Today on 15th December 2024, the Government has announced “crackdowns” on those without permission to work while gleefully congratulating itself for ramping up cruel detentions and deportations. The timing of this announcement which criminalises migrants is particularly tragic and pertinent following the murder of people seeking asylum in Dunkirk overnight. This kind of dehumanising policy and rhetoric we see spouted by the Government today feeds escalating anti-migrant hate.
This Government has manufactured a link between “small boat” crossings and so-called ‘illegal’ working. It fails to understand why people are forced to turn to intermediaries to seek sanctuary in the UK. Their ‘crackdown’ does nothing to address the root causes of why people make dangerous journeys in the first place, including that safe routes do not exist for all nationalities.
Enforcement operations such as raids are a terrifying apparatus of the Hostile Environment. In line with previous governments, the new Government has made it crystal clear that it is content to continue the trend of criminalising migration, and terrify racialised communities.
Punishing migrants without permission to work or reside fails to address the fundamental failures within the immigration system that continuously pushes migrants into exploitative conditions because they can become undocumented so easily. Increasing surveillance and policing of migrant and racialised communities will only drive fear and increase suffering.
At the Migrants’ Rights Network, we’ve been campaigning for greater transparency around opaque immigration raids, surveillance and deportation policies. We call on the Government to abandon authoritarian measures which intimidate racialised and migrant communities.
Our thoughts go out to the loved ones of those who have died at the Dunkirk camp, we cannot begin to comprehend the grief you must be feeling at this horrific time.