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ASYLUM: Let asylum-seekers work, urges Synod


Gathering the evidence: the Revd Ruth Worsley, who introduced the Southwell & Nottingham motion

THE SYNOD has called on the Government to give asylum-seekers the right to work, and to end the practice of detaining children and families in Immigration Removal Centres.

These were among the challenges it issued on Friday morning last week, when it carried an amended motion from Southwell & Nottingham dio­cesan synod.

Introducing the debate, the Revd Ruth Worsley (Southwell & Notting­ham) told the story of a Pakistani who was sitting in the public gallery. He had come to the UK with his wife and two children in 2004, having suffered, as a Christian, under the blasphemy laws in Pakistan. It had taken four years for him to gain leave to remain in the UK, and the family was still waiting for written confirmation in order to stay, to have the right to work, and to begin to make a proper life for themselves.

They were still living in temporary accommodation with minimal support, but the children were established at school, and the father had been studying for the Bishop’s Certificate in pastoral care, was a member of a PCC, and had introduced the motion to the diocesan synod.

Although the number seeking asylum had fallen since the highest level of 2002, Mrs Worsley said, there was still a significant number of people — between 20-30 per cent — whose first applications for asylum were refused, but who had successful appeals. This suggested an unsatis­factory processing of appli­cations.

The New Asylum Model introduced in 2006 aimed to have cases resolved within six months, but that did not take into account the time for appeals. It was because of this protracted process that the motion was asking the Government to permit asylum-seekers the right to work to support themselves and their families.

Before 2002, they were allowed to apply to work or undertake vocational training after a period of six months. In July 2002, the concession was with­drawn on the grounds that decisions were being processed more quickly. “In my experience, I know of no case completed within six months.”

The second part of the motion called for an amnesty for so-called “legacy” cases, those whose applications were submitted before 2002. The Home Office believed that all such cases would be dealt with by 2011, and processing had speeded up to about 4000 a month; but the Home Office had said that about 20 per cent could not be resolved because of “external factors” that meant that they could neither be granted asylum nor removed.

The National Audit Office had estimated that the backlog cost the country nearly £600 million in housing and welfare support in 2007-08, a huge cost to the country, as well as the human cost of leaving people in limbo for years.

The third part of the motion called for an end to enforced destitution. The diocese as well as homelessness charities condemned the practice of deliberately making vulnerable people destitute.

Dr Paula Gooder (Birmingham) felt the Church’s narrow understanding of the command to welcome the stranger should be broadened to something more radical. The outsider should be welcomed as a central part of society, and as someone bringing life to the nation. There was teaching in both the Old Testament and New Testament to support this: the Bible taught that it should be done “from the core of our being”.

Prebendary David Houlding (London) reminded the Synod that it had been here before, 11 years ago, and five years ago. It was important to revisit the subject and keep it con­stantly in sight. “It would seem we are not making much progress,” he said.

It was a matter of presenting the gospel authentically and being Christ-like in witnessing to it. Many of the underlying issues, such as legal rights and destitution, remained. That so many people were left destitute “must surely be totally unacceptable”.

Professor Helen Leathard (Black­burn) had a series of amendments which sought to strengthen and make the motion more urgent. She wanted to see the words “the vulnerable” replaced by “vulnerable people”, and ditto for “the marginalised and persecuted.” It was a very firm reminder that asylum-seekers were individuals with a wide diversity of problems — people who had already lost a lot of their identity.

The Bishop of Lincoln, Dr John Saxbee, said that asylum-seekers were seen as economic units and not as people with human stories. There was nothing about the issues of destitution in the Bill going through Parliament. “We need to say to the Government that the matters are urgent, not for consideration, but action.”

Canon Andrew Nunn (Southwark) described the totally unacceptable treatment of pregnant women taken to a detention centre.

Prudence Dailey (Oxford) urged the Synod to vote against the amendment calling for action rather than con­sultation. The original motion had been carefully crafted. The call to con­fer a right to work on all asylum-seekers might encourage people to come here; the declaration of an amnesty might also be taken advantage of by unscrupulous people. The impression must not be given that the full complexity of some of the issues had not been discovered.

The Revd Rose Hudson-Wilkin (London) said that the Church needed to give the Government and congre­gations a very, very strong lead. The Government was not doing anything about the issues because of fear of what the voters would do.

Professor Leathard’s amendments were both carried.

