ANTI-RACISTS and refugee rights campaigners are to gather outside the Home Office in London this evening under the banner of “stop the hate” to mark international migrants day.
Organising group Stand up to Racism (SUTR) stressed the need to keep up the pressure against the government’s “racist policies and targeting” of refugees and migrants amid reports of deaths as Prime Minister Rishi Sunak continued to “fan the flames” of the far right.
The protest, set to begin after the Morning Star goes to print this evening, is due to hear from speakers including Peace and Justice Project founder Jeremy Corbyn, Charlotte Khan of Care4Calais and PCS union Home Office president James Cox.
SUTR co-convener Weyman Bennett said the action was called to say that the government’s anti-migrant rhetoric is “completely unacceptable” and that refugees and migrants are welcome in Britain.
He said: “While our hearts broke watching the news of more lives lost as a result of racist borders policy — on the Bibby Stockholm prison barge, in the Channel and the Mediterranean sea, Sunak forced through legislation seeking to override the court’s ruling that the Rwanda plan was illegal.
“He met with fascists in Italy and then spouted the racist lie about immigration threatening to ‘overwhelm European states’ — echoing the endorsement of the far-right Great Replacement Theory given by [former home secretary Suella] Braverman in recent months.”
Lynne Hubbard, co-chair of SUTR Dorset, which opposes the use of the barge to hold refugees and offers support and solidarity to those placed on the Bibby Stockholm, called the death on board the vessel “sad and distressing.
“Whatever the circumstances, no-one should die alone on a prison barge, isolated from their friends and with family far away,” she said.
“We stand with the refugees and offer our full support.”
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said that the replacement of Ms Braverman with James Cleverly has not signalled a change of policy or direction from the government concerning refugees and asylum-seekers.
Ahead of the action, he said: “On International Migrants’ Day, it’s vital that progressive forces join the demonstration to oppose this government’s policies and support our Safe Passage plan that would provide a humane alternative to the government’s Rwanda policy.”
