Why do we call for Status Now Archives - Page 4 of 17

February 20, 2022March 3, 2022

Deportation in this cruel hostile environment

StatusNow4All: This cruel hostile environment has given rise to yet another Home Office plan to deport people to Zimbabwe on 2 March 2022. StatusNow4All abhors this decision made in the name of the Home Secretary, Priti Patel.

It is immoral:

These are just some of the factors of note in relation to those who are being rounded up for deportation right now:

· Some have been here a long time, as many as twenty years;

· Some will have had Refugee Leave, such was the compelling case they presented on arrival in UK, but the law allows the Home Office to strip them of this due to a conviction for particular offending behaviours [para 339 Immigration Rules].

· Deportation Orders are automatically made against people without British or Irish citizenship who have been given a prison sentence of more than a year

· Some of these people will have served their time in prison and on license like any other person with a conviction, and have subsequently lived in the community for years without re-offending

February 9, 2022February 19, 2022

What The Nationality and Borders Bill Really Means

9 February 2022: A STATUS NOW NETWORK BRIEFING

This Status Now Network briefing is from the standpoint of migrant communities across the UK who live with precarious residence status: a legacy of the hostile environment.

Why is the government proposing this bill?

This Bill is intended for purely political purposes. It amounts to an attempt to recoup ground lost to hostile environment policies through negative public perception about Government action in both the Windrush scandals and other revelations of injustice in immigration policy that have emerged in recent years.

During the Covid-19 period, as migrant people have been profiled as key workers in health and social care, transport and supply chains, providing the wider population with vital goods and services, public perception of immigration has undergone changes. The measures set out in the Borders and Nationality and Borders Bill are intended to disrupt this growing solidarity and identification with hard pressed migrant communities. It consists of talking up an existential threat via small boat arrivals and types of British citizens who are not considered worthy of that status when no threat of this nature exists. Refugee and asylum procedures for routes of entry without grave risk to life are completely achievable. Criminal law exists to address criminal activity by any British citizen without any distinctions that rely on ethnic or immigrant origin.

February 9, 2022September 16, 2023

People falsely accused of cheating on TOEIC tests, threatened with being removed from UK

9 February 2022: Status Now signatory Migrant Voice exposes another Home Office process that violates people with precarious status:

Migrant Voice: A preview of international student Noman ‘Nomi’ Raja speaking to BBC Newsnight about the turmoil caused by the UK government’s #HostileEnvironment after he was falsely accused of cheating on a #TOEIC test, arrested and threatened with deportation to Pakistan. https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=361018352218599

BBC News report on a BBC Newsnight investigation by correspondent Richard Watson into new evidence revealing international #TOEIC students accused of cheating were falsely targeted, arrested and threatened with deportation. The special in-depth report will feature on #BBCNewsnight on Wednesday 9 February, at 10.45pm (BBC TWO).

February 8, 2022July 31, 2022

EDM #1442: Undocumented migrants and covid-19 vaccination

Early Day Motion 1442 tabled on 3 February 2021: Undocumented migrants and covid-19 vaccination

Motion text: That this House believes that access to essential healthcare is a universal human right; regrets the continued existence of structural, institutional and systemic barriers in accessing NHS care experienced by undocumented migrants and those awaiting determination of their asylum, visa and immigration applications; considers that an effective public health response to the covid-19 crisis requires that the most vulnerable can afford to access food, healthcare, and self-isolate where necessary; understands that some of the most vulnerable people in society will not access vaccination against the virus, since to disclose their identity to the authorities would risk their arrest, detention and deportation; fears that without urgent Government intervention this will lead to further avoidable premature deaths, especially in the African, Asian and Minority Ethnic population; and therefore calls on the Home Office to grant everyone currently in the UK at this time who are undocumented migrants and those awaiting determination of their asylum, visa and immigration applications indefinite leave to remain, and to be eligible in due course to receive the covid-19 vaccination.

January 31, 2022September 16, 2023

Ireland: MASI welcomes the decision by the minister to offer once in a generation Amnesty for 17000 undocumented migrants

Updated 31 January 2022: Migrant Rights Centre Ireland@MigrantRightsIr

What a historic day!

