Why do we call for Status Now Archives - Page 9 of 17

June 3, 2021July 31, 2022

High Court rules Home Secretary acted unlawfully in accommodating asylum seekers in inadequate Napier barracks

3 June 2021: Comment from StatusNow4All signatory: Care4Calais: · **Breaking news**The high court found today:

– Napier Barracks was inadequate accommodation for asylum seekers, placing them at risk of a fire and contracting COVID-19

– The Government’s process for selecting people to be accommodated at the Barracks was flawed and unlawful

– Residents of Napier Barracks were unlawfully detained under purported Covid rules

However over 265 asylum seekers remain accommodated at Napier barracks today and the Government intends to increase numbers up to 337. Already, since being refilled, over 45 people have been transferred out of the Barracks on the grounds of vulnerability following the legal work, indicating that there is still no adequate screening process in place.

We are delighted with this judgement, which follows long months of the Government ignoring a mountain of evidence and complaints that the Barracks are not only unsuitable, but highly damaging, to vulnerable people entrusted to their care. It is disappointing that evidence provided by NGOs and regulators was ignored for so long and it has taken legal action to reach this verdict. However today Napier barracks remains in use and our goal must be to get those inside moved to suitable accommodation as soon as possible. Penally was closed and Napier should be too.

May 30, 2021May 30, 2021

Immigration raid in Kilburn at 3AM

#OustDuterte #StoptheKillingsPh: Filipinos here describe the immigration raid in Kilburn at 3AM today as ‘tokhang-style’ – our local term for Duterte’s bloody war on drugs police operations at dawn that always end in extra-judicial killings. The hostile environment retraumatizes Filipinos living in the UK.

May 26, 2021July 6, 2021

Regularise: A Safer Path to Settlement:

This report comes from StatusNow4All signatory organisation Regularise

24 May 2021: Regularise: A Safer Path to Settlement: Undocumented migrants and the 20 year rule on long residence

Excerpt from Regularise’s briefing:

Background

The 20 year rule on long residence is an immigration directive which appears in the Immigration Rules, written by the Home Secretary and published by the Home Office under the power of section 3 of the Immigration Act 1971. It concerns the ability of undocumented migrants to regularise their status and subsequently—after a 10 year period of ‘continuous lawful residence’ in the UK—qualify for Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) via multiple applications for Limited Leave to Remain (LLR).

Introduced on 9th July 2012, the 20 year rule replaced the 14 year rule which formerly provided a shorter and more direct route to settlement. Prior to 2012, this route permitted undocumented migrants living in the UK to regularise their status by applying for ILR immediately following 14 years continuous residence.

Under the 20 year rule, in order to reach the same point of qualification for an ILR application, a person is required to have continuously resided in the UK for at least 30 years which includes at least 20 years continuous and precarious residence before they are able to make four separate successful applications for 30 months of LLR at a time, totalling a further 120 months or 10 consecutive years (see Fig.1). For comparison, the EU Settlement Scheme required over a million EU migrants to prove they had five years’ continuous residence before being granted settled status. As of May 2020, more than 3.3 million EU Settlement Scheme applications had been concluded of which 57% were granted settled status and 41% pre-settled status.

How does the 20 year rule work?

May 25, 2021May 25, 2021

Home Office drops plans to resume evicting some asylum seekers ‘with immediate effect’

Updated 25 May 2021: Guardian: Home Office drops plan to evict thousands of migrants during pandemic

U-turn affects around 4,000 people refused asylum who were facing eviction with ‘immediate effect’

The Home Office has reversed its plan to evict thousands of migrants during the pandemic, the Guardian has learned.

The U-turn affects about 4,000 migrants who were facing eviction from Home Office accommodation.

Concerns were raised that the department’s plan to resume evictions of some refused asylum seekers with “immediate effect” could increase the spread of Covid and discriminate against people of colour who will be disproportionately affected by the policy.

A court order signed on Tuesday by government lawyers and their counterparts challenging the evictions policy confirmed that the home secretary, Priti Patel, had withdrawn it.

May 22, 2021May 22, 2021

Government ‘devoid of compassion and competence’ over English Channel crossings as numbers double

22 May 2021: Independent: Exclusive: Netherlands and Sweden join list of EU countries saying they will not agree to take asylum seekers from UK

The number of migrants crossing the English Channel has doubled year on year despite Priti Patel’s vow to make the route “unviable”, The Independent can reveal.

May 20, 2021May 20, 2021

Britain’s borders: wide open to Covid, slammed shut for people in need

What are the priorities?

19 May 2021: Guardian: Britain’s borders: wide open to Covid, slammed shut for people in need

“During the first three months of the pandemic – from 1 January until lockdown on 23 March last year, 18 million people arrived in the UK from abroad. But only 273 of them were obliged to quarantine. By contrast, across the 12 months to March 2020, 23,075 people were thrown into immigration detention centres: prisons for people who have not been convicted of any crime but are suspected of entering – or remaining in – the country without the correct paperwork.”

Read the article here: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/may/19/britain-borders-covid-government-indian-variant-migrants

May 17, 2021September 16, 2023

Anti-Deportation Protesters Block Immigration Van From Leaving Glasgow Street

Updated 17 May 2021: We begin with the Guardian article: Cruel, paranoid, failing: inside the Home Office, followed by articles regarding the successful Glasgow action yesterday in securing the release of two men from a Borders & Immigration van from Positive Action of Housing; and the BBC. There is also a more recent article about the dawn raid that was not witnessed.

