Tory protest ban: Priti Patel used to be the Home Secretary and she’s the one who first decided to impose heavy curbs on how protest could happen.
Hostility towards campaigners and charities that has led to a new law clamping down on protest has caused the UK to be downgraded in an international index of civic freedoms.
Here’s The Guardian:
The UK has been downgraded in an annual global index of civic freedoms as a result of the government’s “increasingly authoritarian” drive to impose restrictive and punitive laws on public protests.
The Civicus Monitor, which tracks the democratic and civic health of 197 countries across the world, said the UK government was creating a “hostile environment” towards campaigners, charities and other civil society bodies.
The UK’s willingness to clamp down on civic freedoms such as the right to peaceful assembly means it is now classified as “obstructed” – putting it alongside countries such as Poland, South Africa and Hungary.
“The downgrade reflects the worrying trends we are seeing in restrictions across civil society that are threatening our democracy. The government should be setting a positive example to countries that have clamped down on civic space,” said Stephanie Draper, the chief executive of the Bond charity, a partner in the Civicus collaboration.
She added: “The UK is becoming increasingly authoritarian and is among concerning company in the Civicus Monitor ratings as restrictive laws and dangerous rhetoric are creating a hostile environment towards civil society in the UK.”
Has anybody told Suella Braverman, who’s currently on a propaganda junket in Rwanda?
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Minister for inhumanity: Priti Patel’s “Hostile Environment” policies have involved Home Office staff in illegal activities in the past. Now she is being challenged in court to prove her plan to deport asylum-seekers to Rwanda is not also against the law.
10 years after the launch of the ‘Hostile Environment’ policy, representatives of Home Office staff are challenging the government in court over things they are being asked to do.
The Public and Commercial Services Union and the Immigration Services Union are challenging Priti Patel’s policies to “pushback” small boats in the English Channel and to deport asylum-seekers to Rwanda.
They have strong justification: the “pushback” policy is likely to break international law on asylum while the idea of deportations to Rwanda copies a previous policy by Israel – that didn’t work and was abandoned.
And the Conservative government has a record of “Hostile Environment” criminality.
We all know – don’t we? – about the Windrush Scandal that illegally targeted for deportation a generation of people who had the right to live in the UK but whose documentation had been destroyed.
The Home Office has also wrongly accused 34,000 international students of cheating in English language tests and failed to ensure that innocent people were not wrongly deported.
An Institute for Public Policy Research report in 2020 concluded the hostile environment policy had fostered racism, pushed people into destitution, wrongly targeted people who were living in the UK legally, and had “severely harmed the reputation of the Home Office”.
In the wake of the Windrush scandal the Home Office committed to introduce a total transformation of the department, including a review of the hostile environment policies – and failed to complete it.
So it should be no surprise that civil service representatives are trying to protect workers from having to take part in Priti Patel’s potential crimes.
One glance at comments on the “Hostile Environment” policy by Nazek Ramdan, the director of the charity Migrant Voice, should make the reason crystal clear:
“Perhaps no other policy in living memory has left such a malign mark, a stain like an oil slick. It is racist, xenophobic, immoral, illegal, unfair, punishing, divisive, mean-spirited, discriminatory and counterproductive.”
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Bosom buddies: Boris Johnson with Russian industrialist Alexander Temerko, who allegedly has very close links with the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
According to BBC News, the next big scandal to sweep Boris Johnson’s sleaze-ridden Parliament is likely to be one of hostile states buying access to MPs and Lords.
But we already know that Russia has had access to Johnson himself since long before he became prime minister!
The BBC report says All-Party Parliamentary Groups (APPGs) are vulnerable to “improper lobbying” by foreign actors, quoting the case of Christine Lee, of the Chinese Communist Party, who helped set up the Chinese in Britain APPG.
It also says she made donations to Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs. Let’s have a bit of balance:
Political influence: Christine Lee has been donating money to the Conservatives for many years, and has been seen with David Cameron (pictured), Theresa May and Boris Johnson.
This Writer considers the report to be a sign of bias against those parties by the BBC, as the report makes no mention of the massive influence exerted over the Conservative Party – through its leader – by Russia.
