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Greater Manchester leaders “will not be complicit” in asylum seeker evictions

9 December 2020: Labour List: Greater Manchester leaders “will not be complicit” in asylum seeker evictions

Greater Manchester mayoral and local authority leaders have released a joint statement today pledging that they “will not be complicit” in the Home Office policy of enforcing asylum seeker evictions amid winter and Covid.

Andy Burnham, deputy mayors Bev Hughes and Richard Leese, and nine council leaders have written to Priti Patel to express “profound concern” over those asylum seekers who receive a negative decision soon being evicted.

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AVID: 60+ organisations join our call to close the barracks and engage with civil society

8 December 2020: AVID: Today, we sent a letter to the Immigration Minister and Shadow Home Secretary highlighting the risks of housing vulnerable asylum-seekers in crowded barracks where social distancing is impossible, and urging them to implement community-based alternatives, to avoid further harm. Our letters were co-signed by more than 60 community organisations working with people in detention or seeking asylum.

Read the letter to the Immigration Minister Chris Philp MP

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Human Rights, and Status Now for All

The 7th annual Leicester Human Rights Arts and Film Festival presents Human Rights, and Status Now for All on Thursday, 10 December 2020, 4.00pm – 6.00pm (London GMT)

The Leicester Human Rights Arts and Film Festival invites you to Human Rights, and Status Now for All.

The event marks International Human Rights Day which is observed around the world on December 10, annually. The event will appeal to people interested in community relations, migration, law and politics and those who are interested in how we build better during and after the Covid-19 pandemic.

Attendees will hear from a number of organisations that are part of the Status Now Network who will talk about why Britain and Ireland must give settled status or indefinite leave to remain to all who are in the UK who need such leave as well as how people in the UK and beyond can support this call.

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UK races to deport asylum seekers ahead of Brexit

6 December 2020: Guardian: UK races to deport asylum seekers ahead of Brexit

From January Britain can no longer return them to the EU, but the rush for the deadline may be denying them a proper screening

Scores of vulnerable asylum seekers, including suspected victims of trafficking, are scheduled to be deported this week as the home secretary Priti Patel ramps up removal operations ahead of Brexit.

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“The Radicalization of a Woman Without a Paper: Status Now For All”, a guest lecture by Rogelio Braga

The Leicester Secular Society annual Human Rights lecture series presents “The Radicalization of a Woman Without a Paper: Status Now For All”, a guest lecture by Rogelio Braga on Sunday, 6 December 2020 6.30pm – 8.30pm (London GMT)

Book your ticket via Eventbrite

The Leicester Secular Society (LSS) invites you to its annual Human Rights Lecture which, this year, will be given by Rogelio Braga, who is based in London and is an exiled human rights activist, playwright and novelist from the Philippines.

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We Belong: Mental Health check

The young migrant folk at We Belong recently published this report that looks at mental health and the precariousness of growing up on LLR:

“We Belong’s Mental Health Check is not an easy read – but it is an essential one. It is a clarion call for change. Our report catalogues the terrible toll that the immigration system in general – and the 10-year Limited Leave to Remain route in particular – is taking on young people’s mental and physical health.

Our country cannot afford to go on like this: too many young lives are being damaged and distorted; too much harm is being inflicted; too much ambition and talent is being hobbled – or even extinguished.

Here, we repeat the call of our 2019 report, ‘Normality is a Luxury: How Limited Leave to Remain is blighting young lives’, for a shorter, more affordable and humane path to citizenship for those of us who are proud to call the UK our home (see page 30-31)”

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Home Office accused of cover-up at camp for asylum seekers

Updated with report in the Guardian 26 November 2020: Medical staff urge Priti Patel to close barracks housing asylum seekers

Exclusive: Letter to home secretary raises concerns about sites holding 600 men in Kent and Pembrokeshire

Healthcare professionals have called for former army barracks being used to house asylum seekers to be closed over concerns about the residents’ wellbeing.

