A fortnightly resource for anti-racist and social justice campaigns, highlighting key events in the UK and Europe.

Asylum & migration

26 June: The Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) for Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre (IRC) publishes its Annual Report, which finds the centre still needs improvement. Download it here. (Bedford Today, 28 June 2017)

28 June: The IMB for Tinsley House IRC publishes its Annual Report, download it here.

28 June: The IMB for the Port of Dover publishes its first Annual Report, download it here.

28 June: The UK Upper Tribunal rules that no one should be returned to Libya since the level of violence in Libya is too high. (Free Movement, 3 July 2017)

29 June: Ten immigration detainees launch a legal challenge to ‘slave pay’ of £1 per hour for menial work at IRCs. (Guardian, 28 June 2017)

30 June: Campaigners criticise the sponsorship of London Pride by Virgin Atlantic (among other airlines) because of the company’s involvement in the deportation of LGBT asylum seekers. (Morning Star, 30 June 2017)

July: HM Chief Inspector of Prisons launches a consultation on ‘Expectations for Immigration Detention’, view the document here. The consultation closes on 24 July 2017.

4 July: The Bar Standards Council publishes new guidance for the public and for professionals on immigration and asylum related legal issues, view it here.

4 July: Representatives of NGO search and rescue missions react furiously to the Italian government’s proposal to introduce a code of conduct which, if approved, would bring NGOs under the control of the Libyan and Italian coastguards. (Guardian, 4 July 2017)

4 July: The Hungarian government is reportedly testing an electrified ‘smart fence’ on its border with Serbia that will alert the police every time someone touches it. NGOs say that the fence violates European human rights agreements. (Balkan Insight, 4 July 2017)

5 July: The Austrian defence minister confirms that 750 troops are on standby as four armoured vehicles are sent to the Tyrol to stop migrants crossing its border with Italy. (Guardian, 5 July 2017)

5 July: Survivors of the Grenfell Tower fire, lawyers and others condemn the Home Office’s limited ‘amnesty’ which includes a ‘good character’ clause and will last for only a year, after which survivors may be deported. (Home Office, Independent, 5 July 2017)

5 July: The inquest into the death on 1 April of 17-year-old Mohammed Hassan, an Iraqi asylum seeker, who died after being crushed under a lorry in which he had been hiding, records a verdict of accidental death; the coroner is critical of how Home Office officials in Calais and Dunkirk deal with vulnerable child refugees. (Guardian, 5 July 2017)

6 July: The first annual report from the independent monitoring board covering charter flight deportations finds that aspects of forced deportations fall short in providing basic dignity. Download the report here (pdf file, 832kb). (Guardian, 6 July 2017)

6 July: In evidence to the jobs committee of the Irish Senate, the International Transport Federation says that the government’s permit scheme for migrant workers has ‘legalised slavery’ and permits are no better than ‘dog licences’. The Migrant Rights Centre calls for an immediate review of the scheme, saying it is witnessing ‘gross forms of exploitation’. (Guardian, 6 July 2017)

7 July: Over 2,000 refugees living on the streets of Paris are moved to temporary shelters and school gymnasiums in the 34^th police evacuation of refugees in Paris since 2015. Aid workers are now calling for a long-term strategy for helping these refugees. (Guardian, 7 July 2017)

7 July: HM Chief Inspector of Prisons publishes: Detainees under escort: Inspection of escort and removals to Jamaica, download the report here.

7 July: Undocumented migrant street sellers in Barcelona launch their own fashion label, Top Manta, to replace the fake brands previously sold. (Guardian, 8 July 2017)

7 July: Over 2,000 refugees living on the streets of Paris have been moved to temporary shelters and school gymnasiums. This is the 34^th police evacuation of refugees in Paris since 2015. Aid workers call for a long-term strategy for helping these refugees. (Guardian, 7 July 2017)

7 July: A group of about 12 activists from the identitaire group Ligue du Midi ransack a charity in Montpellier which works with unaccompanied minor refugees; stealing files and breaking crockery whilst shouting ‘No subsidies to finance the invasion’. (LCI, 7 July 2017)

8 July: Refugee Rescue criticises the actions of the Hellenic Coast Guard and Frontex for demanding that rescue vessels give 24 hours notice before launching a rescue mission or face a fine. (Refugee Rescue, 8 July 2017)

