Category: Status Now call updates

19 November 2023: Status Now 4 All welcomes the defeat of the Government’s Rwanda Plan in the Supreme Court

Status Now 4 All joins all refugee and human rights organisations in welcoming the ruling of the Supreme Court that the Government’s so-called ‘Rwanda Plan’ (to remove virtually all people seeking asylum to Rwanda for ‘processing’ through the asylum system with, notably, no possibility of return to the UK) is unlawful.

It is important to note that the ruling was unanimous: five judges ruled the plan unlawful not only under the provisions of European human rights law, but also under domestic British law. Parliament must now also understand that the threat to renounce UK signatory state status to the European Convention on Human Rights, or to repeal the Human Rights Act 1998, will not fix the Rwanda plan in the way the UK Government intends, and both would bring about a significant risk to the human rights of everyone living in the UK and to the UK’s standing in international terms

We extend our deep gratitude to the legal team acting for the respondents in this matter, and all the charities and solidarity organisations which have worked with them to bring about this result.

Continue reading “Status Now 4 All welcomes the defeat of the Government’s Rwanda Plan in the Supreme Court“

This is our call:

We call upon the British and Irish States to act immediately so that all undocumented, destitute and migrant people in the legal process in both the UK and Ireland are granted Status Now, as in *Indefinite Leave to Remain. In this way every human, irrespective of their nationality or citizenship can access healthcare, housing, food and the same sources of income from the State as everyone else

====Status Now 4 All Newsletter===

++++++ November 2023 ++++++

On the 12th October our Friends of Status Now organised a meeting of supporters in Birmingham.

Hosted by Birmingham Asylum and Refugee Association (BARA) participants shared their experiences of living as migrants and refugees with precarious status and looked ahead to the campaigning they expect to be involved in in the coming months.

Foremost in the discussion was the role that migrant and refugee activists can play in the general election campaign which will take place in 2024.  What opportunities will exist for people with precarious status to intervene in public debates over the treatment of people seeking refugee and a better life in the UK?

Continue reading “StatusNow4All Newsletter – November 2023”

Status Now 4 All!  Renewing our Call!

In the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns in 2020, a group of organisations working in solidarity with migrant and refugee people issued a call for ‘Status Now 4 All!’ in order to address the needs of hundreds of thousands of people who were in positions of exceptional risk as a consequence of having a precarious right of residence in the UK.

A lot about the predicament of migrants in British society that emerged during these months conflicted with dominant prejudices that existed over their position as workers and fellow members of local communities.  It became widely understood that migrants earned their livings as key workers across many sectors of services and industries, and were obliged to continue working in high-risk occupations. As health and care workers, working in public transportation, and employed in other vital roles for fulfilling supply chains in the distribution of food and other essential goods, migrants, therefore, formed a large proportion of the newly-named group: ‘essential workers’. 

Continue reading “Status Now 4 All!  Renewing our Call!“

11 September 2023: Considering a call for anti-racist immigration and nationality law.

Hello.  I’m Rhetta Moran.  Thank you for asking me to come here tonight on behalf of the SNN to consider a call for anti-racist immigration and nationality laws.  

The views I’m about to share are best summed up through the words of Angela Davis: Racism cannot be separated from Capitalism.

Before I outline what the Status Now Network is I want to ask a fundamental question: 

What do laws tell us about the society that has produced them? 

If we agree an understanding of what the existence of any law means, including the “Illegal” Migration Act then it becomes possible to collectively, do one of at least three things:

1.  Get rid of that law

2.  Introduce a new one

3.  Abandon the process of law formation altogether, in favour of another way entirely of going about the business of creating a world that is safe for people – and every other living thing. 

Continue reading “SNN at TUC Conference fringe”

20 February 2023: Status Now Network and the fight for antiracist workplaces

Status Now Network joined the Stand Up to Racism and TUC’s national conference Fighting for Anti-Racist Workplaces held at SOAS, University of London, last February 4^th. The conference highlighted the role of the trade union movement to combat racism in the workplace, the hostile environment that targets migrant workers and refugees, and the various community interventions to prevent the rise of the far-right movement across the UK.

Refugees and SNN campaigners Loraine Masiya Mponela and Rogelio Braga were invited to participate in the workshop session #Stop Rwanda #Refugees welcome -don’t let scapegoating divide us , where Braga was one of the speakers. He highlighted that the plight of undocumented migrant workers should also be at the agenda of the British union movement. Undocumented migrants with their precarious migration status are subjected to exploitation, racism, and unfair labour practice with limited protection and support from institutions.

Below is Braga’s speech in the Conference.

Continue reading “Status Now Network and the fight for antiracist workplaces“

20 February 2023: Years of refugee policy failure laid the grounds for the Knowsley riot – the government should be made to own it

The scene outside The Suites hotel in the Liverpool suburb of Knowsley earlier this month provided a powerful summary of where the politics of immigration are in the UK at this moment in time.

It is sadly a feature of anxious times that segments of the population will look to simplistic explanations for the threats to their living standards which place the blame on ‘foreigners’ and other minoritized people.

Continue reading “Years of refugee policy failure laid the grounds for the Knowsley riot“

20 February 2023: The home office published a series of reviews of its hostile environment policies at the beginning of February. 

An attempt was made to rebrand the approach after the details of the Windrush scandal became public in 2017 as ‘complaint environment’ policies but the older term has remained current.

The four reviews published do far are:

Continue reading “Home Office review of the hostile environment concedes that it is racist“