Johnson insists on deportation of Caribbean nationals despite claims they’re NOT ‘serious criminals’
Nazi overtones: Hitler deported Jews from Germany, before deciding to murder them instead; now it seems Boris Johnson is picking on people of Caribbean descent. What next?
Exactly why is the Tory government insisting on deporting people of Caribbean origin who have been UK residents for many years?
He says they’re “serious criminals”. But are they? Let’s remember, the Tories have been wrong about their deportations before, but still insisted on causing misery to thousands of innocent people.
(And the UK electorate then insisted on returning them to office. I suppose it’s true that some people only care when they’re the ones being persecuted.)
All 50 of those being deported are said to be convicted criminals, but here’s the catch: they have all served UK prison terms for those crimes.
They have already paid the required price for their crimes and it would be perverse to punish them again. Isn’t this simply more Tory racism?
The Home Office says the flight is “specifically for removing foreign criminals” and includes “people convicted of manslaughter, rape, violent crime and dealing Class A drugs”. Number 10 has said all the people on the flight have sentences of 12 months or more.
But a law firm representing some of the people on the flight has put forward a different view – that they are “potential victims of trafficking, groomed as children by drugs gangs running county lines networks and later pursued in the criminal justice system as serious offenders”.
And why is this flight scheduled to happen before the ‘Lessons Learned’ review of the Windrush Scandal is published? That event showed that the Tories had wrongly detained and deported thousands of people, forcing then-prime minister Theresa May to apologise for the suffering she had caused as the Home Secretary who approved it.
But at least one person on tomorrow’s (February 11) flight has been found to have been convicted falsely under an unlawful interpretation of the ‘joint enterprise’ rule. He served only two months in prison and has a heart condition which means he may not survive the stress that Mr Johnson is forcing him to undergo.
This would tally with the legal challenge against the deportations.
More than 170 MPs have signed a letter organised by Labour MP Nadia Whittome, demanding that the flight be cancelled, or at least delayed until after publication of the ‘Lessons Learned’ report:
The Home Office plans to deport 50 people to Jamaica on 11th February.
Cancel the flight until the Lessons Learned Review is published and its recommendations implemented, or risk repeating the Windrush scandal.
Over 170 colleagues and I wrote urging the Prime Minister to act. pic.twitter.com/cubfqsBPwx
— Nadia Whittome MP (@NadiaWhittomeMP) February 9, 2020
A draft of the report in June 2019 said: “Government should review its policy and approach to FNOs [foreign national offenders], if necessary through primary legislation. It should consider ending all deportation of FNOs where they arrived in the UK as children (say, before age of 13).
“Alternatively, deportation should only be considered in the most severe cases.”
Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.
Vox Political needs your help!
If you want to support this site
(but don’t want to give your money to advertisers)
you can make a one-off donation here:
Here are four ways to be sure you’re among the first to know what’s going on.
1) Register with us by clicking on ‘Subscribe’ (in the left margin). You can then receive notifications of every new article that is posted here.
2) Follow VP on Twitter @VoxPolitical
3) Like the Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/VoxPolitical/
Join the Vox Political Facebook page.
4) You could even make Vox Political your homepage at http://voxpoliticalonline.com
And do share with your family and friends – so they don’t miss out!
If you have appreciated this article, don’t forget to share it using the buttons at the bottom of this page. Politics is about everybody – so let’s try to get everybody involved!
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
fighting for the facts.
The Livingstone Presumption is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
Health Warning: Government! is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
The first collection, Strong Words and Hard Times,
is still available in either print or eBook format here:
If they could get away with it the Tories would still be deporting convicts to Australia.
They just want to convince Sun reading Tory voters that they are “deporting foreign criminals” It doesn’t matter to them if the people concerned were wrongly convicted, just numbers to them.
They came here, broke the law then they should go back, what about their victims?!
I am so sick of giving criminals a break, I Never broke the law yet i was treat like crap all of my life!!!
Some of them have lived here all their lives (or as close to it as makes no odds), some of them have certainly not broken the law, and all of them have already served their prison sentences, so those among them who really are criminals haven’t had a break.
Yet, the government allows terrorists to walk the streets and grooming/gang rapists of vulnerable children get tiny sentences. Why aren’t these men deported?