And the Russians have never needed APPGs to wield this power – they just went straight to Tory MPs.
Let’s remind ourselves of the UK government’s Russian connections. Consider this:
The so-called ‘Russia Report’, released in July 2020 after being delayed by Johnson for more than nine months so it would not harm his chances in the 2019 general election, defined Russian influence over UK politics as “the new normal” – at least while Tories like Johnson are in charge.
It said successive Conservative governments have welcomed Russian oligarchs “with open arms”, giving them access to political figures “at the highest levels” – and made absolutely no attempt to investigate Russian interference in referendums and elections; in fact, the Tories “actively avoided” doing so.
This has led, the report states, to the growth of an industry of “enablers” who are “de facto agents of the Russian state”. The report does not explicitly state that these enablers include Conservative government politicians, but its assertion that Russia had access to “the highest levels” of political figures certainly suggests that this is the case.
Johnson himself was considered a security risk by the UK’s national security services while he was Foreign Secretary – and with good reason.
Remember the time he went to a party to meet a former KGB agent, Alexander Lebedev, days after attending a Nato summit on Russia?
Who knows what secrets may have emerged from this tactless and indiscreet fool’s flapping gums?
That’s just one incident that is known to us. How many more have there been?
Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party has definitely taken donations from people linked to Russia’s President Putin – and provided private meetings with the last three UK prime ministers in return.
The money totalling £1.7 million came from Vladimir Chernukhin via his wife Lubov, according to the so-called FinCEN files – leaked “suspicious activity reports” by banks.
And a lot of information came out when Johnson’s government dragged its heels about imposing sanctions against Russia over the Ukraine war:
Public opinion is that the Tories have been slow to act because they have taken a fortune in donations from Russians – and they want to know what these UK politicians were asked to do in return for that – as they understand it – dirty money.
Rather than respond to that question, the government seems to have chosen to leave it hanging in the air – trying to divert attention to what it is doing now:
Apparently a minister (was it Hinds?) said that Unexplained Wealth Orders were introduced years ago to allow the government to confiscate assets from people suspected of wrongdoing – and it is widely believed that much of the Russian cash flowing around the UK – and British politics – is ill-gotten. But this just provoked another hard question – and embarrassing answer:
So, Unexplained Wealth Orders have been an unqualified failure – were they mentioned merely to provide an appearance of activity when none has taken place?
Meanwhile:
It was Boris Johnson’s old friend Lubov Chernukhin. She donated £13,750 in October and £66,500 in December, just months before Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine. In total she has handed £2 million to the Tories.
And what do you think of this?
The analysis – which includes many legitimate companies – suggests that thousands of firms listed on the UK’s business register are controlled by Russian nationals who live in the country, with some linked to Putin’s allies.
The final example of Russian influence in the UK, that I’ll include in this article, is something I heard on Radio 4’s Today programme on March 3:
The presenter – I think it was Evan Davis – said it had been suggested that properties like Sutton Place could be seized and used to house displaced Ukrainians. He expressed deep scepticism that the Tory government would ever have the courage to make such a move.
The Tories have only just announced that they’re postponing publication of any revelations of how Evgeny Lebedev – son of the former Russian spy Alexander who Boris Johnson was reported to have met (above) – was made a UK Lord despite deep reservations by the security services. Because the revelations will be damning and they don’t want to mess up their chances in the local elections?
And yet those Tory stooges at BBC News want you to think APPGs, Labour and the Liberal Democrats are the security risk.
Michael Gove: This Site has better pictures but the Spitting Image dummy’s cheeks look like what he was talking in the House of Commons.
Housing and Communities Secretary Michael Gove had a rather spectacular meltdown in the House of Commons when he attacked critics of the government’s new Homes for Ukraine scheme.
Let’s have a look, shall we?
Michael Gove – "I've had it up to here with people trying to suggest that this country is not generous… all the stuff about hostile environments, that was invented under a Labour home secretary… so can we just chuck it on the partisan nonsense & get on with delivering" pic.twitter.com/EsKqbv4Xk7
This Writer recalls there were a few allegations about him flirting with a certain white powder a while ago. Based on this performance, one has to question whether the claim was accurate.
