Lift the Ban

To follow on from my last post, having sought to define the problem around people who are refused refugee status but are unable to be returned home, it is also important to be able to define possible solutions to help such people.

While some form of benefit support will be important, these people have often been in the country a long time waiting for their initial asylum decision and are desperate to be able to use the skills that they have to be able to support themselves. So if we cannot return such people to their country of origin, surely we should be able to let them work?

Since 2002 asylum seekers have been denied the right to work in the UK. So while they are often attacked in the media for relying upon benefits for support, they have no other legal option being denied the right to work.

So when I heard that there was going to be a new campaign in the UK to push for the ban on asylum seekers working to be lifted, I got very excited and full of hope. Yet when I saw the detail, I realised that this campaign was only going to be focussed on people still in the asylum process who had waited more than 6 months. When I pushed some of the organisers about why the campaign would not cover refused asylum seekers unable to be returned home, I was told that this group of people were considered to be too politically difficult.

Here we have a clear injustice of people being trapped in destitution, but then even a campaign on the right to work for asylum seekers self-censors itself not to include refused asylum seekers who are denied any means of supporting themselves.

An injustice compounded by a further injustice. Sometimes I wish campaigners could be just a bit less concerned about things being politically difficult and instead focus on the real humanitarian need.

I spoke to a colleague who works across the North East of England recently. He told me that that the only way he can get interest for the Lift the Ban campaign in his region is to talk about how it is a solution for people refused refugee status and who are unable to be returned home. People are appalled to hear that such a crisis exists in the UK. Yet the national campaign does not include such people.

At the very least you could start the campaign focussing on those in the asylum system, but as a means to build momentum to including people who are refused and on the margins of society trapped in destitution.

I will continue to highlight the injustice caused by this self-censorship and push for the Lift the Ban campaign to include refused, non-returnable asylum seekers.

Information on non-returnable countries

One of the greatest blocks to tackling the injustice of refused asylum seekers unable to be returned home is the absence of any information from the UK Home Office on which countries they are unable to return refused asylum seekers. 

This absence of information is significant. If this information were publicly available, then maybe there might be more public outrage about people who have their financial support terminated but who cannot be returned. It would be far more obvious that any one in this position would be forced into destitution. Information is power, and a lack of any information on non-returnable countries removes any chance of challenging this sad state of injustice. 

I think this information should be publicly available. In the continued absence of such information, I think that concerned Members of Parliament should be asking regular questions to identify the current list of such non-returnable countries. Once we have this information, we can then campaign to ensure that such refused, non returnable asylum seekers are not forced into destitution. 

The injustice of refused, non-returnable asylum seekers

One of the greatest, but often hidden, humanitarian injustices in the UK from my experience working for both the Refugee Council and the Red Cross is the plight of people who have been refused refugee status but cannot be returned home for logistical reasons.

For example a man from Eritrea, who has fled open-ended military conscription in his country but who has had his asylum application refused; the UK government still cannot return people to Eritrea, as there is no safe and viable route. So he remains in the UK but has his financial support stopped, is evicted from his asylum accommodation and is legally barred from working. But he cannot be returned to Eritrea. How is he meant to survive?

Such people are still human and still here; they are trapped in a nightmare limbo – unable to support themselves legally in the UK but also unable to be returned to their country of origin. They are then open to abuse and exploitation just to try to survive.

Surely no-one should be in this situation in the UK? The recent report by the British Red Cross, Can’t Stay Can’t Go, provides shocking details of this crisis but also some clear solutions to help such people.

Yet despite this crisis there is no recognition or help from the Home Office. The repeated line from Ministers of Governments of all political colours is that no-one should be destitute in the UK. Fine words but clearly not true. People are destitute in the UK – with no money, no job, no home.

There needs to be a concerted push from across civil society in the UK to raise awareness amongst MPs of this humanitarian crisis in our own country to build a cross-party alliance for action on this issue. If some-one is refused refugee status and they cannot be returned home, then their support should not be terminated whilst this situation continues for them. To force them into destitution with no other options available is just cruel – surely as such a wealthy country we can and should do better than this?

An introduction to my new blog

Hi! Thanks for looking at my new blog. I have been blogging for a number of years now, but the idea slowly grew to do a new blog, which would highlight cases of injustice and explore why this injustice was happening and why things were not changing.

Much of the content for the forthcoming blog posts will come from my own work with civil society groups around the world which are tackling injustice, but I will also look to expand to other cases of injustice. So this is a bit of experiment, and I hope that you will return to see how this blog develops!

With thanks, Jonathan