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| Volume 54 Number 21, August 24, 2024 | ARCHIVE | HOME | JBCENTRE | SUBSCRIBE |
Migrants rescued from a boat crossing the English
Channel, August 21 2023 Photo: EPA
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced on Wednesday, August 21, a raft of what she called "strong and clear steps" over the next six months "to boost our border security and ensure the rules are respected and enforced". A Border Security Bill had already been announced in the King's Speech, with the intention of setting up a Border Security Command. [1]
The new measures include the immediate recruitment of up to 100 new specialist intelligence and investigation officers at the National Crime Agency (NCA) to "disrupt and smash criminal smuggling gangs and prevent dangerous boat crossings". The government also revealed plans to increase its detention capacity, with 290 new beds at the Campsfield and Haslar Immigration Removal Centres. Campsfield, near Oxford, had already been closed in 2019 following a long-running campaign, not least by those detained there who protested against their treatment with hunger strikes. So now this is set to be reversed. Haslar also, near Portsmouth, was closed in 2015 after a report described it as "expensive and damaging to detainees". The PA news agency reported that it understands that reopening Campsfield and Haslar is the first phase of a long-term plan to open a total of 1,000 beds across the two sites, a scheme which began under the previous government.
In addition, the Home Secretary announced a new intelligence-driven illegal working programme which will be rolled out to target, investigate and take down what Yvette Cooper's statement called "unscrupulous employers who illegally employ those with no right to work here".
"A range of sanctions, including financial penalty notices, business closure orders and potential prosecution, will be taken against those employing illegal workers," the statement reads. "Those caught working illegally and eligible for removal will be detained, pending their swift removal."
The measures also include plans for a large surge in enforcement and returns flights, with the aim of putting removals at their highest level since 2018. Home Office ministers have promised a "large surge" in returns flights for failed asylum seekers. The new plans mean more than 14,000 deportations by the end of the year, The Independent wrote on August 21. According to the same newspaper, official statistics show that, with "legal" and "illegal" immigration combined, some 1.2 million people moved to the UK last year, 85% of them from outside the EU.
Upholding the dignity and humanity of migrants
Amnesty International UK's Refugee and Migrant Rights Programme Director Steve Valdez-Symonds said in a press release:
"It's dismaying to see the new Government reheating the last Government's rhetoric over 'border security' and 'smashing gangs' even while neglecting the pressing need to provide safe asylum routes and a clear guarantee of asylum to refugees arriving here.
"People in urgent need - including those fleeing war and persecution in places like Sudan, Afghanistan, Syria and Iran - will keep coming to the UK and other countries, and the Government needs to establish safe routes that reduce the perils of dangerous border crossings and the risk of exploitation by ruthless smuggling gangs.
"This 'securitised' approach to asylum and immigration will simply deter and punish many of the people most in need of crossing borders, people who are therefore often most vulnerable to criminal exploitation.
"Increasing immigration powers - including to detain people - rather than making sure existing powers are only used where that is necessary and fair has for decades rewarded Home Office inefficiency and injustice.
"A new set of ministers promoting an age-old message of fear and hostility regarding some of the most victimised and traumatised people who may ever arrive in the UK, means that smuggling gangs and racist and Islamophobic hate-mongers at home are likely to feed off this to everyone's detriment." [2]
Dr Peter Walsh, a senior researcher at the Migration Observatory, told The Independent that Yvette Cooper's announcement "lacked the detail required to know how the government plans to increase the removal of failed asylum seekers". He said: "There are different challenges the government faces in returning unsuccessful asylum seekers. Some may raise legal challenges against their removal, such as if they have formed family ties in the UK. A number of unsuccessful asylum seekers also come from countries to which we have recently struggled to return asylum seekers, such as Iraq and Iran. Some countries of origin may refuse to take back their own citizens. How exactly the government plans to deal with these challenges remains, for the time being, unclear."
The organisation Right to Remain, which campaigns for migration justice, stated: "This is yet another horrible development and cause for anxiety and distress for our communities. Month after month, people in the migrant community and those who support them are faced with cruel Home Office plan after cruel Home Office plan.
