What is in Kelvin's Head?

Pollokshields – These are our neighbours

14/05/2021

It was impossible not to be moved by people standing around an immigration enforcement van in Pollokshields yesterday chanting “These are our neighbours, let them go”. Many people today are proud of those in this city who stopped this enforcement action.

Every country needs to have an immigration system and every immigration system needs to be enforced in some way. Every such system needs to be fair and just. However the immigration system in this country has ceased to be fair and has ceased to be just. Any government that actively seeks to be hostile to those seeking asylum has already failed the test of being fair and just. The immigration system in this country has not only become hostile to refugees but the government has recently announced plans to make it even more hostile and to limit the possibility of appealing to the Supreme Court in asylum cases.

Every asylum seeker needs access to justice in order that the system itself can be seen to be fair.

Yesterday, the people of Pollokshields came out onto the streets because they believed that what was being done in their name was not fair. With an aggresively hostile system in place as a policy, it is impossible to be sure that any asylum decision is fair.

The police made a wise call yesterday not to try to clear the street and the two men detailed were set free into the community.

We need a fair asylum system. Without a fair asylum system, there will increasingly be successful protests by citizens who will prevent the authorities from being able to act.

If the government believes it can appeal to voters by making an already hostile asylum system even more hostile, the people in the streets of Pollokshields showed yesterday that at least in some places, that policy will fail.

asylum, refugees

8 responses to “A Christian Country?”

Tim

29/04/2014

Reality is pluralist; a secular basis is good to level the playing-field.

I think Cameron is not so much failing to live in `now’ but hell-bent on dragging the country back to the 50s (mostly the 1850s).

One of Blair’s very few positives was “we don’t do God”, or at least postponing doing God until mostly after he was out of Number 10.

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Fr Steve

30/04/2014

Very good analysis. In Australia I still find I get prickly when people tell me I belong to the C of E! (It has not been formally such since the the 70s)
It is good not to see ourselves in the light of another nation…England…but it is good to recognise to recognise our heritage …Anglican.
I spent part of last year in Hawaii as a locum…..when asked last week by the Mothers’ Union..”What was the difference?” I was a bit glib…but could confidential say “Nothing at all!” Given the fact that 1/3 of the congregation were Filipinos it is an interesting reflection.
Don’t think we should overstate it, but being Anglican is a great thing. But there is much about it that needs a good kick up the backside too!

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Mark

30/04/2014

Though we ought to, maybe proudly, remember that the SEC is not a daughter Church of the Church of England. I’m afraid Cameron isn’t doing himself any favours with the way he’s made these statements, and as far as Scotland goes there’s a large part that has been disenfranchised by any statements that Cameron or any English person says, because they view them as ‘english propaganda’. Sadly, I don’t view the Scottish Government with much love either, having used their position to unfairly tout their party’s stance. Between two opposite poles, both backed by Government, how is one to hear a balanced view, instead of that great love of Blair’s Government, spin.

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Eamonn

30/04/2014

‘I do however have a big problem with starting up a new country and writing Christianity into the constitutional definition of what that country is.’ I agree totally. I lived for 26 years in a country where the constitution, in respect of family matters, reflected the views both of the majority RC church and the Church of Ireland. For example, in order to make divorce possible, an amendment to the constitution had to be passed by a majority voting in a nation-wide referendum. This was only achieved in 1995, and only by a margin of 50.28% to 49.72%. Constitutional definition of religious matters always leads to discrimination.

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Robin

01/05/2014

> ‘I do however have a big problem with starting up a new country’

I have a big problem with seeing Scottish independence (if it were to be re-established following a YES vote in the referendum) as ‘starting up a new country’ . . .

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Alan McManus

02/05/2014

I loathe the smug fortress mentality of many of my co-religionists in RC schools while noting that these schools perform at least as well as non-denominational. I loathe the cowardice of the Reformed churches in failing to speak out against the violence and prejudice associated with a certain group of charitable organisations every July and the complicity of local authorities who DO NOT assure the safety of citizens and of international visitors unused to the historical hatreds of the Scottish central belt. While the latter is true, I continue to support the former and look to Canada as a model of multicultural accommodation than to the aggressive laïcité of France.

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Allan Ronald

03/05/2014

Given the choice between the venomous and literally murderous hatreds of Central Belt sectarianism and ‘aggressive laicité’ I’ll take the latter any day.

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