The Staggers: asylum

The drowning of hundreds of Australia-bound asylum seekers in Indonesian waters this week has highlighted, once again, the pressing need for Australian to rethink its refugee policy. Instead, political discourse has quickly degenerated to finger-pointing and vilification of people smugglers.

Tragically, the fact that Julia Gillard's government and the Coalition have harnessed the large-scale loss of life not as a catalyst for the immediate overhaul of the country's punitive treatment of ... read more

As part of David Cameron's "Save Nick" operation, the coalition has brought forward a series of policies designed to stamp the Lib Dems' identity on the government.

We've already been promised a new "crackdown" on tax avoidance and a scholarship fund for poorer students. Today, Clegg will confirm details of the government's plan to end the ... read more

A pilot scheme aimed at ending child detention in the UK through voluntary deportation has not had much success so far, according to a report by the BBC.

The scheme involves giving families with children two weeks to leave the country "voluntarily", with leeway for officials to give orders for a family to leave on a specific day.

In the pilot, 113 ... read more

A new report by the Institute of Race Relations (IRR) has documented the deaths of 77 asylum seekers in the UK, painting a tragic picture of the human cost of Britain's draconian asylum system.

The deaths, which all took place in the last four years, are attributed to racist asylum and immigration policies. The number is rising, with one asylum seeker death each month.

The report makes ... read more

The death this week of Jimmy Mubenga, who died while being deported to Angola, has thrown the spotlight on to the private security company that was employed to carry out his deportation. G4S, a FTSE 100-listed company that has operations in over 100 countries and is contracted by the British government to run prisons and carry out deportations on behalf of the Home Office.

Over at ... read more

Refugee and Migrant Justice, whose future was reported to be under threat earlier this month, has today gone into administration. The charity, which provides legal support to thousands of asylum-seekers across England and Wales, is suffering a cash-flow crisis because of changes to the system of legal aid payments.

Paul Gray, the chair of RMJ, said:

It is with great sadness that RMJ's trustees took the decision ... read more

Yesterday on the South Bank in London, thousands of people gathered to hear stories from refugees, dance to music from around the world, sample food from other countries and, most importantly, celebrate the protection of refugees in the UK today. It was the launch of Refugee Week 2010.

This event, like hundreds of the other arts and cultural events taking place over the week, centred round ... read more

The Guardian reports today that the government is to set up a "reintegration centre" that will allow it to deport unaccompanied minors to Afghanistan.

Each month, the £4m centre in Kabul will accommodate 12 boys who are under 18, as well as providing "reintegration assistance" for 120 adults. According to the Guardian, these plans are "part of a wider European move" to start removing children to ... read more

When a bank is on the verge of collapse, financiers and politicians are apt to rally round, saying it is "too big to fail". The leading UK charity Refugee and Migrant Justice, which is under threat of closure, may not command such attention, but to the thousands of asylum-seekers it supports each year, it is a lifeline.

This week, leading figures including the Archbishop of Canterbury read more