Migrant Action

Empowerment Advocacy Justice

Migrant Action hosts Consultative Workshop on Leadership Development in the Migration sector

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In an increasingly challenging migration environment underpinned by global political instability, protracted conflicts, increasing economic insecurity and a resurgence of nationalist sentiments across Europe, there is urgency for effective leadership in the migration sector. Such leadership needs to be reflective of contemporary realities of issues and societies whilst strategically focused on the bigger picture and long term challenges. 

In the development of this leadership response, people with lived experience of migration play an integral part recognising and building on their experiences. This shift from being ‘recipients’ of leadership to ‘Givers’ of leadership would add significant value to leadership and service delivery experiences across the sector.

It is against this backdrop that Migrant Action hosted a Leadership Development consultative workshop in Leeds organised by Migration Exchange as part of a national consultation on Leadership and Development in the Migration sector. Workshop participants from the Refugee Council, Leeds City Council, HANA project-Hull, Migrants Organise, MERMEC and Migrant Action shared experiences (personal and organisational). 

Participants recognising the value of good leadership in ensuring quality service delivery, growth and sustainability acknowledged that leadership development does not often constitute ‘investment priority’ for most organisations who are struggling with small budgets. Ever limited funds prioritise frontline service provision responding to client needs rather than staff leadership development. Therefore, funders have a role in shaping organisational cultures and attitudes towards leadership development.

Participants also reinforced concerns about the lack of diversity in leadership in the sector acknowledging that too many organisations in the sector have leadership and governance structures/personnel that do not reflect the communities they serve. They observed this trend reflected a wider structural problem of prejudice, discrimination and racism which is under serving people of lived experience of migration and other groups. This needs to be acknowledged within organisations and leadership take responsibility in systematically addressing it. There was also recognition that people of lived experience need to get better in mobilising and organising themselves in order to be able to influence and achieve the change they seek.

Finally, the model for delivering leadership development needs to fundamentally change. A real shift is required towards a more inclusive, nurturing, empowerment and sustainability-led model. At the heart of the new model must be a thriving partnership between migration and other sectors. Equally, a good partnership with migrant communities to identify, develop and embed good leadership.

Migrant Action will continue working with Migration Exchange on this consultation whilst continuing conversations with local partners.

Detention Centres – Deliberate, Destructive and Distant – Paddy Smith

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27,331 people were held in UK detention estate in 2017 on grounds of ‘breaching’ immigration rules. Detention is integral to UK immigration policy as an instrument for immigration control, economic exploitation and the institutionalisation of social injustice. For many detainees, detention violently robs them of their humanity and dignity. Detention centres are a regular and significant mechanism in the government’s immigration system and central to the its hostile environment agenda.

In 2018, Alex Sobel MP, in a talk at the University of Leeds captured vividly some of the unique and defining characteristics of UK detention estate; He revealed the structural violence and abuses within the system unique in comparison to the rest of Europe. One of the defining features of the UK detention system is its accommodation of unlawful and indefinite detention. The Home Office have the power to detain people indefinitely, without authorisation from judges. For Sobel, this policy does not reflect what he thought a liberal democracy was, but instead an authoritarian, undemocratic government. In 2017, one person had been held for 1,514 days, more than four years. What has been suggested as an improvement is a 28-day limit on immigration detention. However this has been shunned by the government who argue this is just a ‘slogan’ and has no real evidential backing. However, the fact that one can be held in detention for two months and in some cases years without access to justice is at odds with their human rights and the fundamental premise of the UK judicial system.

Along with the indefinite time period, Sobel describes the inhumane conditions of detention centres. Firms like G4S who are contracted to manage these centres, provide the bare minimum conditions under the government’s watch. For example, there are regular cases of unlawful and fatal use of restraint, which has a detrimental physical and mental effects on migrants. Since 2010, there has been six rulings in UK courts on the treatment of migrants in detention centres, as the treatment is seen in breach of rights under Article 3 of the European convention of human rights (right not to suffer torture or inhuman and degrading treatment). No doubt, many more cases would have been taken to court, however it is common for migrants to lack knowledge of their own legal rights, which is another problem. 

