{"id":15165,"date":"2020-10-21T14:11:51","date_gmt":"2020-10-21T14:11:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/?p=15165"},"modified":"2021-02-22T18:45:55","modified_gmt":"2021-02-22T18:45:55","slug":"end-the-hostile-environment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/2020\/10\/21\/end-the-hostile-environment\/","title":{"rendered":"End The Hostile Environment – Defend Asylum Seekers And Refugees"},"content":{"rendered":"

We are posting this article by Fred Laplat and Mike Picken, first posted by Socialist Resistance<\/a>, about the Tories post-Brexit attacks on asylum seekers and refugees, harbingers of stepped up attacks on all migrant workers<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The recently revealed Tory\u00a0plans<\/a>\u00a0to disperse asylum seekers thousands of miles away are another example of the racism of the UK governments\u2019 brand of neoliberalism.\u00a0\u00a0Meanwhile, existing asylum seekers within the UK are facing inhumane treatment by private contractors, incarcerated and facing Covid outbreaks, deportation and frequent movement that also risk spreading the virus among the asylum community.<\/p>\n

For decades, migrant communities and asylum seekers have lived under the shadow of a pervasive and dangerous system in Britain. Theresa May introduced the Hostile Environment policy in 2012 while Home Secretary. But it was Labour immigration minister Liam Byrne who in 2007 coined the term when he said that the Labour government is \u201c\u2026 trying to create a much more Hostile Environment in this country if you are here illegally.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Hostile Environment has killed many and destroyed the lives of thousands. Britain has one of the worst\u00a0records<\/a>\u00a0in Europe in allowing unaccompanied child refugees to be reunited with their families. The Hostile Environment led to the\u00a0appalling treatment of the\u00a0Windrush<\/a>\u00a0generation\u00a0and other\u00a0Commonwealth citizens\u00a0not being able to prove their right to remain in the UK. As a result, many lost their jobs, were denied medical treatment and even deported.<\/p>\n

Now the Tory government is planning to make the Hostile Environment, which they rebranded the\u00a0Compliant Environment<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 even more cruel by planning the use of off-shore detention centres. Migrant detention centres used by Australia on distant islands such as Nauru have been condemned for their abuse of human rights. Behrouz Boochani vividly describes the appalling conditions in these centres in his award-winning book\u00a0No Friend But the Mountains<\/cite><\/a>.<\/p>\n

TORY ATTACKS<\/h3>\n

The attacks on the few rights that migrants and asylum seekers have will appeal to the Tory party membership \u2013 half of whom\u00a0believe<\/a>\u00a0that Islam is a threat to the British way of life \u2013 and to its supporters who voted for Brexit. The English nationalist government of Johnson, Gove and Cummings now want to deliver on their racist and xenophobic promise for Britain to regain its sovereignty and Michael Govecontrol its borders. That was the same message put out by Farage and UKIP, who must be delighted that the Tory party is now carrying out their\u00a0policies<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Tory party may appear incompetent in containing the Coronavirus as Johnson makes U-turns every week. But it is at the same time charging ahead to shift to the right the political values of state institutions and society more generally. It is carrying out a \u201cculture war\u201d against what it sees are progressive and liberal values. This is what lies today behind the plans to attack migrants and asylum seekers. This \u201cculture war\u201d is also behind the\u00a0row<\/a>\u00a0over singing Rule Britannia at the Proms, the proposed\u00a0appointment<\/a>\u00a0of right wingers Moore and Dacre to head the BBC and OFCOM, the\u00a0order<\/a>\u00a0to schools that they consider anti-capitalism as an \u201cextreme political stance\u201d, \u00a0and the\u00a0departure<\/a>\u00a0of top civil servants.<\/p>\n

Today the anti-immigrant hysteria is focussing on the alleged flood \u2013 in reality a trickle \u2013 of \u2018illegal\u2019 migrants who took advantage of mild summer seas to cross the Channel in rubber dinghies and makeshift rafts.\u00a0In a jingoistic and flag waving exercise, Home Secretary Priti Patel has mobilised the navy to aid the border patrol in pushing them back. This will only cause more misery and deaths as desperate migrants and asylum seekers seek even more dangerous routes into Britain, like the\u00a039 Vietnamese migrants<\/a>\u00a0found dead in a lorry in Essex last year.<\/p>\n

