Migration crisis: EU gambles on sweeteners for Africa - Telegraph

The plan emerged on the eve of a key letter that David Cameron will send to the president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, setting out his demands for reforming Britain’s relationship with EU.

But critics described the proposed migration scheme as “madness” and warned it would push the British public towards voting for the UK to leave the EU in the forthcoming referendum.

The EU’s way to stop illegal mass migration from Africa is to make it legal. This is sheer madness

Nigel Farage

Mr Cameron has promised to negotiate a better deal for Britain’s membership of the EU before putting the new terms to a vote in an “in/out” referendum by the end of 2017.

On Tuesday, he will use a major speech to make his strongest threat so far that he could recommend an “out” vote if Europe turns a “deaf ear” to British requests for change.

However, some of Mr Cameron’s own Cabinet ministers have privately given up hope that he will secure the kind of radical changes to Britain’s EU membership that they want.

The Prime Minister will seek to press his case for European reforms in face to face talks at Wednesday’s summit on the migration crisis, in Valletta, Malta.

But he will first have to decide whether to accept the controversial new blueprint for addressing the migration crisis by opening the path to European life for thousands of African people.

While British officials appeared sceptical about the proposal, Mr Cameron faces an awkward decision on whether to veto the plan and risk infuriating other European leaders whom he needs to woo in order to secure his referendum reforms.

Under the plan, a leaked draft of which has been seen by The Telegraph, students, doctors and entrepreneurs from African states – who represent the elite of society - will be given language training, visas and job offers to entice them to travel to Europe.

Officially, the plans are intended to undermine the multi-billion pound illegal smuggling industry by offering migrants legal routes to Europe, meaning fewer people risk death at sea.

However, a leaked draft of the text confirms that the scheme is essentially a carrot to encourage African leaders to take back tens of thousands of illegal migrants whom European countries want to deport.

The action plan commits leaders to "the creation of positive synergies between negotiations on visa facilitation and discussions in other areas such as readmission."

The EU will offer £1.3 billion in aid under what is being called a “trust fund” for countries including Ethiopia, Sudan, Uganda and Kenya to address the “root causes of irregular migration”. The money is to be used to persuade countries to accept failed asylum seekers.

The plan proposes “promoting legal channels for migration and mobility from and between African countries”. The recommendations include helping Africans find work in Europe by connecting labour agencies in “with a view to facilitating placements and job opportunities”.

Migrants should be given language training before they travel, while African college qualifications for “one or more professions” should be recognised by European countries. That could, for example, allow teachers, doctors or accountants trained in Kenya to find work highly-paid work in Germany or France.

The blueprint says visa rules should be relaxed, administration fees abolished and relatives of migrants should be allowed to join them once they have reached Europe. Tellingly, it suggests the visa arrangements for the holders of African diplomatic passports should be revised.

Nigel Farage, the UK Independence Party leader, said: “The EU’s way to stop illegal mass migration from Africa is to make it legal. This is sheer madness.”

Sir Bill Cash, the Conservative chairman of the Commons European Scrutiny Committee, said the migration crisis could tilt the referendum in favour of exit from the European Union.

“The British people are watching,” he said. “I have previously said there would be a tsunami and we would be swamped – and now we are told it is to be three million people. We have to keep control of our borders.”

The plan would not have a direct impact on the UK because Britain is not a member of the Schengen common migration zone within the EU, where border checks have been scrapped.

However, thousands of migrants massed at Calais in northern France and caused chaos earlier in the year, bringing traffic through the Channel Tunnel to a halt, stowing away inside lorries and cars, with some making it through illegally to enter the UK.

A British diplomat said: "Issues of legal migration remains a matter of national competence for the UK and nothing in the draft text compels the UK to change its long-standing position."

Regaining full control of Britain’s borders through reforming EU laws on legal migration is one of the top demands for reform among Eurosceptic MPs and campaigners.

But Downing Street gave no indication that there would be any major changes to EU rules on “free movement of people”, to the dismay of Mr Cameron’s Tory colleagues.

Mr Cameron will send a long-awaited letter on his EU reform demands to Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, on Tuesday. However, Downing Street said it would contain only the “broad outlines of the Prime Minister’s agenda”.

As disclosed by The Telegraph last month, Mr Cameron’s demands include explicit guarantees that the pound will be protected and the Euro is not the official currency of the EU; and an explicit statement that the UK will not be part of moves towards creating an EU “superstate”.

His package of requests also contains demands for curbing the welfare entitlements among EU migrants in the UK, and measures to boost economic competitiveness in the European single market. But the “specific details” will be negotiated in a series of meetings afterwards, Number 10 said.

In a speech later on Tuesday, Mr Cameron will claim he is willing to recommend that voters choose to leave the EU if he cannot get the deal he wants, despite declaring previously that he wants Britain to remain a member.

He will ask the “In” campaign how it can defend the status quo and challenge “Out” supporters to say what being outside the EU would mean for economic security.

He will say: “If Britain’s concerns were to be met with a deaf ear, which I do not believe will happen, then we will have to think again about whether this European Union is right for us. As I have said before – I rule nothing out.”

However, Mr Cameron’s demands left his Tory colleagues unimpressed. One Cabinet source said: “We are in a powerful position in Europe and we have got to be ambitious. We should be asking the Europeans for big reforms. But this is all smoke and mirrors.

“It looks like the PM is not even asking for radical changes and therefore we are not going to get much back.”

Another Cabinet minister said: “I would like Parliament to have the option of whether we implement EU directives or not. The UK Parliament must be sovereign. Our relationship with the EU must be primarily focused on the single market, and we need significant and radical reform of freedom of movement.”

Two other Cabinet ministers said Mr Cameron must restore the sovereignty of Parliament over EU directives.

Analysis: EU leaders offer Africa a grand bargain over migration with no bearing on the real world