EU president issues migration warning to UK

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has told British Prime Minister David Cameron that it would be wrong to portray Eastern Europeans as criminals as most of them “earn their wages”.

The UK has recently introduced more stringent immigration laws, and Cameron has stated that Europeans on low pay in Britain should not have access to social housing or tax benefits for four years. He also wants to stage an in/out referendum in 2015 if he is re-elected.

However, Juncker insisted that the EU’s free movement of labour principle meant that no nation within the EU could discriminate against nationals of other EU countries.

He explained that it was up to the national legislators to fight against such abuses as he was “utterly against” behaving like all Bulgarians, Romanians and Poles in Europe’s labour market have a criminal mentality. He said these were people who earn their wages so it was time to stop discriminating against them, particularly in the UK, which fought hard to ensure the EU was expanded.

Juncker also said that London would suffer if Britain restricted the free movement of labour. He explained that it was not right to question the “fundamental right of free movement of workers” because that would mean that in the future the free movement of capital could be questioned, which would be the end for the city’s tax rulings.