2020 October 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqujy-ehKMA&feature=youtu.be
Information Commissioner Orders Home Office to Disclose Data to ‘No-Deportations’
September 2020: 1) ‘No-Deportations’ made an FOI request, 23 April: ’Number of people forcibly removed from the UK on Charter Flights (Escorts and Removals) Q1 January/February/March 2020’: Immigration Enforcement replied: Thank you for your Email of 23 April, in which you ask for information about Charter Flights in 2020. The information which you have requested is being considered under the exemption in section 31 of the FOIA, which relates to law enforcement. This is a qualified exemption, and to consider the public interest test fully we need to extend the 20-working day response period. We now aim to let you have a full response by Monday 22 June.
Continue reading “Information Commissioner Orders Home Office to Disclose Data to ‘No-Deportations’”Home Office outsourcing asylum interviews to private contractors is irresponsible and callous. We have a better alternative.
28.9.2020: The UK Government’s Home Office are planning to outsource asylum interviews to private contractors. They claim that the move is intended to deal with a backlog of over 40,000 cases. The move has sent chills amongst some people seeking asylum, and wider communities with experience of outsourced state services, and especially amongst those who have endured an interview process that was already dysfunctional before the COVID-19 pandemic and crisis.
Outsourcing the interviews would mean that whichever company gets the contract – G4S, Capita, Mitie, Sopra Steria or Serco – would be able to access highly sensitive and confidential information that could put peoples’ lives at risk. Could any of these private companies be trusted with access to sensitive information? Could they be trusted to employ case workers who are capable of creating safe spaces for people to tell their harrowing stories? Could they ask the right questions in the right ways and not intimidate people?
Continue reading “Home Office outsourcing asylum interviews to private contractors is irresponsible and callous. We have a better alternative.”Divisive spin and scandalous neglect: this government’s approach to refugees
We welcome this statement from Leicester City Mayor & Executive:
23.9.2020: Divisive spin and scandalous neglect: this government’s approach to refugees
Leicester is a city that has been shaped by our recent history of providing refuge for people fleeing from war, conflict and oppression. Our city comprises many, many thousands and many generations for whom this plight and flight was a real, lived trauma. People who had to flee immediate jeopardy and make sudden, rapid life changing acts of survival. People who sought refuge and found a home in Leicester.
Continue reading “Divisive spin and scandalous neglect: this government’s approach to refugees”Statement exposing how Home Office plans to restart evictions and continue deportations are irrational and undermine public health
On 15th September 2020, the Minister for Immigration Compliance and the Courts wrote to Local Authority Chief Executives – you can read the letter here: https://statusnow4all.org/condemnation-of-home-office-decision-to-start-evicting-asylum-seekers-despite-warning-of-second-wave/
Three days later, 18th September 2020, the Public Accounts Committee exposed that the Home Office has no idea of the impact of immigration policies and raised serious concerns over the work of the Home Office Immigration Enforcement directorate dating back over several years. That Home Office ‘work’ has directly interfered in the lives of hundreds of thousands of displaced people, including children in families. That ‘work’ has resulted in a myriad of humanity-denying actions authorised through Home Office powers, as most recently exemplified in the horrific death of Mercy Baguma. From within Government structures, the 18th September report placed massive questions marks over a multitude of migration related Home Office decisions.