DEATHS, COVID AND PRIVATISATION<\/h3>\n

The Tories have handed responsibility for housing existing asylum seekers in the UK to private contractors such as the infamous Serco and Mears groups.\u00a0\u00a0In Scotland,\u00a0three asylum seekers have died<\/a>\u00a0in recent months after hundreds were moved out of their Glasgow homes by the Mears group and incarcerated in hotels, prompting calls from MPs for a public inquiry.\u00a0\u00a0In\u00a0Birmingham<\/a>, dozens of asylum seekers housed by Serco were moved in September, some 120 miles to London, despite testing positive for Covid and being required to self-isolate. Leaders of seven councils have written to the UK government describing the actions of Serco as \u201cbeyond reckless\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0In October, desperate asylum seekers facing Covid outbreaks in Glasgow have also\u00a0written to the UK government<\/a>demanding action.\u00a0\u00a0The Tory government policy of putting its appalling treatment of asylum seekers ahead of public health remains despite the condemnation of the Scottish Refugee Council,\u00a0pointing out the reality<\/a>\u00a0of most asylum claims being regarded as genuine.<\/p>\n

The UK government has also attacked lawyers defending asylum seekers threatened with deportation.\u00a0\u00a0In August, the Home Office Twitter account attacked \u2018activist lawyers\u2019 for opposing \u2018returns\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0Formal complaints<\/a>\u00a0from organisations representing lawyers, including the Law Society and Bar Council who stated that the Tory attacks \u201cundermine the rule of law\u201d, led to the removal of the tweets.\u00a0\u00a0Yet when\u00a0Channel 4 News<\/a>\u00a0pointed out that a deportation flight to France chartered at a cost of around \u00a330,000 involved the deportation of just one asylum seeker, the Tories once again claimed it was all the fault of lawyers.<\/p>\n

MOBILISING OPPOSITION<\/h3>\n

While freedom of movement within the EU is something that socialists should defend, the EU\u2019s own treatment of migrants and refugees remains appalling.\u00a0\u00a0The 2016 deal with Turkey to hold migrants outside of EU territory was a terrible response to the rise of far right racism within EU states.\u00a0\u00a0It has meant that the EU now ignores the gross violations of human rights by the increasingly authoritarian government of Erdogan, whether it be against Kurds,\u00a0the left opposition in Turkey<\/a>, or even against EU member states as in the current diplomatic dispute in the EU over Cyprus and response to the situation in Belarus.<\/p>\n

The task of mobilising opposition to Britain\u2019s closing of borders and treatment of asylum seekers and refugees is becoming more and more urgent. And the end of European free movement in January will constitute the biggest expansion of border\u00a0controls in many decades.<\/p>\n

We urgently need a successful protest movement around asylum seeker and migrant rights to push back the far right\u2019s narratives. The coalition that would organise such a mobilisation must be inclusive, democratic and migrant-led.\u00a0 A first step is the weekend of action against the Hostile Environment on Saturday 10th and Sunday 11th October 2020 called by\u00a0Migrants Organise<\/a>. That weekend must mark the stepping up of the campaign to demand justice for all the lives destroyed by Britain\u2019s racist immigration policies and to make clear that Black Lives Matter also means that the Hostile Environment must end.<\/p>\n

3rd October 2020
\n__________________
\nalso see:-<\/p>\n

GLASGOW KILLING RAISES MAJOR QUESTIONS ABOUT TREATMENT OF ASYLUM SEEKERS<\/a><\/p>\n

INDICTMENT SUBMITTED TO THE PERMANENT PEOPLES\u2019 TRIBUNAL<\/a><\/p>\n

WHAT\u2019S WRONG WITH THE IMMIGRATION BILL?<\/a><\/p>\n

CORBYN, LABOUR AND THE TORIES\u2019 IMMIGRATION BILL \u2013 A dialogue<\/a><\/p>\n

also from Socialist Resistance:-<\/p>\n

ON \u2018ANTISEMITISM\u2019<\/a>
\n________________<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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