Guardian Cruel, paranoid, failing: inside the Home Office

For the thousands of people who end up on the wrong side of the Home Office each year, there is often a sudden moment of disbelief. This can’t be happening, people tell themselves. They can’t do this, can they? https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/may/13/cruel-paranoid-failing-priti-patel-inside-the-home-office

May 16, 2021May 16, 2021

BID raises concerns on the use of prolonged solitary confinement in immigration detention

Time-served prisoners!

16 May 2021: Guardian: Torture victims kept in solitary by Home Office for up to a year

Immigration detainees left desperate and suicidal after being held in prisons during the pandemic

The Home Office has pursued a policy of psychological brutality by locking up scores of torture survivors in solitary confinement for indefinite periods, according to fresh testimony from immigration detainees.

May 15, 2021May 15, 2021

Court says: This man is not a criminal

January 2021: BBC: Channel migrants: Iranian jailed for piloting two dinghies

‘Following the sentencing, the Home Office’s Clandestine Channel Threat Commander Dan O’Mahoney said Kakaei’s actions “risked lives” and the prosecution “put a stop to that cycle of criminality”.

This is what the New Plan for Immigration rests on, calling people seeking asylum ‘criminals’, but on retrial:

14 May 2021: Guardian: Iranian asylum seeker cleared of Channel smuggling charges

Man who took turn steering boat ‘because he didn’t want to die’ freed, with case opening way for others to appeal their sentences

An asylum seeker jailed on smuggling charges for helping to steer a boat filled with migrants from France to England has had his conviction overturned at a retrial after spending 17 months in jail.

May 13, 2021April 12, 2022

EDM #7 – Regularisation of undocumented migrants

StatusNow4All welcomes the following EDM #7, and we remind readers of EDM #1442: https://statusnow4all.org/edm-1442-undocumented-migrants-and-covid-19-vaccination/

EDM #7: That this House recognises that there are many barriers that prevent people from accessing and maintaining stable immigration status even when they were either born in the UK or have lived in the UK for many years; further recognises that the majority of undocumented migrants have lost their status through no fault of their own, including through an inability to pay application fees, lack of access to legal advice, mistakes on the part of decision-makers and complexity of immigration rules; understands that the harm done to individuals through hostile immigration policies extends to family members and the communities that they are part of; notes that the UK has one of the most complex and expensive routes to regularisation in Europe; further notes that all current routes to regularisation and settlement are far too long, complicated and inflexible, leaving people with no options but to live undocumented; understands that migrants who do not have access to the public safety net or the right to work are vulnerable to exploitation and; and calls on the Government to support recommendations made by Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants in its report, We Are Here: routes to regularisation for the UK’s undocumented population, published in April 2021 by introducing new routes to regularisation and removing barriers which cause migrants to become undocumented.

https://edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/58432

May 10, 2021May 10, 2021

IRR: Sewell report seeks to sideline structural factors attached to racism

Updated 10 May 2021: Racism in action: Guardian: Celebrities unite to back #StopAsianHate campaign

Marvel film stars Gemma Chan and Benedict Wong among prominent east and south-east Asian people taking action on UK’s wave of Covid-related sinophobia

The Marvel film star Gemma Chan has revealed that she is frightened for her family in the UK after a surge in hate crimes against Chinese, Japanese and south-east Asian people.

May 8, 2021September 16, 2023

The call for StatusNow4All is absolutely relevant in these times of injustice

This poster can be used for educational purposes. It’s message reminds us that the earth is not ours to ‘buy and sell for private gain. You poor take courage
You rich take care, This earth was made a common treasury For everyone to share‘ (Billy Bragg: The World Turned Upside Down)

… but the UK Government is using its power to steal and entice prestigious award winners from other countries whom it deems to be useful for UK, whilst destroying lives of others who are already here, all of whom have something to offer, given the chance. The call for StatusNow4All is absolutely relevant in these times of injustice.

From Loraine: Recently when I was interviewed for a short documentary out in June, the man asked – some refugees have done great things. I corrected him because it’s not about great things, it’s about having a second chance at your life. Its about being able to live freely like everyone else. We can’t push every refugee to be a superhero (if at all it exists) in order to be accepted. Accept us as human beings. Why is that hard?

Evening Standard: India to take back illegal migrants in return for UK visas for young workers

The UK and India have signed an agreement for the Asian country to take back illegal migrants in return for visas for young workers.

April 28, 2021April 28, 2021

End the virus of racism

28 April 2021: Aljazeera: Racism on the frontline: Britain’s Asian healthcare workers

Racist abuse of Asian healthcare workers is reportedly on the rise as they risk their lives in the fight against COVID.

Enforced removals to Vietnam risks re-trafficking

26 April 2021: From Mariko Hayashi, Director of SN$A signatory organisation Southeast and East Asian Centre (SEEAC): “The UK is one of the major destinations of victims of human trafficking from Vietnam, which was the third most common nationality of all referrals to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) as potential victims in 2020. The figures show that between 2018 and 2020, in only three years, 2,242 Vietnamese people have been identified as potential victims of human trafficking. I am very concerned that some of the individuals removed from the UK without proper due process could have been victims of human trafficking.

The hostile environment policies and border securitisation, which often criminalise migrants who are vulnerable to exploitation, perpetuate violation of human rights and even put these migrants at risk of being re-trafficked.”

April 25, 2021April 25, 2021

Home Office sued by asylum seeker over baby’s death

Guardian: Home Office sued by asylum seeker over baby’s death

Woman claims asylum housing staff ignored pleas for help when she was in pain while 35 weeks pregnant

A woman whose baby died is suing the Home Office for negligence over claims that staff at her asylum accommodation refused to call an ambulance when she was pregnant and bleeding.