Continue reading “Statement exposing how Home Office plans to restart evictions and continue deportations are irrational and undermine public health”How can we be practical with the people living in the hostels and hotels
Bullet points from 3rd September 2020 Zoom Meeting of anti fascist activists in the North West about responding to Britain First attacks on hotels etc. organised by Liverpool based PCS Trades Union organiser Mary Dooley
- Coordinate letters to local papers and complaints to IPSOS if letters or articles fostering hate are carried in local press
- Insist that decent internet and wifi connection is put into every residence
- Intention is to involve the people living in the hotels and hostels in the planning and development of our responses so that they are enabled to acquire more control of what is happening and their environment
- Make phone trees including phone numbers of natural leaders in the residences
- Put calls out for old phones so that residents can be given them – and sim cards
- Translate leaflets into key languages – expressing solidarity and offering contact details
- Residents can use healthy snacks fresh fruit and cash – there is no access to cooking facilities so food donations must be appropriate
- Secure solidarity statements and actions from local trade union branches and TUC groups in the area
- Translate leaflets into key languages – expressing solidarity and offering contact details
This is in response to the intrusions by Britain First into hotels where asylum seekers have been accommodated: https://statusnow4all.org/press-release-the-status-now-network-unconditionally-condemns-the-actions-of-members-of-britain-first/
Home Office “has no idea” of the impact of immigration policies
- Read the report summary
- Read the conclusions and recommendations
- Read the full report
- Read the full report (PDF)
The Home Office has “no idea” what its Immigration Enforcement Directorate’s £400 million annual spending achieves, says the Public Accounts Committee in a report published today, raising the spectre of the department making policy decisions based not on evidence, but rather “anecdote, assumption and prejudice”.
Continue reading “Home Office “has no idea” of the impact of immigration policies”Condemnation of Home Office decision to start evicting asylum seekers despite warning of second wave
Letter sent from the Home Office: Director General’s Office, UK Visas and Immigration and Her Majesty’s Passport Office, date: 15 September 2020
Dear All,
At the Asylum SEG on Friday of last week we committed to keeping you updated on cessations and when these would be resuming for those who have received a negative decision. I am therefore writing to let you know that the Minister for Immigration Compliance and the Courts has written to Local Authority Chief Executives today setting out these will start with immediate effect in England, and in the rest of the United Kingdom following consultation with officials in the Devolved Administrations.
We continue to share detailed data with Local Authorities to assist them in planning and this will continue. Migrant Help stand ready to support with the move-on process for those who will now receive cessation letters and we continue to work closely with them.
Andy Kelly will be writing to the SMPs today and will ask that the local NGOs are copied into any local information relating to restarting of negative cessations.
Thank you again for your continued support.
Yours Sincerely,
Abi Tierney
Director General, HM Passport Office and UK Visas & Immigration
See the letter here:
Continue reading “Condemnation of Home Office decision to start evicting asylum seekers despite warning of second wave”
Status Now 4 All backs peaceful demonstrations calling for Leave to Remain for undocumented migrants in UK
18th September 2020 PRESS RELEASE: STATUS NOW 4 ALL BACKS PEACEFUL DEMONSTRATIONS CALLING FOR LEAVE TO REMAIN FOR UNDOCUMENTED MIGRANTS IN THE UK
A national Day of Action is being held this weekend to call for an end to the Government’s Hostile Environment policy and for Leave to Remain to be given to all undocumented migrants in the UK.
Regularise, one of Status Now Network’s signatories, is organising a peaceful demonstration for the rights of undocumented migrants on Saturday, 19th September. It will be held from 1pm-4pm outside 10 Downing Street to ensure the Prime Minister Boris Johnson hears our call for Status Now.
See https://m.facebook.com/events/2387705671522936? www.regularise.org
Also at 1pm on Saturday September 19th, the human rights charity RAPAR www.rapar.co.uk will be holding a demonstration outside the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal Offices, Manchester M1 4AH.
Continue reading “Status Now 4 All backs peaceful demonstrations calling for Leave to Remain for undocumented migrants in UK”Status, Safety and Solidarity event 22 September 2020
[Updated 22.9.2020] Many thanks to everyone who attended or took part in this energising event.
You can watch the Zoom meeting here:
Status, Safety and Solidarity Now 4 All on Tuesday 22nd September with participation from MPs, trade unions, campaigners and those with lived experience, the focus being:
- Building solidarity and dismantling the false divide between all workers, undocumented workers and the Trade Unions movement.
- Valuing the lives and livelihoods of all undocumented migrants and people with insecure status, as migrant rights are human rights.