• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Joint Public Issues Team

Churches working for peace and justice

  • Home Page
  • Who We Are
    • Six hopes for society
  • Issues
    • Economy
      • Tax Justice
      • Reset The Debt
      • Living Wage
    • Environment
      • Net Zero in My Neighbourhood
    • Poverty and Inequality
      • The Cost of Living Crisis
      • Universal Credit
      • Truth and Lies
      • Enough
      • Rethink Sanctions
      • Faith in Foodbanks
      • Housing and Homelessness
    • Asylum and Migration
      • Refugees
      • End Hostility
      • The Asylum System
    • Peacemaking
      • The Arms Trade
      • Nuclear Weapons
      • Drones
      • Peacemaking resources
    • Politics and Elections
      • Elections
      • Meet Your MP
      • Art of the Possible
      • Brexit
    • Other Issues
      • International Development
      • Modern Slavery and Exploitation
        • Forced labour in fashion
  • Get Involved
    • JPIT Conference 2022
    • Newsletter
    • Events
    • Walking with Micah
  • Resources
    • Advent
    • 10 Minutes on… podcast
    • Politics in the Pulpit?
    • Stay and Pray
    • Season of Creation
    • Prayers
    • Public Issues Calendar
    • Poetry
    • Small Group Resources
  • Blog

Church leaders ask Home Secretary for end to hostile environment

Asylum and Migration, Blog · 21 August, 2018

Twenty Church leaders have called for an end to the hostile environment in an open letter to the Home Secretary, Sajid Javid MP.

The hostile environment is the web of government policies designed to make life so difficult for people who cannot prove they have the right to live in the UK that they will choose to leave.

The leaders, including representatives from the Anglican, Catholic, Church of Scotland and Methodist Churches, argue that the destitution deliberately inflicted by the government is ‘inhumane’ and that it leads to racial discrimination. They ask Javid “to seize this opportunity and to adopt an approach to immigration that treats every individual, whatever their status, with humanity, dignity, respect and fairness.”

Is it any wonder that Churches are speaking out about immigration policy? In Glasgow up to 300 asylum seekers who have had their right to remain turned down are under threat of being evicted from their homes. Once evicted they will lose the right to housing and will be faced with homelessness and destitution. Housing charity Shelter Scotland has filed papers at Glasgow Sheriff Court to prevent two tenants being issued with so-called lock-change orders.

The issue will also be raised in the Court of Session in Edinburgh after a case was lodged by Govan Law Centre, which is also trying to prevent the evictions by Serco.

Rev Dr Richard Frazer, convener of the Church and Society Council, said: “The Church of Scotland is deeply, deeply concerned at plans to evict up to 300 asylum seekers from their homes in Glasgow… many of those facing eviction have already needed to flee their homes in the past from appalling violence, terror and war. It is unacceptable that this should be happening.”

Open letter to the Home Secretary:

Dear Home Secretary

We are writing as a group of Churches and Church Leaders to express our deep concern about the impact of the government’s ‘hostile environment’ policies, and to support calls for them to be dismantled. We welcome the recent report from the Baptist Union, the Church of Scotland, the Methodist Church and the United Reformed Church: Destitution, Discrimination and Distrust: the web of the hostile environment, and support its conclusions.

The injustices of the hostile environment alarm us. It deliberately prevents people who cannot provide the right documentation – for whatever reason – from getting work, renting a home or accessing the kinds of services we all need to live. As the report shows, this is leading to poverty, homelessness and avoidable suffering. We believe it is inhumane to use destitution, or the threat of destitution, as a policy tool to encourage people to leave the country.

We are also concerned by the mounting evidence that hostile environment measures are causing racist discrimination. People who do not look or sound ‘British’ are now facing increased difficulty in finding homes and employment, because landlords and employers are being asked to play the role of border guards.

This is not about who we do or do not allow into the UK, but about how we relate to one another inside our borders. Due process, justice and the proper implementation of immigration policies should not require us to live in suspicion of our neighbours.

