REGINE Regularisations in Europe Final Report - European ...

Accord of March 2008 have not yet been put into practice. 253 A German NGO notes that “as
regularisation policy in Germany is limited to providing a right to stay to persons who have been in a
toleration status for a long period of time, that is persons without a right to stay but who are
documented, a large number of persons fails to get access to their most fundamental rights.” 254
In Greece, the main problems associated with current regularisation practices are found to be
bureaucratic procedures, high fees, and onerous documentation requirements: “The most recent
regularisation has been strict and with too many formal requirements, a hybrid of a general and a very
limited regularisation. In fact, less than 200,000 people have applied, despite the favourable measures
adopted for migrant youth and children after pressure by NGOs and the Ombudsman. All the past 3
regularisations have in common the amnesty of the employers and the paradox of obliging exclusively
migrant workers to pay [significant] and not refundable social security contributions and hefty fees in
order to regularise themselves.” 255 Another Greek NGO adds: “[R]egularisation [policies] in Greece
[can be] characterised as ineffective. The main reason of this ineffectiveness is the incoherence of the
measures and the absence of systematic information of those eligible. Although we agree in general
with the connection between the regularisation and the time of presence of the immigrants in the
country we are convinced that the ways with which the Greek laws call the immigrants to prove their
presence in the country create more problems than they solve. In addition, over the least years there
has been no information campaign for immigrants nor any mechanism for their information. This
political choice of the state shows that its target is not the 'regularisation" of those who normally have
a right to it.” 256
In Portugal and Spain, NGOs generally positively evaluate government policies on regularisation, but
see some room for improvement, including reducing some of the documentary requirements for
regularisation programmes or doing away with fines that regularised migrants have to pay in Portugal.
However, there are also more fundamental concerns. Thus, ACCEM, a Spanish NGO, observes that
“although the Spanish immigration law foresees different paths to regularisation, in the praxis they are
not sufficient.” Among the problematic areas it identifies are: a) eligibility criteria; b) required
documentation; c) conditions of continuous stay; d) delays in processing the applications; and e)
regional differences resulting from different implementation of regularisation measures by provinces.
The NGO responses suggest various ways forward. First, NGOs argue that they – along with other
stakeholders – should be involved in designing any policies on regularisation at the national level, not
least since NGOs are closest to migrants in an irregular situation and have the best knowledge of the
needs of irregular migrants. Generally, NGOs do support (permanent) regularisation mechanisms, in
particular for hardship cases. An interesting proposal for a ‘bridging visa’ that would be available for
irregular migrants who have been legal residents (but have lost their legal status for reasons beyond
their control) comes from an Irish NGO. The proposal, which is supported by the Irish Confederation
of Trade Unions, is presented in Box 5 (above).
253 Centre des Immigrés Namur-Luxembourg ASBL (Antenne de Libramont), response, ICMPD NGO
Questionnaire, 5 May 2008
254 Flüchtlingsrat im Kreis Viersen e.V., response, ICMPD NGO Questionnaire, 21 April 2008
255 HLHR, response, ICMPD NGO Questionnaire, 29 May 2008
256 ANTIGONE, response, ICMPD NGO Questionnaire, 29 May 2008
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