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This question is one of many cries of despair which I have seen over recent months. As a volunteer with Care4Calais I found myself interviewing people accommodated in a hotel outside of Leeds by the Home Office. The “her” in this case was a manager of the hotel who had been threatening the asylum seekers living under her care with sanctions against their claims for asylum and with physical violence. Care4Calais’ involvement collecting testimony of mistreatment to force a judicial review, along with distributing much needed supplies had previously been undertaken at Napier Barracks in Kent. This camp along with Penarth in Wales is where the Home Office had been detaining asylum seekers in unsafe, COVID non-secure facilities. The use of these camps had been condemned by human rights groups since their inception, and the transfer of asylum seekers to these sites has since been declared unlawful by the Supreme Court. Sadly, the evidence of all these failures appears to have done nothing to stop the Home Secretary in pursuit of increasingly cruel policies. 

Next week the Home Secretary Priti Patel brings forward the “Borders Bill”; the legislation which was poorly consulted on earlier in the year. This week The Times revealed that the Home Office is planning to create a centre in Rwanda to process asylum claims. The intention appears to be that anyone who enters the UK through irregular means (which is most asylum seekers) will be removed and taken the 4,000+ miles to Rwanda to have their claim decided there. One commentator noted that removing asylum seekers from communities across the UK to camps in south-east England was idea number one. Now they are to be taken even further away from those of us who would seek to welcome them.

The UK government is not alone is pursuing these tactics. Australia’s policy of “offshoring” asylum with camps on Manus and Naura has been condemned by human rights organisations around the world, and even by the UK government which now seeks to emulate it. The costs of that policy have been reported as being equivalent of £2 million, per person, per year. While the costs and funding of the UK-Rwanda proposal are not yet public it is hard to imagine, given what we are learning about corruption and the funnelling of public money to close friends of Conservative ministers throughout the COIVD pandemic that opportunities don’t exist to take public money as personal profit while cutting further corners when it comes to the care of vulnerable people. Patel’s current policy also has chilling reminders of the Israeli government removing Eritrean and Sudanese people to third countries, Rwanda and later Uganda. Deemed illegal by the courts and condemned by the UNHCR this policy left many with irregular immigration status, unable to work, and at risk of being returned to their country of origin, the place which they are seeking protection from. A process known as ‘refoulment’. 

This week we celebrated the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, the first missionaries of the church. The Book of Acts recalls Saint Paul being shipwrecked on Malta and the extraordinary welcome that he was shown. I doubt that next week in Parliament we will see any such welcome being planned for refugees in this new legislation. I live in hope, but sadly not expectation of an MP standing up and asking the Home Secretary; “where is her humanity?”.