"That this announcement has been made not even two weeks after the horror of race riots in the UK is truly horrendous. At a time when racialised communities need to feel the solidarity of community and belonging, they are being made to feel even more unwelcome and unsafe.
"At Right to Remain, we firmly believe that no one is illegal, and that migration is a natural human phenomenon. Everyone deserves to be and stay wherever they need to be. We stand in solidarity with our community, and will provide updates as swiftly as we can." [3]
The Migrant Rights Network, in response to Yvette Cooper's statement, stated: "This announcement is consistent with the new-government's long-standing emphasis on deportation deals in the lead up to the General Election, including Starmer's insistence that people should be deported back to Bangladesh, as well as his desire to secure EU-wide returns deals. This echoed the former Prime Minister's agreements with Bangladesh, Frontex and the Calais Group." [4]
Defence of the rights of immigrants and the rights of all
While Starmer and the government have been making much of the necessity for cracking down and giving harsh sentences to the "far right" involved in the public disorder against immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers, they are now pursuing a legal version of the same anti-immigrant outlook, especially against the refugees and asylum seekers who are attempting to find a way to Britain for refugee and asylum, despite all the dangers and difficulties.
In opposition, the mass of the people take the stand that it is just that Britain should be a refuge for all those fleeing slavery, genocide, colonial conquests, imperialist wars and coups d'etat. Especially the youth have been taking up the fight against the old colonial and anti-humane establishment, a fight which also has included the demand that the Israeli-Zionist genocide against the Palestinian people must be stopped and the complicity of the British government in this genocide be ended. The fight has included the tearing down and opposition to statues which exalt slavery, genocide and those who have committed crimes against humanity.
This is the background to the government's latest campaign to end so-called "illegal" immigration and to also take up the slogan to "stop the boats". While posed in the guise of ending the trafficking of people, which may well be criminal in itself, the plight of those human beings who are fleeing unbearable situations which the big powers themselves have caused is not being addressed or taken into account in practice by the Labour government. Instead, the government is continuing to dehumanise people who are desperate to build a new life and make their contribution to society.
The resistance of communities in unity demonstrations to the racist propaganda and the attacks on immigrants has demonstrated people's defiance of the direction that the cartel parties in Westminster are taking society. The mass of the people have shown that the future lies with defending the rights of all by virtue of their humanity, [5]
Defend the rights of immigrants, asylum seekers and refugees!
Notes
1.In the notes to the Bill, the government confirms their intention to
implement "fast track" returns for those from "safe"
countries and ending the failed Migration and Economic Development Partnership
with Rwanda. The reference to "fast track" return schemes, amongst
other things, raises concerns about the necessity for schemes to comply with
commitments under the Refugee Convention which aims to ensure people's claims
are fairly and properly considered. Failure to do this has correctly led to the
end of a fast track system in the past after it was found to be unlawful. A
further concern was raised by Jeremy Corbyn in the debate on this section of
the government's legislative programme. He asked Yvette Cooper: "The
tragedy of desperate people dying in the channel is compounded by desperate
people dying in the Mediterranean and the Aegean as human beings fleeing all
kinds of horrible situations seek a place of safety. Is she co-operating with
other European countries on a safe route for asylum seekers? Is she prepared to
look in a much more humane way at the desperate situation facing people fleeing
human rights abuses and wars around the world?"
2. 'Securitised' immigration measures will punish vulnerable people
https://www.amnesty.org.uk/press-releases/uk-securitised-immigration-measures-will-punish-vulnerable-people
3. Solidarity in the wake of Labour's immigration enforcement announcement
https://righttoremain.org.uk/solidarity-in-the-wake-of-labours-immigration-enforcement-announcement/
4. Deportations are about to ramp up
https://migrantsrights.org.uk/2024/08/21/deportations-are-about-to-ramp-up/
5. See also "Desperate Attempt to Promote an Anti-Immigrant
Movement", Workers' Weekly
https://www.rcpbml.org.uk/wwie-24/ww24-19/ww24-19-01.htm