IMMIGRATION DETENTION SOLIDARITY VIGILS ARE CONTINUING WEEKLY ON FRIDAYS

The shocking Channel 4 footage and the Parliamentary Inquiry into immigration detention have shone a light into the dark and hidden world of the UK's detention centres. Since 20th March we have been having a rally each week to protest against the UK's detention system and to show solidarity with the hunger strikers. It would be great to make them bigger and stronger in these next few weeks. 

The rally is every week, on Fridays in Bristol at the junction of Stapleton Road and Easton Way from 5-7pm. Hope to see you there!

See the detention centre footage here 
http://www.corporatewatch.org/news/2015/mar/04/harmondsworth-immigration-detention-centre-secret-filming-mitie 

Read the Detention Inquiry here 
http://detentioninquiry.com/2015/03/03/time-for-a-time-limit-parliamentarians-call-for-a-28-day-maximum-time-limit-on-immigration-detention-to-be-introduced/  

'Songs from the Journey' Fundraising Concert

A magical night of food and music, celebrating life together and raising funds for the wonderful Bristol Dignity For Asylum Seekers group.

St Annes Church, St Leonards Road, Easton/ Greenbank, Bristol. (A lovely cosy church with gorgeous acoustics)

Suggested donation £5, (but no one turned away for lack of funds)

Featuring ....
Moss and the Iranian band - gentle songs and rhythms, winging their way from Iran to Englistan.

The Island Folk choir https://www.facebook.com/groups/theislandfolkchoir/ - a shake down of both traditional and contemporary songs, giving them bold and ingenious harmonies, arranged by the super-talented Polly Wilde. Mainly British folk, with some songs and inspirations from further afield. It will definitely beautiful!

Cuperlica -
A duo playing sounds and rhythms from across the Balkans, all the way to the Middle East. With soaring clarinet melodies and fast syncopated guitar and percussion, they play a stormy mixture of traditional and original songswhichwill take you on a journey to far away lands...... you may even feel the urge to dance.... if you can keep time!!


A BIG VEGETARIAN SOUP WILL BE PROVIDED, PLEASE BRING OTHER FOOD TO SHARE (bread, homous, cheese, deserts, other dishes....) so we can feast joyfully together!

And bring your dancing shoes!!!

ALL WELCOME!

Home Office Refuses to End Signing at Patchway

Dear Supporters,

On Tuesday of this week, the Home Office met with representatives of Bristol Refugee Rights, Bristol Signing Support, Borderlands, local MPs' offices and the police commissioners' team. They were presented with our 1000 strong campaign petition to reduce signing frequency for migrants and bring signing back into town where people can access it more easily.

Despite this demonstration of overwhelming support the Home Office refused to end signing at Patchway. This shows an ongoing lack of respect for the people who have to travel so far to sign and a disregard for the community and civil servants who have shown a lot of concern for signers. We are outraged by this lack of accountability to the public from a government office. Sadly this reflects what we have seen in the past with regard to their decision making process on people's asylum applications.

However, the Home Office was forced to concede two things as a result of all the pressure: signing for families will be reduced to every six months, and people in education will be able to request to sign out of term time only. The Home Office has agreed to review the move to Patchway again after another three months.

For families and students, these changes will be significant. However, people who are destitute are still having to get themselves to Patchway with no money. Even those who are entitled to support with travel expenses are still having to apply for it.

People are still having to sign weekly, fortnightly or monthly at great cost to their emotional health and with no reasonable justification as to why they should have to sign so often. People are still at risk of being detained despite having committed no crime.

This is why we must continue to be organised. These two concessions happened because we were organised. We came together, people signing and their allies. We believed it was worth naming this injustice and demanding change. We organised events, petitions, speakers, trained ourselves to speak to the media and got good coverage; we tweeted and blogged on social media, getting support from across the country, and momentum grew. The Home Office was forced to defend its decision publicly and had to make some concessions. Many more people know about the signing regime as a result of this campaign. We celebrate this.

Imagine what more could happen if we were louder and stronger....

We will be reconvening soon to work out our next movements in this campaign and how we can continue to fight for justice for all migrants. If you would like to get more involved in the next stage of our campaigning please email us on asylumisnotacrime@mail.com

From all at Dignity Group