‘I will fight to oppose those who try to divide our communities’ 

By Claudia Webbe MP 

Leicester is one of the most ethnically and culturally diverse places in the UK, and each of our interlinked communities contribute significantly to our collective religious, cultural and political life.

I am incredibly proud of the multiculturalism and diversity of my home city. As your new Member of Parliament for Leicester East, I will be a friend and ally to all communities in our wonderful city.

Our city’s identity is forged from a proud history of immigration, with Jewish Russian migrants arriving in the mid-1800s and European Jews fleeing persecution in the 1930s.

After the Second World War, Leicester welcomed migrants from the Caribbean and the Indian sub-continent. In the late 1960s, Asian refugees arrived from East Africa, and this century we have welcomed refugees and asylum seekers from all over the world.

That’s why last week, like many of my constituents and people across the country, I was appalled by the government’s decision to deport dozens of people to Jamaica despite widespread protests from human rights organisations.

This deportation shows that the government has not learned the lessons of the Windrush scandal, in which British citizens of Caribbean descent, were wrongly detained, denied legal rights and threatened with deportation.

These included Rolston Knight, a Leicester resident for more than fifty years who was refused status as a British national.

Labour is calling on the government to suspend all similar deportation flights pending the publication of the Windrush Lessons Learned Review and the implementation of its recommendations.

Leaks from the review clearly said that it failed to take account of racial discrimination when implementing the hostile environment, and that the government shouldn’t deport people who arrived in this country under the age of 13. The Government’s flagrant disregard of its own advice is shameful, and this report must no longer be suppressed.

It is disputed that last week’s deportees were all foreign nationals, and many of them were convicted of non-violent offences.

Thirteen of them came to the UK as children – nine were under the age of ten, eleven had Indefinite Leave to Remain status, and one had a British passport. One came to this country at the age of five and was the victim of county lines grooming and compelled to carry drugs.

That person was released five years ago, and never re-offended.

I completely oppose the deportation of British citizens.

On February 10, the day before the government’s planned Jamaican deportation flight, I used my contribution in parliament to ask if any of the people scheduled for deportation had been able to have access to legal advice and representation.

The importance of this particular issue I raised was then confirmed shortly afterwards by the Court of Appeal’s ruling that the deportations of least 25 people should be suspended until they are given their constitutional right to access justice.

It is totally unacceptable that those being held at detention centres at Heathrow were not able to access appropriate legal advice due to mobile signal problems that the Home Office did nothing to fix for 23 days.

Before any charter flight takes off, it is crucial that evidence is provided that all reasonable avenues have been explored to establish the deportees’ legal status.

Legal aid, which has suffered excessive cuts under the Tories, is not automatically available, meaning it is very difficult for people to secure legal advice before they are deported.

Deportations have an immense human cost.

I have been campaigning for years to highlight the abuses suffered in detention centres, especially for women held in the notorious Yarl’s Wood centre.

Exclusive, horrific and explosive footage was released on the February 11, which I have seen in full, which leaves me in no doubt that detention centres like Yarl’s Wood are inhumane and ought to be shut down.

We also know that vulnerable individuals with serious medical conditions are forced to fly. One of the people deported last week, a 34-year-old father of two who left Jamaica when he was 12, was made to leave without his medication.

There is also often a real risk of serious harm, even death, in the countries that people are sent to.

In a statement, the government said that “We make no apology whatsoever for seeking to remove immigration offenders and dangerous foreign criminals.”despite the fact many were not dangerous criminals and have lived most of their life in Britain.

As a black woman representing an incredibly diverse constituency, it worries me that the Government are following Donald Trump’s playbook by generalising BAME people as criminals.

By stoking the flames of division, this government are shamefully trying to distract from the fact that they only govern in the interest of the super-rich.

At a time when hate crime has more than doubled since 2013, it has never been more important for communities to come together and unite. The government will not end the Windrush scandal unless it completely changes course.

That means repealing the 2014 Immigration Act and ending the ‘hostile environment’.

We must oppose any attempt to divide our communities based on nationality or religion.

As Leicester East’s new MP, I will work hard to protect all my constituents and fight against those who wish to pit communities against each other.

Claudia Webbe MP is the member of Parliament for Leicester East. You can follow her at www.facebook.com/claudiaforLE and twitter.com/ClaudiaWebbe