Focus

Migration

Hunger For Freedom: Campaigning Against Detention From Inside and Outside Yarl’s Wood

by Irene Renny and Tom Kemp

The success of the last Yarl's Wood hunger strike shows that listening to and collaborating with people in detention is an imperative part of building a successful anti-detention movement. What else can the protest teach us about organising against detention and showing solidarity with those inside?

These Five Victories in the Fight for Migrants’ Rights Show We Can Win

by Charlotte England

The government backtracked on its demand that schools collect data on pupils’ nationality and country of birth this month, presenting a sudden and startling victory to campaigners opposing the hostile environment. Here are five other key wins in the fight for migrants’ rights in Britain.

Novara FM: After Windrush: Britain and Migration

On #NovaraFM, James Butler, Aaron Bastani and Ash Sarkar look at the politics of the recent Windrush crisis, the history of migration policy in the UK, and ask: what could a left-wing migration policy look like?

Explainers: What Is the Hostile Environment?

British children sleeping on night buses or in storage units, torture survivors required to pay upfront for medical treatment, these are just some of the consequences of Theresa May’s ‘hostile environment’. In this explainer video; Migrants Rights Specialist Rockhaya Sylla unpacks some of the origins and repercussions of this harmful set of policies.

Outsourcing Incarceration: Privitisation in Britain’s Immigration Detention Estate

by Rudy Schulkind

The private companies that run Britain's detention centres have repeatedly failed to protect the rights, dignity and safety of the people they imprison. But the Home Office has created a system in which it is incredibly difficult to hold them to account.

A Short Guide to Deportation Charter Flights

by Phil Miller

Mass deportations on chartered aircraft are only one small part of the UK’s deportation system. But in many ways they are the system’s most violent and terrifying instrument, taking place away from the public gaze in secretive night-time flights.

Britain’s Plan to Build a Prison in Nigeria is Wrong and Must Be Stopped

by Natalie Fiennes

As the government unveils plans to build a new prison wing in Nigeria, it’s clear it's not just the Windrush generation affected by a cruel and unjust UK immigration policy.

Migration Focus: A Progressive Immigration Policy?

If we get a left-wing Labour government led by Jeremy Corbyn, they will have an immigration system, and what that will look like matters - for migrants, asylum seekers and refugees. Maya Goodfellow discusses how we might get there.

Refugees in Indonesia and Iraq Condemn Western Indifference

by Matt Broomfield

Coverage of the 'refugee crisis' tends to focus on the West, particularly on Europe, but none of the seven countries worldwide to host over half a million refugees are in the EU or North America. Instead, most refugees live on the periphery, confined to squalid, brutal detention centres and stripped of even the scant protection afforded to asylum-seekers on European shores.

IMOBastani: Theresa May Must Resign

Windrush Brits are being detained and deported and it is a disgrace. When will Theresa May have the dignity to resign? For more articles, videos and podcasts as part of our migration focus head to novaramedia.com/focus/migration

Domestic Violence or Deportation? The Migrant Women Forced to Choose

by Niamh McIntyre

Many migrants don’t have an automatic right to the protections and spaces most in the UK take for granted. For thousands of migrant women who experience domestic violence every year, it can often come down to a difficult choice - stay in an abusive relationship, or risk being reported to the Home Office.

Migration Focus: We Don’t Need Borders

We think of borders as the most natural thing in the world. In reality, they are an unnecessary evil, and fighting them has to be a top priority. Here’s why borders have no place in a just world.

Can America’s Sanctuary City Model Work in the UK? A North London Borough is About to Find Out

by Charlotte England

Inspired by the sanctuary cities that refuse to enforce Trump’s racist immigration laws in the US, residents in north London are lobbying their council to defy and oppose Theresa May’s hostile environment policies and make their borough safe for migrants.

Migration Focus: Interview With Diane Abbott

Can we look forward to a fairer immigration system under Labour? A few weeks ago Ash Sarkar sat down with Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott to talk about migration, asylum, deportation and more.

5 Reasons Global Free Movement Isn’t Such a Bad Idea

by Aisha Dodwell

Arguing for fewer immigration controls has become an invitation for abuse and ridicule. Here are five reasons global free movement and open borders isn't actually such a bad idea.

