UK government 'complicit' in asylum seeker hotel assaults: Unions

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
5 Mar 2023 12:43
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The UK government has been chastised for its degrading language and for demonizing refugees.

People observe a fire outside a hotel housing asylum seekers after a protest in Knowsley, Merseyside, on 10 February. (Reuters)

Following violent skirmishes involving hundreds of far-right protesters outside a hotel in Liverpool sheltering asylum seekers, the UK government has been chastised for its degrading language and scapegoating of asylum seekers.

On February 10, fifteen individuals were arrested, including a 13-year-old child, when hundreds of far-right demonstrators began violent battles outside a hotel housing asylum seekers in Knowsley, Liverpool.

The protest came amid heightened tensions as record numbers of migrants are crossing the Channel in small boats, prompting the Conservative government to come up with a controversial plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda.

In a related development, some of Britain’s biggest unions have accused the government of being “complicit” in attacks on hotels housing asylum seekers and are urging members to “mobilize” against far-right groups seemingly emboldened by the rhetoric of senior Tory politicians.

The first significant engagement by trade unions on the increasingly politicized topic followed comments on Friday by the Conservative party's deputy chairman, Lee Anderson, who said he sympathized with protesters outside hotels.

His words come days after Home Secretary Suella Braverman said hotels giving refuge to asylum seekers were producing "understandable tensions", and protesters attacking them were not “racist or bigoted."

Patriotic Alternative (PA), a far-right group involved, was created in 2019 by Mark Collett, "an admirer of Adolf Hitler" who once proposed Mein Kampf as one of three books individuals should read. PA, Britain's fastest-growing far-right organization, distributed hundreds of anti-migrant flyers to households in Merseyside days before a brawl outside a Knowsley hotel sheltering asylum seekers.

Now the leaders of 13 main unions including Britain’s largest, Unison, which has more than 1.3 million members, the GMB, which has 600,000, along with the National Education Union, which has at least 450,000, have issued a joint statement saying, “We know whose side we are on when we see far-right mobs attacking refugees, and politicians playing the mood music.”

“In recent weeks, we have seen an alarming rise in violence and intimidation organized by the far right against refugees and refugee accommodation. The government is complicit in these attacks," the statement added, calling on workers and trade union members to show their solidarity and to mobilize against the far-right."

It accused the government's controversial policy of deporting asylum seekers from the UK to Rwanda of fitting "with a long-running campaign of hyperbole and demonization."

A number of rallies outside hotels have been met with counter-demonstrations, many of which have been organized by "anti-fascist organizations".

Last year, far-right protesters visited hotels sheltering asylum seekers 253 times, more than double the number of visits reported in 2021. Amanda Smith, a hard-right English Constitution party member, is believed to have visited migrant accommodation 124 times last year.

Following a protest at a hotel sheltering asylum seekers on Friday, Rotherham's council leader warned that the far-right was "not welcome" there.