Labour should be the party of inalienable human rights

By Lisa James / @lisajames

Three headlines recently caught my eye, each making me slightly angrier than the last. The first was in Thursday’s Metro: “Gay asylum seekers win right to remain in Britain”. The other two were, of course, in The Daily Express: “Now Asylum if You’re Gay: They must be free to go to Kylie concerts and drink multi-coloured cocktails, says judge”, and The Star: “No Room for Gays”. It was the casual homophobia of the latter two that most enraged me, but I was also dismayed by the lack of understanding of our obligations towards asylum-seekers. This got me thinking about our current asylum system, and where we go from here.

The 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees states that protection should be offered to anyone who:

“owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country”.

The 1951 Convention was born out of the horrors of the second world war, and the UK ratified it in the early 1950s.

People seeking asylum because they fear persecution on the grounds of their sexuality are offered protection as members of a “particular social group” and what the Supreme Court’s recent judgement does is provide clarity on how the UK Government should be interpreting its obligations to this group of people. What it is not is the creation of a ‘new’ right. To use Henry Shue’s terminology, states have obligations to “respect, protect and fulfil” human rights. And these obligations extend beyond its citizens, as the 1951 Convention makes abundantly clear. If someone fears their right to life is threatened because of their sexuality, we have a clear moral and legal obligation to offer them protection.

Our current asylum system fails the most vulnerable in many ways and, in my opinion, goes too far towards protecting the state and the expense of individuals. A recent article by Amelia Gentleman illustrates this much more powerfully than I could:

“It would be wrong to describe Abdi as poor because this suggests he doesn’t have enough money to survive on, which would be to put a rather optimistic spin on his situation. He isn’t poor, he just doesn’t have any money at all, and hasn’t done for the last six months since his asylum claim was rejected in December.

Gentleman is pragmatic and uncomplaining as he explains how he manages to subsist beyond the fringes of society, hand to mouth, on meals of bread and tuna bought with Red Cross food vouchers. He has noticed, however, that the longer he lives like this, the heavier the toll on his health.”

The Supreme Court’s judgement is a very welcome step in this context but, as some of the headlines show, there is still a long way to go before as a society we welcome and protect those seeking persecution. This is where I’d like to see the Labour Party step in and, proud of our history of providing refuge too groups fleeing persecution, start talking more of rights, and of a country that offers sanctuary to those that most need our protection, so that they too can enjoy their inalienable human rights.