Despite these problems laid out by Sobel, there is a distinctive lack of engagement with the topic of detention centres by the public, even though around £108 million of taxpayer’s money funds this abusive system every year. In the 2018 Shaw Report, it is stated that detention centres are “little known and little understood” by the public and the media. Migrant Action believe that this public ‘amnesia’ and culture of distance about the institutional violence within the UK detention estate embolden the state apparatus to pursue unnoticed rampant state harm on vulnerable migrants behind the walls of detention centres.

 It is our mission to lift the veil off the injustices and violence in detention centres and help build public consciousness towards greater accountability by the state.

Migrant Action believe detention centres are embedded in a wider issue of chronic, systematic underinvestment in the immigration system. They are emblematic of government’s approach towards migrants, described by MP Joan Ryan as “going after low hanging fruit to meet immigration numbers”. There is a strong view that the government have an abundance of evidence for action, however they strategically shuffle around this. For example recently, the Immigration Regulations and the Detention Centres Rule 2018 was formed right before Stephen Shaw’s second review into detention centres. This was so the Home Secretary could push through a new definition of torture within the detention centres through parliament, preventing Shaw voicing his own concerns about torture and vulnerable migrants.

In addition, it is a mistake to believe detention centres within the UK are necessary. There are workable alternatives to detention centres. Sweden shows how with political will, a better system can be in place. Detention centres are rarely used, as in 2013 only 2,900 people were detained, despite receiving high numbers of asylum-seekers. The system in place is one of case management, where a case manager will work with a migrant to provide a link for the individual to the authorities and the community. This allows the migrant to engage with support services of the community, and with their own immigration process. In Sweden this method meant that 68% of people ordered to leave the country went voluntarily.

What can you do to help?  Don’t be a Bystander

Due to the evident lack of public knowledge, Migrant Action believe it is vital to spread awareness about the brutal regimes of the detention estate to your peers.  Raise the issue with your local MP and challenge them on what is being done about it. Press your local MP to engage with national campaigns on ending detention. Engage with local advocacy organisations like Migrant Action, or organisations who work directly with detainees. Add your voice to the national campaign ‘These Walls Must Fall’ http;//detention.org.uk

Stand up for the human rights and for justice for those incarcerated in detention centres

Home Office has “utterly failed” on immigration detention, says report.

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The Home Office Select Committee’s staggering characterisation of the UK detention estate comes as little surprise to campaigners and organisations. The report; https://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/home-affairs-committee/news-parliament-2017/immigration-detention-report-published-17-19/exposes a ‘shockingly cavalier’ culture within the estate and concludes that the immigration detention system has ‘utterly failed’ its responsibility.

These failings are multi-faceted and multilayered. The Select Committee’s report at the very least, reinforce the concerns and conclusions by numerous organisations and campaigners who have equally x-rayed these disturbing behaviours has become normalised culture that is inherent and routinely expressed with impunity within the detention estate. 

A snapshot of the failings of immigration detention highlight; the flagrant exploitation of detainees used as cheap captive labour who are paid £1 per hour.  The Shadow Home Office minister Lord Richard Rosser stated ‘The government is certainly redefining what ‘low paid work’ really means’ ( Morning Star, March 19 2019). Failings also find expression in forms of social control of detainees whose rights and freedoms are inextricably linked to compliance with detention regimes to the extent that people have to earn the right to be exploited or risk their ‘privileges’.  https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/f/working-clampdownhow-detained-migrants-are-coerced-cut-price-labour

Furthermore, failings also manifest in limited/denial of access to legal advice, poor medical assistance, poor advocacy support, indefinite detention and other forms of injustices. See https://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/joint-select/human-rights-committee/news-parliament-2017/draft-human-rights-act-report-published-17-19/

These routine systemic failings and the consequent wide ranging devastating impact from such failings necessitate not just an enquiry or some cosmetic reforms or even closure of an immigration removal centre. Rather, such failings warrant ending immigration detention as a policy option.

New Frontiers, New Partners: Migrant Action in South Yorkshire

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Dmitry Fedotov ( Enterprise & Communities Manager- Youth Association)
Florentine Bootha-King ( Manager- ELSH)
Fidelis Chebe ( Director-Migrant Action)
(Left to right)

Non asylum seeking migrants in Barnsley and Doncaster (South Yorkshire) encounter similar challenges as those in Leeds, however these challenges are made worse due to the significant lack of appropriate support. As such, vulnerability is even more entrenched amongst migrants leading to poor migration and integration outcomes.  

