NEWS RELEASE
From the office of the Green MEPs

Photocall… Photocall… Photocall… Photocall… Photocall

10 February, 2004

EURO-MP ‘ROUGHS IT’ IN SLEEP-OUT ASYLUM PROTEST

Event: Green MEP ‘sleeps rough’ in Trafalgar Square Asylum protest
Place: Trafalgar Square, London
Time: Wednesday, February 11th, 7pm onwards

LONDON’S Green Party Euro-MP Jean Lambert will experience the daily reality of a destitute asylum seeker tomorrow when she ‘sleeps rough’ in Trafalgar Square to draw attention to the human cost of the Government’s Asylum and Immigration Bill.

"Asylum seekers are being forced into destitution by a Government whose policy is taken straight from the editorial columns of the right-wing press,” said Mrs Lambert, also a member of the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee.

"The UK must honour its international legal - not to mention moral - obligations to provide sanctuary to those seeking refuge from tyranny and persecution, not try to deter refugees with detention and draconian attempts to drive them into poverty.”

 


Mrs Lambert will be joining London’s Deputy Mayor Jenny Jones, asylum seekers, and campaigners in Trafalgar Square for the ‘sleep-out’, which has been organised by the Coalition Against the Destitution of Asylum Seekers.

The Coalition brings together refugee, homelessness, and anti-racism organisations.

The Asylum and Immigration Bill, which is due to receive its third reading at the House of Commons in March, has been widely condemned by human rights and refugee advocacy organisations, including Amnesty International.

If passed unamended, it will give the Home Office the right to refuse support to asylum applicants who fail to register their claim within 72 hours of arrival in Britain. Campaigners fear the measure will sends legitimate asylum seekers onto the streets, simply due to lack of awareness.

"I am doing this for one night out of choice to draw attention to the plight of the thousands who do not have that luxury and are being forced to sleep out every night,” added Mrs Lambert.

ENDS

For more information please contact Ben Duncan on 020 7407 6280, 07973 823358 or at press@greenmeps.org.uk