Long Read: How Power Hungry Politicians and the Far-right Are Turning Italy Against Refugees

Solidarity With the Yarl’s Wood Hunger Strikers

Women in Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre have now been on hunger strike for nearly two weeks. Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott expresses her solidarity with their fight for adequate healthcare provision, for improved legal access and an end to indefinite detention.

No More Deaths at Sea

On the sixth of February 2014, the Guardia Civil fired rubber bullets at African migrants trying to swim into the Spanish-controlled Moroccan city of Ceuta. At least 14 deaths were recorded. Four years later campaigners marched against the callous disregard for life at Europe’s borders. A Film by Gosia Juszczak & Darío Unai Cristóbal Pulido

Novara Docs: The Cargo Women of Melilla

Embedded in the Moroccan coast, the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla represent Europe’s southernmost border. There is no formal customs agreement between these two autonomous cities and Morocco, giving rise to a system where goods are smuggled across the border as personal luggage to avoid customs charges and taxes. The burden of this work […]

Ghettoes of Europe: The Private Landlords Making Billions From Refugee Shelters in Berlin

by Hsiao-Hung Pai

Refugees live in roofless, partitioned rooms without privacy or basic facilities, in isolation on the edge of the city. Despite high rates of depression and suicide, the authorities keep cramming more people in, benefiting only the private companies and individuals who run these mass shelters for profit.

Novara Docs: The Bitter Fruit of Andalucia

Visible from space, the vast concentration of plastic greenhouses in Almeria supply more than half of Europe’s fruit and vegetables. An economic boom in this previously poor region of Andalucia has come at the expense of the African migrants who work in these greenhouses, under slave-like conditions. Approximately 200 workers live there during peak season. […]

In international law and political discourse, 'migrant' is distinguished from 'refugee'. The latter is legally entitled to our aid, whereas the former can freely be treated with suspicion and contempt. But this binary obscures the conditions that gave rise to the so-called refugee crisis.

Interview: Interview: Aderonke Apata

Aderonke Apata on her experience in Yarl's Wood detention centre.

Focus

Migration

Migration

Hunger For Freedom: Campaigning Against Detention From Inside and Outside Yarl’s Wood

by Irene Renny and Tom Kemp

These Five Victories in the Fight for Migrants’ Rights Show We Can Win

by Charlotte England

Novara FM: After Windrush: Britain and Migration

Explainers: What Is the Hostile Environment?

Outsourcing Incarceration: Privitisation in Britain’s Immigration Detention Estate

by Rudy Schulkind

A Short Guide to Deportation Charter Flights

by Phil Miller

Britain’s Plan to Build a Prison in Nigeria is Wrong and Must Be Stopped

by Natalie Fiennes

Migration Focus: A Progressive Immigration Policy?

Refugees in Indonesia and Iraq Condemn Western Indifference

by Matt Broomfield

IMOBastani: Theresa May Must Resign

Domestic Violence or Deportation? The Migrant Women Forced to Choose

by Niamh McIntyre

Migration Focus: We Don’t Need Borders

Can America’s Sanctuary City Model Work in the UK? A North London Borough is About to Find Out

by Charlotte England

Migration Focus: Interview With Diane Abbott

5 Reasons Global Free Movement Isn’t Such a Bad Idea

by Aisha Dodwell

Long Read: How Power Hungry Politicians and the Far-right Are Turning Italy Against Refugees

by Hsiao-Hung Pai

Novara FM: On Migration and the State: Lea Ypi

Migration Focus: Migration Focus

Solidarity With the Yarl’s Wood Hunger Strikers

No More Deaths at Sea

Novara Docs: The Cargo Women of Melilla

Ghettoes of Europe: The Private Landlords Making Billions From Refugee Shelters in Berlin

by Hsiao-Hung Pai

Novara Docs: The Bitter Fruit of Andalucia

At Your Service? Migrant Women Workers in the UK Hospitality Sector

by Ewa Jasiewicz

Long Read: Surviving Hostile Environments: Migrant Families With No Recourse to Public Funds

by North East London Migrant Action

Long Read: Good Refugees vs Bad Migrants

by Hector Uniacke

Interview: Interview: Aderonke Apata