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Refugee rights at risk, warns charity

3 March 2003

One of the country’s leading agencies working with asylum seekers has today warned that the human rights of asylum seekers hang in the balance. The Court of Appeal is preparing to decide tomorrow whether or not recent legislation that strips ‘late’ asylum applicants of all welfare support breaches their human rights. Since the measure came into force on 8 January, the charity has seen 80 people across the country who have been forced to sleep rough and go hungry at the height of winter, with no right of appeal. Refugee Action’s chief executive Sandy Buchan explained:

“Applicants must register their claim as soon as they can, yet our experience shows that local immigration offices are sometimes turning people away. Innocent asylum seekers, who have done nothing wrong in seeking asylum here, are bearing the brunt of an appalling law and impossible bureaucracy. They are caught between a rock and a hard place. We urge the Court of Appeal to uphold the human rights of asylum seekers.”

Refugee Action is especially concerned about the plight of women affected by the measure – women like Grace (24), who fled Uganda after being imprisoned and tortured for her political activities. She applied for asylum the day after her arrival in the UK but was refused support from the Home Office. Grace was frightened and traumatised when she arrived in Britain. In Uganda she had been held in a torture house for seven months, where she was raped daily by guards and witnessed the father of her children being stabbed to death in front of her. Grace explained:

“In Uganda I was studying social sciences at University and I was very involved in the student union. My partner and I were members of the Allied Democratic Movement, the political opposition in Uganda. There is no democracy or freedom of speech there. Some of my friends disappeared and some had their hands and ears cut off.

“In July 2002 my partner and I were arrested during a rally and taken to a torture house. They raped me in front of him and when he tried to stop them they stabbed him in the stomach. I was imprisoned for seven months and every single day they raped me. All the prisoners slept in the same room together. The guards made me eat faeces and stand in cold water.”

Grace eventually escaped from the prison and from Uganda. After being refused support by the Home Office here, Grace spent three days sleeping rough in a phone box in Liverpool’s Lime Street Station. By the time she arrived at Refugee Action, she had not eaten for four days. Grace explained:

“If you’re running away from something all you want to do is to be safe. When I was refused support they said that I was free to go. I said, ‘I have nowhere to go, I’m so hungry.’ After three days sleeping rough, a man spoke to me and I started crying. He told me about Refugee Action.”

Staff at Refugee Action in Liverpool applied for a judicial review of Grace’s case and a judge has granted her injunctive relief pending the outcome of her case. This means that Refugee Action can place Grace in accommodation until a decision is made in the courts. Before 8 January, Refugee Action was able to place destitute asylum seekers in accommodation but this is now illegal if a person has been refused support under section 55 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002.

“I thought people in Britain would be friendly. We are called ‘bogus’ refugees and that really hurts. I’m a human being,” Grace added.

For more information please call: press office on 020 7654 7707 or 07810 757 752 (out of hours).

Notes to editors

Section 55 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002, enacted on 8 January 2003, requires asylum seekers to make their claim for asylum “as soon as reasonably practicable” after their arrival in the UK. In practice, this has meant that many single ‘in-country’ applicants have been refused support. Despite their best efforts to register their claim for asylum, often on the day they arrived here, some asylum seekers have been turned away by local immigration offices, forcing them to make their way to asylum screening units in either Croydon or Liverpool to register their asylum claim. Applicants refused support are dependent upon the goodwill of strangers or charities.
On 19 January the High Court ruled that Section 55 breaches the human rights of six asylum seekers who brought a test case under human rights law. The Court of Appeal is reviewing this judgement on Monday.
Since 8 January, Refugee Action has seen 80 people who have been refused support because of Section 55, 53 of whom have been granted interim relief pending a Judicial Review of the refusal decision after the Court of Appeal hands down its judgment on Tuesday.
Refugee Action is an independent, national charity working to enable refugees to build new lives in the UK. We provide practical advice and assistance for newly arrived asylum seekers and long-term commitment to their settlement through community development work. As one of the country’s leading agencies in the field, Refugee Action has 21 years’ experience in pioneering innovative work in partnership with refugees.

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