He banged on the Dispatch Box, he strutted up and down the Chamber, he wagged his fingers around in aimless gestures, and as for his language… “Chuck it?” Really?
Let’s have a look at that “ungenerous” claim.
Under the new scheme, people who wish to offer a rent-free space in their home or a separate residence, for at least six months, can register their interest online.
Each household housing a refugee will be offered £350 a month, tax-free. They will not be expected to provide food and living expenses but can choose to offer this.
But they can only sponsor a Ukrainian national to receive an entry visa into the UK if they already know the individual by name.
Bearing in mind that 43,800 people signed up for the scheme in its first five hours, I wonder whether they all have that kind of connection with people from the eastern European country.
Time will tell but people are already having their say about Gove’s outburst – and it hasn’t been complimentary:
So hang on a minute..the website has been launched by the government so you can register your intent to take a Ukrainian refugee. But..wait for it..you can ONLY take a refugee if..YOU KNOW THEIR NAME..sorry, what, pardon!
— Lady Lem-Sip 🇪🇺🍋😷☘️🇮🇪🇫🇷🏴🌻 (@LemSip27) March 14, 2022
Is there anything more Tory than Michael Gove strutting about with his tits up, pretending to lose his temper about honest and, frankly, kind evaluations of Government policies as ungenerous while claiming Theresa May was a Labour Home Secretary?
(Gove was probably referring to a claim that the “hostile environment” policy was made possible because a Labour Home Secretary (Alan Johnson?) authorised the destruction of many documents proving that people of the so-called Windrush Generation (for example) had a right of residence in the UK. The documents were destroyed during the term of his successor, Theresa May, though.
May went on to coin the term in a 2012 speech: “The aim is to create, here in Britain, a really hostile environment for illegal immigrants.” So it is her policy – a Conservative policy.
Michael Gove, why don't you ask the Windrush victims or Afghan refugees if the UK is generous?
What a theatrical huff from Gove, shouting that he’s had it with accusations that ‘this country isn’t generous’.
The accusations aren’t towards the country but its govt, Gove’s govt. The one that slashed foreign aid and exploited fear of immigration to turn bigotry into policy.
The last point is very good: the accusations aren’t that the UK isn’t generous but that the Conservative government running it isn’t.
The UK’s citizens didn’t create the conditions under which Windrush people were thrown out, and they didn’t create the conditions in which Ukrainian refugees are being refused entry.
A Tory government is – one that contained Michael Gove in some capacity.
He’s got a lot of cheek, coming out with that.
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The new government media briefing room: your local parish council could have done a better job, and cheaper, but Boris Johnson gave the contract to a company based in a hostile state.
After This Site’s article yesterday showing that Boris Johnson is trying to hide the idiocy of his decisions by claiming they are “very sensible”, this:
His government paid £2.6 million to a Russian company for construction of the new media briefing room – in Downing Street, the heart of the UK government.
Despite being sued for unlawfully withholding details of contracts, the Tory government has refused to say whether the work was put out to competitive tender. It should have been, because the contract was not awarded as part of an emergency.
In fact, no details of the contract with Russian-owned Megahertz have been published.
Megahertz carried out the main work on the project, including installing computers, cameras, microphones and a control desk. Its owner Okno-TV has previously carried out similar technical work for Russian state-controlled broadcasters Russia Today, Channel One, and Public Television of Russia.
It has not been suggested that the company is influenced by the Russian government, but the question has to be asked:
Why did Boris Johnson hire a company from a country that has been designated a “hostile state” to build a communications hub for the UK government?
It’s a security nightmare.
And, after the Salisbury poisonings, a public relations disaster.
Worse still, the briefing room itself looks amateurish.
Advance photos of the space, released before it goes into daily use, show a layout that could have been put together at a village hall, with a central podium backed by two Union flags and a TV screen on one side facing rows of the kind of chairs you see stacked at the side of your local meeting-room.
It doesn’t look like a £2.6m facility. Let’s be honest, it doesn’t look like it cost £2,000.
