Gays, dissidents and cancer sufferers all failed by the Home Office. Time to act!

Look, I know the Government think we are fools but surely they don't need to rub our faces in the dirt. Especially when their effortless superiority means that some peoples' lives are put on the line.

The real trouble is that they are either incredibly cynical in a way that would astound even Machiavelli or they are living in La La Land!

the latest offering comes from Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith with her astonishing explanation that you can feel free to be gay in ever so camp Iran. As she puts it;

With particular regard to Iran, current case law handed down by the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal concludes that the evidence does not show a real risk of discovery of, or adverse action against gay and lesbian people who are discreet about their sexual orientation."

Mmm yes! Is that the same Iran that as pointed out in Pink News has been criticesed by both Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International for targeting and even executing practising homosexuals - not a surprise as Iranian law is clear on such matters! Whilst the government eventually acted humanely in the case of Mehdi Kazemi whose boyfriend had been hanged, there seems now a temptation to merely accept the explanations of the regime as with Admiral West's accepting that teenage boys Mahmoud Asgari and Ayaz Marhoni were executed for rape when the case against them was full of inconsistencies and they were both minors at the time of the alleged offense. Fear not! That interpretation will quickly change the moment the Government wishes to support military moves against the Iranian regime.

And anyhow what is this stuff of being "discreet about their sexual orientation?" Quite simply where that is required, we are talking about licencing people to live in fear and denial. Is that what our Government sees as one of its 21st century modern solutions?

Clearly our Government talks with a forked tongue on such matters. Indeed it has a record that stinks to high heaven for its self righteous hypocrisy. So let's have just a few examples.

Firstly, with regards to Uzbekistan which has a particularly appalling human rights record, in response to a query by Bob Marshall Andrews, the Home Office made this astonishing reply;

"In more general terms, I confirm that it is Home Office policy to remove political dissidents to Uzbekistan, if the independent judiciary has deemed an asylum claim to have no basis."

Surely to contemplate sending people back to duch possibilities as being boiled alive, can only come from people who have the advantage of being morally castrated!

Secondly, only recently whilst our Government has rightly been expressing outrage at the actions of the Mugabe Government towards its own people, failed asylum seekers from Zimbabwe have been receiving letters from the Home Office telling them to get on with returning to Zimbabwe;

"Your claim for asylum has been refused," the letters say. "I am now writing to make sure that you know that the Border & Immigration Agency is expecting shortly to be able to enforce returns to Zimbabwe. The Asylum and Immigration Tribunal has now found that there is no general risk on return for failed asylum-seekers."

Well if you believe that, you doubtless also believe in the Tooth Fairy! The plain truth is that Mugabe's henchmen regard those Zimbabweans who have sought asylum in Britain as amongst the most disloyal of people. And Zanu PF deals in the dialectic of fists and pistols rather than that of cordial debate!

Thirdly, the British Govenment has put in place a programme to deport refugees from Iraq back to their peaceful land. As the Guardian article put it;

More than 1,400 rejected Iraqi asylum seekers are to be told they must go home or face destitution in Britain as the government considers Iraq safe enough to return them, according to leaked Home Office correspondence seen by the Guardian.

The Iraqis involved are to be told that unless they sign up for a voluntary return programme to Iraq within three weeks, they face being made homeless and losing state support. They will also be asked to sign a waiver agreeing the government will take no responsibility for what happens to them or their families once they return to Iraqi territory.

The decision by the home secretary, Jacqui Smith, to declare that it is safe to send asylum seekers back to Iraq comes after more than 78 people have been killed in incidents across Iraq since last Sunday.

Safe? I tell you that the Home Secretary is a bare faced liar on this one. Just today turning to the Foreign Office profile on Iraq, I found these words;


"The security situation in Iraq remains highly dangerous with a continuing high threat of terrorism throughout the country. This includes violence and kidnapping targeting foreign nationals (including individuals of non-western appearance). You are strongly advised to seek professional security advice and make arrangements for your security throughout your visit. Even those working with dedicated protection teams should exercise extreme caution."

So I guess that Gordon, Alistair and Jacqui won't be taking their loved ones for a Summer holiday in Baghdad. Yet, they are prepared to send Iraqi men, women and children to take their chances with the gunmen. What greater evidence can their be that the weasel words about caring abour Iraqis are totally empty when uttered by the crowd who rule over us?

And finally, I mention once more the sad case of Ama Sumani who was deported because her visa was inoperative. The problem here is that this woman was suffering from cancer and as a result of our great leaders, she lost the treatment that might have prolonged her life. Seeing the film of her ahead of her deportation made me think of the walk to the gallows. To all intents and purposes, this woman was executed for visa failings. It was the day that I realised that our country is led by a bunch of shitheads!

I appreciate that media such as the Express, Mail and Sun have created a climate of hostility to refugees. But surely in the name of humanity, we need a Government that will not go along with the worst of sentiments but rise to embrace the best of sentiments.

This blog is an unashamedly Christian blog. Yesterday was Refugee Sunday in many of our churches and I used some of the above in my sermon for that day. We also sung a hymn from the Methodist Church website written by Rev Andrew Pratt. Its words are;

There are no strangers to God’s love,
yet we have privatised God’s grace.
Bounded by nationhood and lies,
in fear we shrouded love’s own face.
Acknowledging our sin and greed
we come confessing common need.

These are our neighbours and our friends,
the ones who run in fear from war,
who dread abuse by power or state,
or seek the means to be less poor;
these are the ones we have denied,
as in each one the Christ has cried.

When people seeking sanctuary
come to our shores and need our aid,
then in Christ’s name let’s offer care;
through this our debt of love is paid.
God’s grace is free, this grace receive,
let actions show what we believe. (tune "Eternal Father, strong to save")


To me those words sum up what is at stake. They are the convictions that inform my view on this matter. Now is surely the time for alliances to be formed that change our understanding of the plight of refugees and the policies we adopt towards them.

Long ago, St Augustine wrote;

"God loves each of us as if there were only one of us."

That includes the gay person in Iran, the Uzbeki dissident, the Zimbabwean who fears the violence of Mugabe, the Iraqi refugee who has had enough of violence and the cancer sufferer who depends on a merciful application of visa rules.

Surely, we must stand for them!