STOP DEPORTATIONS SHOW SOLIDARITY FOR ASYLUM AND MIGRANT RIGHTS

Socialist Resistance no43 | page 8-9

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eighteen months a

debate has been

taking place

amongst asylum

seekers, other

migrants, and

migrant support

groups, about the

need for a campaign to

regularise the status of migrants with Irregular status. Sarah Parker looks

at the arguments and the campaigns. From time to time the debate has been reflected in Parliament and the media, where the demand has been met with a firm rejection of any idea of an amnesty or regularisation by the Office.

Unfortunately the only campaign around the issue, Strangers into Citizens, operates under the aegis of Church of England and the Catholic Church.

It involves elements of the Labour bureaucracy including Ken Livingstone and Jack Dromey, who are probably in regular contact with the New Labour inner circle desperate to ease the pressure on the crisis-and scandal-ridden Home Office while avoiding any possibility that resistance from migrants and their allies could be seen to pose an effective challenge to the government's agenda.

The demands of the campaign are quite right wing,