Admittedly, the broadcasting equipment was probably expensive. But, coming from a Russian firm, who knows what might be included in it, alongside what Johnson asked for?
The work also comes after a Tory government had to end the involvement of Chinese firm Huawei in the rollout of 5G telecommunications in the UK.
So This Writer is in a rare position of agreement with Labour’s Chris Bryant, who chairs the all-party Parliamentary group on Russia, who said,
What shocks me most is that the Johnson government seems to have learnt nothing about the involvement in sensitive UK projects of companies with [links] to autocratic regimes, whether in Russia or in China.
Fundamental to the whole issue, of course, is the fact that Johnson spaffed this cash to Russia while do the dirty on nurses by giving them a pay cut.
It is clear that Johnson’s claim that he could not afford to pay any more to the people who saved so many from Covid-19 is bunkum; he’s got money to burn.
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The Empire Windrush: if the people who arrived on it to help the UK rebuild after World War Two had known how they and their descendants would be treated after 2010, would they have bothered?
If at first you don’t succeed (in persecuting and killing people), try, try and try again seems to be the Conservative motto.
The Windrush scandal was a national outrage. Now we learn that the Home Office could have avoided harming people – but deliberately chose not to.
Where is the fury over this?
the independent chief inspector of borders and immigration (ICIBI) said the department had failed to implement a series of recommendations he has made since 2016 calling for better monitoring of the impact of the hostile environment.
“Had they been, some of the harms suffered by the Windrush generation and others may have been avoided,” said the chief inspector, David Bolt.
The Windrush Lessons Learned review, published in March last year, demanded a “full review and evaluation” of the hostile environment policy devised while Theresa May was Home Secretary – and current incumbent Priti Patel accepted the recommendation in July.
But Mr Bolt said ministers had done little to evaluate the measures, both in terms of the efficiency of the processes underpinning them, including the costs to third parties carrying them out, and their effectiveness in delivering the hoped-for outcomes.
Chai Patel, legal policy director at the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, said the hostile environment must be scrapped before “more lives are lost or destroyed”.
“Even the government’s own immigration inspectorate no longer has any faith that Ms Patel’s Home Office intends to fix the mess it has made of the immigration system,” he said.
Does anyone?
But this story seems to have been buried.
Do thousands more people have to be harmed, deliberately, by Priti Patel before we all wake up again, or are we going to let her get away with it next time?
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A protest outside Atos in London in 2017. Atos is one of the private companies that carries out sickness and disability benefit assessments on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions.
Some of you may be wondering why This Site is publishing fewer articles lately. The simple answer is: time. I’m trying to fight back against malicious accusations that have been made against me, but the arguments need to be correctly phrased.
So I am grateful that there are people like Mo Stewart around.
Mo has spent years researching the government-engineered (by both the Tories and New Labour) plight of those claiming sickness and disability benefits, and is the author of Cash Not Care: The Planned Demolition of the UK Welfare State, which is available for purchase if you click on the link.
Along with eight other experts, Mo has just had a letter published in The Guardian, reminding us of exactly what the DWP does to the sick and disabled.
It isn’t pretty.
Read:
The British public have reacted to “a sense of betrayal of that so-called British value of fairness” (The hostile environment? Britain’s disabled people live there too, theguardian.com, 26 April). This “sense of betrayal” was only possible because the national press reported the plight of the Windrush scandal, but this is not always the case. Some of the press were happy to promote the exaggerated claims of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) which, during five years of coalition government, knowingly misled the public regarding “fake” claimants of disability benefit. Coincidentally, disability hate crimes increased by 213% during the coalition’s term in office.
Influenced by a US healthcare insurance “consultant”, who funded DWP-commissioned research used to justify welfare reforms, the work capability assessment (WCA) adopted the bio-psychosocial model of assessment which has failed all academic scrutiny. The WCA is used by the DWP to resist access to the employment and support allowance (ESA) sickness and disability benefit, which is the financial equivalent of jobseeker’s allowance, so there is no financial incentive when claiming ESA.