Canon Kathryn Fitzsimons (Ripon & Leeds) sought to add a new sub-paragraph calling for an end to the practice of detaining children and fam­ilies in Immigration Removal Centres. She spoke of her horror and frustration at the way these were being treated. Two thousand children were being detained in the UK every year. They were the only children in the country who could be locked up in­defi­nitely without having com­mitted a crime. It caused serious mental and physical stress. Forty per cent of children detained at Yarl’s Wood went on to be released and remain in the UK. “Why are we detaining them?”

The Revd Meg Gilley (Durham) spoke of a woman handcuffed and unable to support her terrified children as they were taken in a separate vehicle to Yarl’s Wood. “The way we treat these vulnerable people is the way we should be judged.”

The Bishop of Bradford, the Rt Revd David James, told the Synod what had happened when immigration officials came to his house to take away a family whom the parish had been caring for and supporting. “If I hadn’t been a bishop, they’d have arrested me,” he said.

The children in question had been in the country for some time. They didn’t remember their country of origin, and were flourishing in their schools. The vicar and his family who were looking after them were prepared to break the law to protect them. “Something very wrong is happening to people,” he said.

Canon Fitzsimons’s amendment was carried.

Canon Jonathan Alderton-Ford (St Edmundsbury & Ipswich) moved his amendment, which sought to insert a new paragraph asking the Government to “investigate and report publicly in the quality of the legal services provided to asylum-seekers”. This was right at the heart of what the motion was trying to achieve, he said. It would give it more “bite and attack”. There was a subculture of law firms failing asylum-seekers with poor advice, poor service, “huge additional fees and service charges”, and “taking money for doing nothing at all”.

“The Law Society should be dealing with this matter,” Philip Ivey-Ray (Chelmsford) said.

The Revd Hugh Lee (Oxford) said that he was horrified at that comment. The Law Society looked after itself, not anyone else. The subject needed to be broadened to include all the legal services to asylum-seekers. “We need to investigate these thoroughly,” he said.

Alan Fletcher (Leicester) said that the problem with asylum law was that it was an area in which the major law firms had no expertise, because there was no money in it. Just a few firms specialised in it, and were rewarded by great personal satisfaction. But it was not commercially viable. “It is difficult to know who else other than us can investigate this.”

The amendment was carried unanimously, but for one member.

The Archbishop of York, Dr Sentamu, said that the Archbishops’ Council would be setting up a working group. “Watch out for it.” He added that the debate and its result would strengthen the hand of the Bishops when talking to the Government on asylum matters.

Ian O’Hara (Coventry) told the Synod of Peace House, which had been set up in Coventry. It offered refugees and asylum-seekers a guaranteed welcome, meal, and warm bed. It had produced a book that was a compend­ium of the sort of stories that the Synod had been hearing. They should stir the Church into action.

A concern was that asylum-seekers were given only supermarket vouchers, but they also needed cash, and too often had to exchange the vouchers at less than their market value.

The Revd William Raines (Man­chester) told of a woman from Rwan­da, beaten and raped, and consequently HIV-positive. She was a “legacy” case, originally refused asylum because Rwanda was deemed a “safe” country to be returned to. She was also turned down on medical grounds because antiretroviral drugs were avail­able in Rwanda, ignoring the fact that there was no electricity in her village, and she would be unable to keep them refrigerated.

She had been working as a volunteer for an HIV trust and even Manchester City Council had endorsed her claim for permission to remain as a model citizen. The church had gathered 4000 signatures to support her and was putting together a new appeal. “The more I knew about the asylum appeal system, the more I think it could have been designed by King Herod after reading Kafka.”

The Revd Lydia Wells (Sheffield) and the Revd John Chorlton (Oxford) also told stories about the sufferings of individual asylum-seekers, and the Revd Stephen Coles (London) told of a Nigerian gay activist refused entry as an asylum-seeker by a Muslim woman immigration officer, but very quickly granted permission to stay after the church’s intervention.

The amended motion was put to the vote and passed by 242 to 1, with 1 recorded abstention.

It read:

That this Synod, continuing to affirm scriptural teaching about care for vuln­erable people, welcome for strangers and foreigners, and the Church’s calling to reach out to the marginalised and persecuted, call upon HM Govern­ment:

(a) to ensure that the treatment of asylum-seekers is just and compassion­ate, and to that end to:

(i) confer a right to work on all asylum-seekers, (ii) declare an amnesty for so called “legacy cases” that predate the Government’s New Asylum Model, and (iii) bring to an end the practice of detaining children and families in Immigration Removal Centres;

(b) to find a practical and humane remedy to the intolerable situation of destitute “refused” asylum-seekers who are unable to return to their country of origin because of personal safety, health or family reasons;

(c) to investigate and report publicly on the quality of the legal services provided to asylum-seekers.



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