A wake-up call

By Jason Moore EVERY morning at the moment there is a queue almost a mile long outside the main police station in Palma. All those queuing are foreigners waiting in line to have their paper-work processed by the local authorities. Some sleep outside all night. It's a very depressing sight and clearly underlines the fact that the Foreigner's Department in Majorca is not prepared to cope with this volume of people. Only the paperwork of about 80 people is being processed a day, surely more staff can be found within the small army of civil servants in the Balearics to make this whole process more effective and faster? The Balearics need immigrant workers. The local government has made this very clear. But isn't it a pity that the island which is set to be their new home isn't prepared for them. The Central Government Delegate Ramon Socias has said that there is no need to queue-up, he says that by one o'clock the office is empty. Surely this cannot be the case. You are not going to queue for most of the morning and not if you can simply walk in at lunch-time and get served on the spot. What I find rather annoying also, is the local authorities do not appear to realise that there is a problem. The time has come for the government to re-organise the whole operation and make sure that it is well staffed and well equipped. I don't understand why an office which exclusively deals with foreigner's paperwork is not set-up. If Majorca wants to continue to attract people from other countries to work here then it must get its act together. The only solution is to move the Foreigner's Office out from the police station, build a new centre exclusively for foreigner's paperwork and recruit staff who can speak a variety of different languages. That is the way forward.