[ad_1]
Priti Patel has been accused of “deeply insulting and condescending” behavior by the victims of the Windrush scandal after she branded those calling for the deportation flights to be stopped as “celebrities doing good.”
In a letter to the Ministry of the Interior, highlighted Windrush activists and support organizations said the Home Secretary’s comments were “poorly judged and misinformed,” and accused her of using his name to try to score political points.
They reacted after Patel used a newspaper interview to attack more than 80 black public figures who called for the cancellation of a deportation flight to Jamaica for several convicted criminals.
The coverage included quotes from Interior Ministry sources criticizing lawyers acting on behalf of people who were to be deported.
Activists fear the illegal expulsion of people who have the right to stay in the UK. On Wednesday morning, the Home Office deported 13 men to Jamaica, but 23 others were granted clemency after the government acknowledged that some may have been victims of modern slavery.
In his interview with the Daily Mail on Friday, Patel claimed it was an insult to see “misinformed Labor politicians and charitable celebrities trying to mistake Windrush victims for these vile criminals who will be deported.”
His words infuriated Windrush victims, who said in a reply letter: “We, the top Windrush activists and organizations, signed the same letter as other prominent black figures, many of whom have parents and grandparents of the generation of Windrush, to express our most important concerns with his mass deportation flight to Jamaica. “
The signatories included Natalie Barnes, whose mother Paulette Wilson was unjustly detained and threatened with deportation, and Anthony Bryan, who was unjustly detained for five weeks, before being booked for a flight to Jamaica despite not having been there in more 50 years. Bryan said: “The Home Office cannot be trusted to do the right thing. We need everyone to get involved in the campaign. “
He said he was upset by Patel’s comments, adding: “I’m still waiting for the Interior Ministry to get it right.”
The letter was also signed by Windrush victims Glenda Ceaser, Ewaldo Romeo and Michael Braithwaite, as well as by Bishop Desmond Jaddoo and other activists. They told the Home Secretary that her comments were “deeply insulting. [and] protective”.
Patel referred to the deportation targets as “rapists and murderers,” but Jacqueline McKenzie, an attorney for McKenzie Beute and Pope who has worked on Windrush cases, said that not all were very serious criminals, and the original list of Names for those proposed The deportation included many people who had been in the UK since childhood and whose crimes were less serious.
“When you learn a little more about their backgrounds, there are examples of people who are victims of grooming, people who have been in care, people with very disaffected lives and I think we need to take that into account in the debate,” he said.
The letter, to which McKenzie was also a signatory, came when attorneys acting on behalf of several people facing deportation said they had received death threats and increased their security since Patel’s criticism.
Amer Zaman said his firm Cranbrook Legal had received multiple emails, including one warning him to “wait for a package” and that he would not be “alive much longer.” He said he was in the process of reporting them to the police.
Miranda Butler, an attorney for Garden Court Chambers, said Mail Online’s decision to appoint her and others should be viewed in the context of broader concerns about the safety of attorneys involved in immigration cases.
The Bar Council and the Law Society, as well as other government ministers, have pleaded with Patel to stop his attacks on them.
A third attorney, Sheraaz Hingora of Clarendon Park Chambers, said he and his colleagues had also been abused.
He said: “The aggressive and threatening messages I have received since the article have been distressing, particularly with the recent rhetoric against government immigration attorneys. It feels like I’ve become a target when I was just doing my job.
“People seem to forget that the work we do is also designed to protect innocent British children from the serious harm caused by the deportation of a parent.”
Last week’s campaign was supported by model Naomi Campbell and actress Thandie Newton. They signed an open letter last week to various airlines asking them to refuse to provide deportation flights for the prisoners.
The letter read in part: “Until justice has been served for all Commonwealth Windrush victims, any deportation to Commonwealth countries risks further illegal expulsions of members of the Windrush generation or descendants of Windrush who may be entitled to stay in the UK but do not yet have the required paperwork. “
Labor immigration spokeswoman Holly Lynch has led MPs’ opposition to the deportations, telling the Commons on Monday that the full consequences of the Windrush scandal had not yet been established.
She added: “With that in mind, what assessment has been done to ensure that none of those scheduled to be on the flight are eligible under the Windrush scheme, or have been affected by the broader immigration injustices that affected the victims of the Windrush scandal? ? “
A spokesman for the Interior Ministry said: “We reject the underlying implication of these allegations. Any form of violence or threatening behavior is completely unacceptable.
“None of the people on the flight were eligible for the Windrush scheme and their cases were reviewed by the Windrush relief team.”
Mail Online has been contacted for comment.