This DWP assessment totally disregards diagnosis, prognosis, past medical history and all medical opinion. Deaths of genuine claimants were always inevitable. There is a reason why the DWP has refused to publish updated ESA mortality totals since February 2014, as suicides linked to the ESA assessment climb. It’s time for this ideological DWP tyranny to end, and for the national press to stop disregarding another national atrocity impacting on disabled people.
The letter is signed by:
Mo Stewart Independent disability studies researcher Professor Woody CaanEditor, Journal of Public Mental Health Dr Tanya TitchkoskyProfessor of disability studies, University of Toronto Professor Peter BeresfordProfessor of citizen participation, Essex University Dr Marion Hersh Senior lecturer, biomedical engineering, Glasgow University Dr Dominic Griffiths Senior lecturer in Inclusive Education and SEN, Manchester Metropolitan University Dr Anne DaguerreAssistant professor in work, employment and welfare, Middlesex University Dr Simon DuffyDirector, Centre for Welfare Reform Vin WestChair, Arfon Access Group
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As long as Theresa May remains in the government, the wrong that has been done to the Windrush Generation is not going to be corrected.
Theresa May must go. She can resign, or she can be forced out – I don’t mind which – but she cannot be allowed to stay.
The appointment of Sajid Javid – a BAME minister who Mrs May doesn’t like, let’s not forget (she demoted him when she became PM) – seems to be a token gesture: “Let’s put a second-generation migrant, son-of-a-Pakistani-bus-driver in as Home Secretary and everybody will think we’ve changed – so we won’t have to.”
And – bearing in mind it’s more than a week since the Windrush scandal broke – nothing has changed so far. Let’s consider what that means, with a summary of Mrs May’s attacks on immigrants – both legal and otherwise – courtesy of Dylan Strain on Twitter:
It was Theresa who in 2010 raised the price of APPLYING for indefinite leave to remain to £849. By 2015 the fee was £1,500 and today it's £2,389 – not for a family, but for every member of it. (Thread of Theresa May's wrong doing below) #WindrushScandalhttps://t.co/9k3DKYBSNx
'It was Theresa who, in 2012, declared an intention "to create here in Britain a really hostile environment for illegal migration". She set up a task force known as the Hostile Environment Working Group to force other parts of the state could do UKBA's job'
It was Theresa who, that same year, sent out 'Go Home' vans. It was Theresa's department that produced advice for people deported to Jamaica advising them to put on an accent and "try to be Jamaican".
It was Theresa who has been asked, for years, by refugee and migrant charities to close the loophole. Whose department was laid siege to by community law projects acting for those who could not afford lawyers. Who still doesn't know if the people she ignored are here or there.
It was Theresa who was PM when Black History Month launched a petition demanding an immigration amnesty for the Windrush migrants in October, and which despite passing 170,000 signatures is still being "considered' for Parliamentary debate.
It was Theresa who three days ago refused to meet the Commonwealth leaders when they were all in London, and caved in only after the Daily Mail declared it a scandal.
The fact the people who have suffered as a result of Theresa May's "really hostile environment" are browner, poorer and less able to be heard renders her claims of being a champion of social justice utterly laughable.
'Theresa May might not be a racist – but she's presided over the most racist, disgraceful abomination in recent British history. She allowed it to grow to such massive proportions that it's now a stain upon our national character.'
Not only did Mrs May allow this “abomination” to grow to such proportions that it is now a “stain on our national character” – she rewarded those who were responsible for it:
Interesting: Three years ago 2014/15 head of “Immigration Enforcement” Home office agency created by May to increase deportations and that was charged with delivering on internal numerical targets received a bonus of between £5k and £10k, according to Home Office Annual Report: pic.twitter.com/Y08cKItjo3
When Mrs May became unelected prime minister (remember: she became Conservative leader because her opponent stood down, and at last year’s general election she lost her party’s Parliamentary majority), she appointed Amber Rudd as Home Secretary. At the 2016 Tory conference Ms Rudd gave an address that led to her being reported to the police on a charge of making racist hate speech.
