DEAR PRITI PATEL

Production image from ‘Tanja’ - campaign theatre to end immigration detention. Credit: JSP Photography & Freckled Agency

1st July 2021

CC:  Shadow Home Secretary; Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport; Shadow Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport; Members of the Home Affairs Select Committee; Members of the APPG for Refugees; Members of the APPG for Immigration Detention

Dear Home Secretary,

RE: The introduction of the ‘Nationality and Borders Bill’

A rapidly growing network of Theatre Companies committed to supporting refugees, asylum seekers and migrants are calling on the government to urgently reconsider any plans to introduce legislation that would see people seeking sanctuary taken from the UK and detained in overseas detention centres.

We are deeply concerned to hear that our government has not ruled out sending people seeking safety to offshore, outsourced immigration detention centres. We need only look to the widely criticised Australian model to see the appallingly high levels of self-harm and mental illness offshore detention can lead to. We remind this government that as signatories of the 1951 Refugee Convention we have a moral and legal duty of care. We are part of a proud network committed to welcoming and supporting those that ask for nothing but safety and contribute so much to this country. The UK can, and should, do better.

We ask that the Home Secretary and department officials work with our UK-wide network to give people seeking sanctuary the proper welcome they deserve.

Please read our open letter to the government here

Yours sincerely,

Stand & Be Counted Theatre, Marlborough Productions, Counterpoints, Displace Yourself, Maison Foo, performingborders, Phosphoros Theatre, Mafwa Theatre, BIASAN, Intercultured Festival, Pilot Theatre, Compass Collective, Curious Monkey, Ice & Fire, Migrants in Culture, Global Voices Theatre, City of Sanctuary