Through building partnerships and working collaboratively with local community based organisations, Migrant Action effectively pursues its ambition of resolving their immediate concerns while empowering migrants negotiate pathways to integration.  Through our partnership with ELSH (Education Learning Support Hub- Barnsley), Migrant Action will become an integral part of an increasingly vibrant hub in the heart of the community thereby rendering our services more accessible to people who need our support. Our partnership with ELSH would increase access to other vital services within the hub and widely.

Equally, our partnership with The Youth Association, opens new pathways for engagement with the Roma communities in Barnsley and Doncaster to support young new arrivals and their families. Migrant Action’s engagement with the ROMA community has particular significance as there is growing anxiety amongst EU citizens regarding their right to stay in the UK after the UK leaves the EU.  

Identifying key stakeholders, building partnerships and working collaboratively to deliver support is central to Migrant Action’s strategy for consolidation, growth and social change.  We look forward to working with our partners in South Yorkshire.

Our research team

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Migrant Action is committed to its partnership with the local community expressed in variety of ways. By offering volunteering and student placement opportunities we grow our local partnership and empower individuals to make positive contribution to our work and the wider society. As an organisation, we recognise the value of research in evidencing our stance and interventions. We are delighted that these 3 ‘young researchers’ from the University of Leeds have taken a keen interest in these areas of Migrant Action’s work and wish to investigate with the view to increasing our collective understanding and capacity to respond so as to make a positive difference to the experiences of migrants.  Many thanks to Maddie, Rohde and Paddy! 

( Fidelis Chebe- Project Director Migrant Action)

‘In the shadows’: The problem of isolation among International Students

My name is Rohdé and I’m a Dutch student studying at the University of Leeds. My role within Migrant Action in the Research team focuses on international students in Leeds and the isolation problems they face moving to the UK. Research has proven that international students run into social, academic and psychological isolation when they move to a new country and I want to find out what problems international students in Leeds experience. 

By doing that, I hope I can find out how the universities in Leeds can improve their policies and support arrangements for international students and how Migrant Action as a local organisation working with migrants can respond proactively to these challenges and help contribute to a more positive experience for international students. 

De-skilling of Migrants- Madeleine Tarrant

Maddie is a third-year Philosophy student at the University of Leeds and volunteer for Migrant Action and is part of the research team. This research activity and volunteering is part of Maddie’s final year project at university and she hopes that the research would help influence and inform future Migrant Action initiatives. The project is based around the problem of deskilling amongst migrants, with a particular focus on the occurrence of deskilling in Leeds itself. 

Maddie states; ‘This is a phenomenon that is scarcely discussed in mainstream media and conversation but I hope that my research will help to change this. I am exploring the systematic nature of deskilling amongst explanations of why it occurs, and so far my research has highlighted the existence of underlying, institutionalised racism and prejudices which inform employment policies and make it increasingly difficult for skilled migrants to obtain qualification matched work. 

Through a series of interviews I hope to uncover the grievous human cost this has on individuals, families and societies. My final aim is to use my research to help Migrant Action to tackle the problem of deskilling, and provide migrants with the support and assistance needed to find appropriate, skill-matched employment’. 

Paddy Smith- Migration Briefings

Paddy is a second-year Geography student at Leeds University and is examining global migration and implications of these movements for migrants and host societies. As a volunteer and part of the Migrant Action research team, Paddy would produce a series of migration briefings to;

Unpack migration discourses and policies and their manifestations within the local community of Leeds.  The briefings would investigate and propose an alternative humane narrative to the dominant divisive discourse underpinned by anti-migration sentiments. The briefings also set out to;

Engage people from all walks of life to support Migrant Action from ranging from students to policy makers. Raise Awareness of migration issues, Challenge the overuse of vulnerability in the migration discourse – briefings would highlight the use of language as a tool of subjugation and disempowerment of migrants therefore articulate the need for a shift, Challenge hostile environment policy – take a critical focus on the actions of the government and Community engagement – consider migration issues within the local community of Leeds

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