Ms Rudd wrote a letter to Mrs May in January 2017, promising to increase deportations of people the Conservative government has decided should no longer be allowed to live in the UK by 10 per cent. I cannot, in good conscience, say that this policy was directed at illegal immigrants – as the Conservatives are rather desperately trying to assert – because it has become clear that people with every right to remain in this country were targeted from the moment Mrs May became Home Secretary, never mind Ms Rudd.
So to clarify, Amber Rudd was running out of illegal immigrants to kick out of the UK in order to meet her quotas, she then had a light bulb moment and thought 🤔 let’s go after Legal POC residents, lock em up in detention centres, no one will notice and Theresa May agreed.
(I’m not sure Natalie Rowe’s suggestion is accurate; we don’t know that this was the intention. But it is certainly what happened, and we may deduce that legal residents were targeted in order to meet the increased targets being demanded by Ms Rudd and Mrs May.)
Last week, Ms Rudd lied to a Parliamentary committee, claiming that there were no deportation targets. Then she lied to the Commons themselves, saying she had not known the targets existed – despite having set them in January last year. When her letter discussing these targets with Mrs May became public, she had no choice other than to resign.
Rudd lied. May knew Rudd lied. May did nothing. May failed in her duty as PM to preserve the fundamental standards required in a democracy. May must go.
Instead of going, Mrs May is trying to draw a line under the matter. But the fact exists that she did receive a letter from Amber Rudd discussing deportation targets.
James O’Brien discussed the implications on his LBC show:
So – as Rachael Maskell argued in Parliament, it seems Amber Rudd was the scapegoat – just one more of Mrs May’s subordinates who was sacked for carrying out her policies:
— Rachael Maskell MP (@RachaelMaskell) May 1, 2018
Mrs May herself has confirmed that she knew the Home Office had targets for the removal of illegal immigrants. Note the word “illegal”. She said: “When I was home secretary, yes, there were targets in terms of removing people from the country, who were here illegally.”
But she didn’t lift a finger when it became clear that people with every right to be in the UK were also being deported – and, as Dylan Strain has pointed out in his Twitter thread (above), she has known for years.
So the argument that Mrs May is in the clear because she may not have heard Amber Rudd misleading a committee, or may not have bothered about it because Ms Rudd corrected what she said the following morning, simply doesn’t add up. Ms Rudd’s correction was also a lie and Mrs May knew it, because she knew all about the targets. But she still allowed her MPs to make public displays of support for Ms Rudd, despite knowing that they were based on false information.
It implies an intention to mislead the public, from which Mrs May cannot slither away.
We should tackle the use of “illegal immigration” by Conservative MPs.
Every single Tory MP brings up "illegal immigration" immediately they're questioned about Windrush. They've agreed on it as the party line. Isn't it a disgrace our media's letting them get away with it and even parroting it?
It is, indeed, a disgrace. The prime minister of the UK has known for years that legal citizens of the UK were being targeted by her “hostile environment” policy, that she and her party are still claiming was aimed at “illegal immigration”. If she had done anything at all to stop legal citizens being targeted, then they might be justified in using this excuse. She did not, so they are not.
Now we have a new Home Secretary, Sajid Javid – just another human shield for Mrs May, as Owen Jones explains:
Theresa May has replaced one human shield with another. She is responsible for the Windrush scandal – and she must resign over it. https://t.co/rqlp9f7lcb
And the “hostile environment” policy goes on – renamed the “compliant environment” by Mr Javid. Those two words mask a multitude of sinister – no, call them what they are: downright evil – meanings, as David Lammy explained:
The hostile environment is not about illegal immigration. It is about creating a hostile environment for anyone who looks like they could be an immigrant. An unjust law is no law at all. 230 years after the abolitionists I stand in Parliament and ask Am I Not A Man And A Brother? pic.twitter.com/Jvt62miJMk
These crimes against UK citizens are still happening, with the blessing of Theresa May’s government – and will continue happening as long as she is prime minister.
Mrs May has inflicted the policy on the country and has lied repeatedly and bare-facedly in order to keep it going. It is intolerable. She must not be allowed to get away with it. We must demand her resignation – or removal.
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According to Larry the Cat’s Twitter account, “The cabinet stand like this because a body language expert thought it would be a laugh to see if they would.” And on his first day as Home Secretary, Sajid Javid was stupid enough to do it.
