Asylum and Immigration in Coventry

The definition of a refugee, under the 1951 UN Convention, is a "person who owing to a 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 to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country."

Refugees are only 2% of the population of Coventry. Most refugees, in fact, never reach Britain -- the UK only takes 1 in 2000 of the global total of refugees.

Nevertheless, asylum seekers and refugees are convenient scapegoats for the far-right. Heck, in a coded far-rightist letter in the Coventry Observer two weeks back, asylum seekers and migrants were even blamed for road congestion. Who knew? No traffic problems on the A45 if we just close the border. This hysteric rhetoric will get worse before it gets better, with 16 BNP candidates in this year's elections.

Refugees and asylum seekers bring a wide range of skills and diversity to our city. They've left their country, culture, profession, friends and native language behind. They face discrimination in employment once here, either through a lack of English, or through racism. It's important to provide services for asylum seekers and refugees, if only for the purposes of (buzzword alert) community cohesion.

One interesting project in Coventry in the last year was at the Belgrade Theatre.

Young refugees and asylum seekers were given free lessons in clowning. The workshops were aimed at boosting confidence, improving language skills and, frankly, helping them to laugh again, in the face of dislocation and trauma.