Mail Stokes Up Romanian Bashing

[Update at end of post]

The obedient hackery of the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre have recently found a new group to demonise: Muslims, unless they are Abu Qatada, have lost their most hated ranking. Poles, Latvians, Lithuanians, Estonians, Slovenians, Hungarians, Czechs and Slovakians have hardly got a look in. Because now the Romanians are coming. And they are not the Daily Mail’s Kind Of People.

Romania and Bulgaria (the latter also being scary territory for Mail readers, but not nearly as much as the former) have recently joined the EU. From next year, both countries’ citizens will be able to enjoy the same freedom of work and movement that nationals of other member stated have taken for granted for many years – including the three quarters of a million Brits in Spain.

But, as so often, the Mail does not wish to inform its readers of the benefits of EU membership: this is a body ruled by people who talk foreign, and we all know what that means. Those who do not speak English for our benefit are Very Bad Folks Indeed. So Romanians being allowed to travel to other countries has become something very scary.

“Hordes of Romanians and Bulgarians are already preparing to head for Britain in search of work” screamed the Mail On Sunday in January. And they were all going to claim benefits! There would be coach loads of them! But not to worry, because “Plans have been drawn up for an advertising campaign denouncing Britain as cold and wet to deter Romanians and Bulgarians from coming to the UK”.

Readers had clearly not been frightened sufficiently by the start of March, and so there had to be more frighteners. “More than 250,000 Romanians and Bulgarians have come to Britain ... 175,000 of them have been given National Insurance Numbers”. They’re already here! How did that happen? Well, like so many Eastern Europeans, they mainly came to work on farms.

So that’s still not scary enough, then. This has not deterred the Dacre attack doggies one bit. Today has brought a report from the German city of Duisberg, telling horror stories of what happens when the Romanians move in. “Filth, noise and crime” is asserted to accompany them. They crap in the streets. They mug and steal. They give Daily Mail photographers the finger (that might come in useful in the UK).

And they get benefits. These are, of course, sufficient to put them in the lap of luxury. And they’re going to come to the UK and get benefits here. Only in the forty-second paragraph of Louise Eccles’ piece does she concede “It would be utterly wrong — and this needs to be stressed — to characterise the Romanians and Bulgarians as scroungers”. But most readers will have already concluded exactly that.

Expect more of this as the year progresses. Be afraid, Mail readers, be very afraid.

[UPDATE 1620 hours: readers at the Express should also be very afraid of Romanians, but on this occasion it's all about shoplifting. Dirty Des' finest, reporting on a group of five Romanians who have been convicted of half-inching goods from a range of supermarkets, told readers that "last night there was concern over the increasing levels of criminality among migrants from the former Communist state".

It always happens "last night" at the Express. The paper was also quick to point out that Romanians were "second highest in a league table of foreign crooks arrested in London". Given this deluge of attack copy, I'd hate to be one of next summer's Romanian fruit pickers (in other words, employed lawfully). Keeps the readers picking up their papers, though, and that's partly the point of the exercise.

The rest is to be frightened of anyone talking foreign. After all, you can't get away with picking on the Welsh any more]