact (both positive and negative) of regularisation policies that have already
been implemented and with respect to the mutual sharing of experiences. In our opinion, it isn't
necessary to have a common approach for regularisation programs and mechanisms on a Europe-wide
level and we believe that these issues should fall within the competency of the individual member
states. Our view is that the adoption of a common European approach to the issue of regularisation
could well end up having a rather negative impact consisting of the attempt of the opponents of
regularisation to minimize the range of options, which regularisation provides, or the opponents could
end up being able to effectively find support for a general ban on regularisation programs across
Europe.” 259 The need for a thorough debate on regularisation is also stressed by a Belgian immigrant
association: “I think the keyword here is participation by all the stakeholders (including the
undocumented themselves) not just the host countries in formulating, implementing (monitoring and
follow-up) and evaluating policies, programs and mechanisms. Migrants have something to
contribute.” 260
In conclusion, NGOs clearly see a role for the European Union in regularisation policy and welcome a
debate on regularisation on the European level. Although there are concrete proposals for possible
257 ANTIGONE, op. cit.
258 Greek Migrants Forum, response, ICMPD NGO Questionnaire, 30 May 2008
259 Counselling Centre for Refugees/ Organization for Aid to Refugees, response, ICMPD NGO Questionnaire,
30 April 2008
260 Samahan ng mga Manggagawang Pilipino sa Belgium, response, ICMPD NGO Questionnaire, 13 May 2008
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