Result:
The Tory Powerstance Workout Video – Featuring Sajid Javid [Image: The Agitator].
And:
“Ladies and gentlemen,” wrote Gary Barker, “I give you your new Home Secretary, Sajid Javid and your surviving (just) Prime Minister Theresa May.”
Worse than that, he used his first appearance in the Commons, in his new role, to promise to “do right by the Windrush Generation” – and then lied to everyone.
Responding to a question from Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott, on whether he would restore the protections that were taken from the Windrush migrants in the 2014 Immigration Act, he said: “No such protections have been removed. People who arrived pre-1973 – they have the absolute right to be here and that has not changed.”
Ms Abbott begs to differ. Refused the opportunity to respond in the House, she took to Twitter with this:
UK removed legal protection for Windrush immigrants in 2014 https://t.co/j6nOl5fbKL Yet new Home Sec @sajiddavid tells MPs no protections against deportation were removed in 2014
The Guardian report shows that a clause giving longstanding Commonwealth residents protection from enforced removal was taken off the statute book by the 2014 Act. The Home Office claims it was redundant – but who’d believe it?
Mr Javid also said that he disliked the term “hostile environment” as a description of Home Office policy relating to immigrants and would not be using the term – which shouldn’t be too hard, as the Home Office ditched it a while ago.
Instead, he said he preferred to talk about having a “compliant environment”.
Interesting word choice.
“Compliant” means “disposed to agree with others or obey rules, especially to an excessive degree; acquiescent; meeting or in accordance with rules or standards” [Boldings mine].
So Mr Javid wants to create an environment in which everybody slavishly obeys the rules he makes up – no matter what they may be.
Vile.
And what of the rules that are already in place – the really ugly, racist rules that mean thousands of people, including British citizens who have been unjustly accused of being illegal immigrants?
So the “hostile environment” is still in place, no matter what Mr Javid says.
That’s a series of lies racked up in his first Commons appearance.
Home Office employees are probably saying to each other: “Meet the new boss… Same as the old boss.”
Maybe, but as the title of the old Who song, from which that lyric is taken, states:
We won’t get fooled again.
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Tom Pride has requested that we all share this as widely as possible. He writes:
The Daily Express – like most of the UK press – doesn’t like to be criticised.
And – like most of the UK press – it doesn’t like to give a right of reply to anyone, not even to respected organisations such as the British Red Cross.
That’s why the newspaper is refusing to publish a joint letter from the British Red Cross, Refugee Action and the Refugee Council which is critical of it.
This is the letter the Daily Express doesn’t want you to see. So please share it as widely as possible.
Dear Sir,
The stream of aggressive stories about asylum seekers appearing in this paper in recent days is of serious concern to all of us who work with and support people fleeing persecution.
Your readers would be forgiven for thinking the UK is being flooded by asylum seekers. This couldn’t be further from the truth, with asylum applications around the 23,000 mark a year the UK is home to less than 1 per cent of the world’s refugees and takes proportionately below the EU average.
To characterise the people housed in Folkestone as having a ‘lovely break’ by the sea that Brits would be envious of is hugely misleading and dangerous.
Asylum seekers are people who have often fled horrifying experiences in their home countries. Some have been raped. Some have been tortured. Many have witnessed the death of a loved one. Be assured, people who have suffered extreme trauma and whose lives are hanging in the balance will not be focusing on the sea view of temporary room.
There are no refugee visas available for people fleeing persecution. The fact that people are forced to travel clandestinely is recognised within the Refugee Convention and British Law. Entering Britain illegally can be a necessity; it is not an indication of the validity of someone’s asylum claim.
Additionally, appealing a refusal does not indicate someone cheating the system. Decisions on asylum claims can be life or death and the appeal overturn rate shows the Government frequently gets it wrong the first time.
Stirring up hostility against asylum seekers is as unwelcome as it is unsavoury in a country with a proud tradition of protecting refugees.
Maurice Wren, Chief Executive, Refugee Council
Mike Adamson, Acting Chief Executive, British Red Cross
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