The Regularisation Scheme for Undocumented people is open for applications!

Today is truly the victory of the Justice for the Undocumented campaign group and all the brave undocumented people who came forward and fought for justice! #undocIrl

Find out more about undocumented scheme at http://mrci.ie/scheme21

January 6, 2022January 6, 2022

JCWI report launch: “We also want to be safe”

Event: Tuesday 18 January 2022: JCWI: Report launch: “We also want to be safe”: undocumented migrants facing COVID in a Hostile Environment

New research from the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants shines a spotlight on the devastating impact of Hostile Environment policies on undocumented migrants during the pandemic. Join us on Tuesday 18 January 2022 for the launch of the new report.

Chaired by Clive Lewis MP
With guests:

Caitlin Boswell, report author
Francesca Humi, Kanlungan Filipino Consortium, contributor to the report
Blessing, contributor to the report

“We also want to be safe”: undocumented migrants facing COVID in a Hostile Environment

December 18, 2021December 18, 2021

STATUS NOW 4 ALL – MIDLANDS: Join us online as we commemorate this year’s International Migrants Day 2021 #IMD2021

STATUS NOW 4 ALL – MIDLANDS: Join us online as we commemorate this year’s International Migrants Day 2021 #IMD2021 This is an online event.

Date: 18th December 2021: Time 1-2PM.

This event is organised by Status Now 4 All signatories based in the Midlands as part of the International Migrants Day 2021. Among other speakers, we will hear from a number of organisations signatories about why they support the Status Now 4 All campaign, how you or your organisation too can be part, and why this campaign is important for all of us. There will also be creative performances.

Here is the recording of the event:

December 18, 2021September 16, 2023

AT and WITHIN the UK’s Borders: StatusNow4All identifies with everyone in transit and everyone who has died in transit

Update 18 December 2021: See here for depth information about home office border security plan: https://corporatewatch.org/home-office-set-to-advertise-385-million-private-border-security-contracts/

StatusNow logo

Status Now Statement: AT and WITHIN the UK’s Borders: StatusNow4All identifies with everyone in transit and everyone who has died in transit.
People have moved around the world for many reasons through time, and they still do. In their attempts to reach what they perceived to be a toehold where they and their families might begin to become safe, consider how many of these people have died because obstacles have been put in their way on land or in the water. We don’t know the numbers.

We do know that the overt and systematic militarisation of the European Union borders began in 2004 when Frontex (funded through the European Commission) were contracted.

In July 2021 a condemnation of Frontex’s actions failing to protect asylum seekers rights was published.

Now, in the wake of the most recent drownings in the English Channel, networks up and down Britain are mobilising to communicate their complete condemnation of the Government’s immigration control systems, AT and WITHIN the UK’s borders. Every time people plan and work together through such mobilisations, we strengthen the bonds committed to transforming the way the migration system works and stopping the deaths and the suffering.

December 16, 2021September 16, 2023

Unhelpful – Review of data sharing: migrant victims and witnesses of crime

15 December 2021: Home Office: Review of data sharing: migrant victims and witnesses of crime

Conclusions

74.The submission of the super-complaint has highlighted the need to continually review and improve upon existing practices to provide confidence and assurances that any allegation(s) of crime will be given full and proper consideration by the police irrespective of the victim’s immigration status. We fully acknowledge the concerns raised around the current data sharing arrangements and wider issues around supporting migrant victims and witnesses with insecure status to regularise their stay if appropriate.

December 14, 2021September 16, 2023

Online Event 25 November 2021 6-8pm – These Walls Must Fall: We Want Freedom

Updated 14 December 2021: the video of this zoom event can be seen here, along with many others on their channel:

https://youtu.be/Ho1v53WQ9y4

These Walls Must Fall event: Join us for ‘We Want Freedom!’, a national These Walls Must Fall online event at this crucial time in the fight for migrant justice.