As Christians we assert the importance of offering welcome to the stranger and caring for the vulnerable, whoever they are. Many of our churches support those who have suffered hardship because of the hostile environment. Our churches include some of the very people who are at risk of destitution and discrimination. We hear many stories of how the system has failed people and the harmful human impact of these policies.

We believe that the hostile environment should be brought to an end, not simply given a new name. As a first step towards that, we are calling for a full and independent review of immigration policy and practice to examine the damaging effect that the policies of the hostile environment are having on the whole of society.

The revelations earlier this year about the appalling treatment of some members of the Windrush Generation have thrown the spotlight on the failings of the hostile environment. They also offer an opportunity for a fresh start. We urge you to seize this opportunity and to adopt an approach to immigration that treats every individual, whatever their status, with humanity, dignity, respect and fairness.

Yours sincerely

Rt Revd Jonathan Clark, Bishop of Croydon and Chair, Churches Refugee Network

Rt Revd Dr Guli Francis-Dehqani, Bishop of Loughborough

Rt Revd Richard Jackson, Bishop of Lewes

Revd Michaela Youngson, President of the Methodist Conference

Mr Bala Gnanapragasam, Vice-President of the Methodist Conference

Revd Richard Frazer, convenor of the Church and Society Committee of the Church of Scotland

Revd Nigel Uden, Moderator of the General Assembly of the United Reformed Church

Mr Derek Estill, Moderator of the General Assembly of the United Reformed Church

Revd Lynn Green, General Secretary of the Baptist Union of Great Britain

Most Revd Mark J Strange, Bishop of Moray, Ross and Caithness, Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church

Paul Parker, Recording Clerk, Quakers in Britain

Rt Revd John Keenan, Bishop of Paisley, Roman Catholic Church in Scotland

Mr John P Cross, Moderator of the General Assembly of the United Free Church of Scotland

Rev Alan Donaldson, General Director, Baptist Union of Scotland

Revd Judith Morris, General Secretary, Baptist Union of Wales

Revd Dr Geraint Tudur, General Secretary, Union of Welsh Independents

Christine Elliott, Director of International Programmes, Churches Together in Britain and Ireland

Kathy Mohan, CEO, Housing Justice

Revd Fleur Houston, Churches Refugee Network

Mrs Joan Cook, President of the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches and President of the Scottish Unitarian Association

 

Filed Under: Asylum and Migration, Blog Tagged With: hostile environment

Lucy Zwolinska

Previous Post: « Rising homelessness in the UK: Complex or embarrassing?
Next Post: Should the government’s power ever be used to create destitution? »

Primary Sidebar

Search

Recent Posts

  • Homes for Ukraine – One Year On
  • Response to the ‘Illegal Migration Bill’ – March 2023
  • Ukraine Invasion – One Year On
  • JPIT’s Review of 2022
  • What does Government Support for Asylum Seekers really provide?
  • God with Us – the Refugees of Calais and Dunkirk
  • How can we respond to COP27?
  • Statement on the conclusion of the COP27 Climate Conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt
  • COP27 – what should we be looking for?
  • “He has filled the hungry with good things” – What we need from the Autumn Budget
  • What are the stories we should tell about the humanitarian crisis at Manston Airport Asylum centre?
  • How can we be sure that the products we buy are not the result of modern slavery?
  • Why I hate Warm Banks (and why my church is opening one)
  • How does our theology call us to challenge Poverty?
  • Introducing Alfie
  • Biden says nuclear risk is the highest since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis
  • Churches respond to risk to benefit levels
  • Briefing on the ‘Mini Budget’ for the Enough to Live group
  • Introducing Hazel
  • Introducing Hannah

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter

Footer

Follow us

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Quick links

Stay and Pray
Politics in the Pulpit
Faith in Politics podcast
Public Issues Calendar
Useful Links

Our work

About Us
Meet the Team
Join the Team 
Internship
Our Newsletter

Contact us

25 Marylebone Road
London NW1 5JR

Tel: 020 7916 8632

enquiries@jpit.uk

Copyright © 2023 · Showcase Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in