Italy's immigration debate was about helping refugees in their own homelands
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#ITALIANSFIRST - Help them in their own homeland
With Italy and its citizens still recovering economically, proponents of this view believe that the country should help its own people before welcoming immigrants and refugees.
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Context
This hashtag was part of the Northern League's political campaign. At the beginning, this slogan was used to support anti-immigration policies that didn't accept any kind of immigrant. Over the years its supporters softened their position. Nowadays, they say that Italy can't make it alone and that the government should stop welcoming people. Some say that refugees are the only one who should be allowed in, some others say that even refugees should not seek for help in Italy.
The Argument
Italy is still facing the consequences of the 2007 economic crisis and many Italians live in bad conditions. With these premises it’s hard to help both Italians and immigrants. There are no more jobs for Italians themselves - the government can't take care of others too.
The Italian government should rather invest money in the development of African countries, so that people won't need to run away from their homeland.
Counter arguments
There is a European asset for refugees. It doesn’t cover all the expenses, but all the recent governments have wasted a huge amount of money in other projects. There is also a problem with tax evasion and corruption. There would be money, if only the government decided to take action against these issues.
The idea of investing money in Africa is good - but if it's not done well, it could turn into a collaboration with governments that will just imprison refugees in countries like Libia, which is often being accused of several human right violations in refugee's camps.