The devastating ‘Borders Bill’ is in Parliament for the second reading right now. It could bring unprecedented changes to the UK immigration system, which already treats people who come to the UK incredibly cruelly.

Speakers from across the movement will discuss the whole system of deportation and detention, how we can fight it at every stage, and how local acts of solidarity can make a difference.

December 10, 2021September 16, 2023

The Power of Art

On Human Rights Day 2021: I have seen peace by Loraine Masiya Mponela

This is original work by Loraine Masiya Mponela. While sharing is encouraged and appreciated, please do acknowledge accordingly.

I have seen peace by Loraine Masiya Mponela

I cry for justice

and equal rights

the right to be treated fairly

in front of the law

December 9, 2021June 5, 2023

EDITORIAL: An exponential expansion of the number of people in the UK with precarious status: one potential implication of Clause 9 of the current Nationality and Borders Bill

9th December 2021

An exponential expansion of the number of people in the UK with precarious status: one potential implication of Clause 9 of the current Nationality and Borders Bill

‘“It’s a horrible Clause”. Frances Webber, Institute of Race Relations, London.

The idea that ‘an uncommunicated decision can bind an individual’ is ‘an astonishing proposition’^[1].

In August of this year Sky News published analysis^[2] of the last three years of ‘complete’ Home Office data relating to migration. Demonstrating that the people who arrive in the UK in small boats and who generally claim asylum are only a small fraction of the number of migrants arriving in the UK each year, it admitted that ‘These numbers are based on estimates. The real number of unauthorised people in the UK is not known as official figures cannot capture the true reality.’ Sky News then fell back onto the much-cited Pew Research figure dating from 2019 that describes there being between 0.8-1.2 million migrant people in the UK who are ‘unauthorised’^[3]. The Status Now Network favours the term ‘precarious’ to describe everyone in the UK without secure status.

On 11^th November 2021, a number of media outlets carried the Institute of Race Relations exposure^[4] of ‘the dangers posed by a clause inserted quietly into the Nationality and Borders Bill, which will allow some British citizens (mainly dual nationals) to lose their citizenship without being notified in a wide range of circumstances, which could put them at grave risk.’ As of 6^thDecember this Clause, number 9^[5], is one of several that make up an additional 88 pages of amendments that have been tabled^[6] as the Bill passes through its procedural stages.

Here, IRR’s Frances Webber explains more of the history of Clause 9:

November 23, 2021November 23, 2021

The immigration detention estate for women

Updated 23 November 2021: Re: Hassockfield/Consett/Derwentside immigration detention centre to house women will open by the end of 2021!

iNews: As migrant channel crossings hit a new record, insiders says centres like Yarl’s Wood can never be humane

For 20 years, Yarl’s Wood has been holding asylum seekers without time limits. Now a controversial new centre is replacing it to hold women. Is it time to call an end to detention?

Agnes Tanoh still remembers the fear of being taken into Yarl’s Wood, nearly a decade on. “You walk through the gates,” says the 65-year-old Ivorian refugee, “and the tunnel you take to reach the first office destroys your mind. I thought, ‘I am going somewhere I may never leave.’”

It was March 2012 when Tanoh was arrested and taken to the notorious immigration detention centre in Bedfordshire. After the disturbing ordeal of fleeing her home country the previous year, with her life at risk, she was incarcerated indefinitely as she awaited news of her fate.

“You haven’t defended yourself at trial,” she explains. “Being taken to a detention centre is being given a sentence without a time limit. It can be one week, three months, one year – you don’t know. Detention breaks families and causes distress and trauma.”

It is immoral:

9 February 2022: A STATUS NOW NETWORK BRIEFING

Early Day Motion 1442 tabled on 3 February 2021: Undocumented migrants and covid-19 vaccination

Updated 31 January 2022: Migrant Rights Centre Ireland@MigrantRightsIr

Updated 19 January 2021: JCWI: “We also want to be safe” – undocumented migrants facing COVID in a Hostile Environment

Updated 17 January 2022: City AM: Army to take control as govt plans to order Royal Navy to stop Channel migrants and fly asylum seekers to Rwanda and Ghana