Medical staff have written to the home secretary, Priti Patel, with a damning assessment, to raise concerns about the sites at Napier barracks in Kent and Penally barracks in Pembrokeshire, which between them are holding more than 600 men.

The group, represented by Doctors of the World, a human rights organisation, believe the sites are unsuitable due to the lack of access to adequate and appropriate healthcare services and risks from a lack of compliance with Covid-19 regulations.

They also fear the military environment will trigger further trauma for the men, many of whom will have fled conflict, militia and may have been detained in similar environments in their home countries. [Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/nov/26/medical-staff-urge-priti-patel-to-close-barracks-housing-asylum-seekers

23 November 2020: Guardian: Home Office accused of cover-up at camp for asylum seekers

Official Secrets Act used to prevent volunteers discussing ‘disturbing’ conditions at ex-barracks

Volunteers have been asked to sign confidentiality agreements underpinned by the Official Secrets Act before entering an army barracks used to house asylum seekers, as details emerge of the “disturbing” conditions on the site.

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Home Office failed to comply with equality law when implementing ‘hostile environment’ measures

and … Bella Sankey@BellaSankey· Director of @DetentionAction: And it’s officially confirmed. The @ukhomeoffice are planning a pre-Christmas mass deportation of Black British residents to Jamaica on 2nd December. Despite #COVID19 risks they think that they have capacity to deport 50 people on the flight. #Jamaica50@DetentionAction

Note – you can sign this petition: Urgent action needed: Home Office plan pre Christmas mass deportation to Jamaica during lockdown

EHCR: Home Office failed to comply with equality law when implementing ‘hostile environment’ measures Published: 25 Nov 2020

We assessed how and whether the Home Office complied with the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED) when developing, implementing and monitoring the hostile environment policy agenda, particularly in considering its impact on Black members of the Windrush generation.

The assessment has found that negative consequences were repeatedly ignored, dismissed, or their severity disregarded at crucial points of policy development. There was limited engagement with representatives of the Windrush generation, even as the severe effects of hostile environment policies began to emerge.

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‘Work It Out’ and ‘In the Gaps’ from JCWI

2020 Nov 24: report from one of our signatory organisations, Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants : Work It Out

Foreword:

Nearly a year after the first documented case of Covid-19, no life has been left untouched by the pandemic. Many of us
have lost loved ones. Many more have lost jobs and livelihoods. We have all learned how important it is to feel safe, loved and cared for.

But throughout this crisis, countless lives have been saved and many of our communities have been kept afloat. Not by walls or hostility but by workers.

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SERCO attempting to evict Refugee People during Lockdown

22nd November 2020 Press Release:

SERCO attempting to evict Refugee People during Lockdown

“… evicting people onto the street does nothing,

apart from create more illnesses, more miseries and more risks of death. 

It has to stop.” 

Shade Alonge, for DeButterfly CIC and Mama Health and Poverty Partnership,

Greater Manchester

On 19th November, two members of the human rights organisation RAPAR, both of whom live in the city of Manchester, both of whom fled from persecution in their home countries and both of whom have been awarded Refugee Status, received letters from SERCO telling them that they are to be evicted from their homes on 29th November and 17th December respectively.

The private company SERCO, whose Chief Executive Officer is Rupert Soames the brother of ex-MP for the Conservative Party, Sir Nicholas[1], is contracted by the Home Office to accommodate people seeking asylum in the North West.  Under non-COVID conditions, there are two points in time at which SERCO are entitled, legally, to tell Refugee People that they intend to evict them from their homes: 

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‘We are only as safe as the most vulnerable in our society’

19 November 2020: During this pandemic, the government has handed out £18 billion to private companies, many of which had little or no experience in public health and whose only qualification seem to be a close personal relationship with a member of the government. This is a government that is frivolous when it comes to handing public money out to Tory donors or private companies, but penny pinching when it comes to bailing out communities across the country.