10 July: Refugee Action publishes: Slipping through the cracks: how Britain’s asylum support system fails the most vulnerable, download it here. The research finds that the Home Office is missing its own targets in providing financial support and as a result, many people are left homeless and destitute. (24Housing, 10 July 2017)

12 July: A cross-party House of Lords inquiry concludes that the tactics used by the EU’s naval mission, Operation Sophia to disrupt the business of people smuggling in the Mediterranean has resulted in more deaths, with the policy of destroying smugglers’ boats leading to refugees being sent to  sea on more unseaworthy vessels. (Guardian, 12 July 2017)

Violence and harassment: attacks on people 

27 June: Police appeal for information after a man was racially abused and then attacked as he sat in his van outside a polling station in Chorlton on 8 June. (Manchester Evening News, 27 June 2017)

29 June: A migrant worker in Menidi, Greece, is stabbed by three fascists on his way to work. Mohammed Avzel, 46, is chased and stabbed in the leg before bystanders intervene. (AYS, 30 June 2017)

29 June: Police release a picture of a man wanted in connection with an attack on a Southampton taxi driver who was racially abused and punched repeatedly by a passenger on 15 June. (Daily Echo, 29 June 2017)

30 June: Police appeal or information after an 18-year-old man suffered broken ribs after being racially abused and attacked by a gang of men in Telford on 16 June. (Shropshire Live, 30 June 2017)

30 June: A man suffers serious injuries and is hospitalised after being punched in a racist attack in Rochdale. Jonathan Taylor, 32, is later charged with assault and a racially aggravated public order offence. (Manchester Evening News, 3 July 2017)

30 June: A man is arrested in Paris for driving his car into a crowd of people in front of a mosque in the suburb of Creteil, claiming the Bataclan and Champs-Elysees attacks as motivation. No-one is injured. (Telegraph, 30 June 2017)

2 July: Police appeal for information after two men were attacked on 16 May in Chadwell St Mary. The pair were racially abused and had glasses thrown at them. (Clacton and Frinton Gazette, 2 July 2017)

2 July: A man is racially abused and then punched in the face as he walks near Southern Cemetery in Chorlton. (Manchester Evening News, 5 July 2017)

4 July: A spate of acid attacks on Muslims in London is reported. The most recent occurred on 29 June, when a man driving along Commercial Road had his car stolen by men who squirted something at him. (Independent, 4 July 2017)

4 July: A man in his 40s or 50s sets his dog on a mother and her two children and then racially abuses them in the Hartcliffe area of Bristol. (Avon & Somerset Police, 5 July 2017)

4 July: A group of three friends are racially abused by a man on a bike and then one is knocked unconscious with a bike lock in a ‘shocking’ racist attack in Bristol city centre. (Bristol 247, 10 July 2017)

Violence and harassment: attacks on property

28 June: Racist graffiti appear in Watford High Street, reading ‘go home foriners’ (sic) and ‘should of (sic) voted UKIP go home’. (This is Local London, 28 June 2017)

28 June: Police appeal for information after a swastika is daubed on an underpass in Sheldon. (Birmingham Mail, 28 June 2917)

29 June: Police appeal for witnesses after a Belfast takeaway has its shutters and a car belonging to the restaurant daubed with racist graffiti including the words ‘go home’ painted on the vehicle. (Newsletter, 29 June 2017)

4 July: Isatta Kallon, 49, is left in fear after a leaflet declaring the area a ‘White Zone’ is placed on her car in Torquay. The leaflet appears to be produced by the banned National Action. (Plymouth Herald, 4 July 2017)

8 July: Racist graffiti is painted on a wall in a Hull car park in the city centre; a Union flag, a Saint George’s Cross and the words ‘We ‘R’ UK not EU. Say no to all migrants’ is daubed on the wall. (Hull Daily Mail, 8 July 2017)

Violence and harassment: abuse

26 June: British Transport Police appeal for information after two incidents of racial abuse at Bognor Regis train station on 26 April and 15 May. (Bognor Regis Observer, 26 June 2017)

26 June: Police appeal for information after a taxi driver is subjected to prolonged racial abuse by two men he collected from a Hertford cocktail bar. (Hertfordshire Mercury, 26 June 2017)

28 June: Police appeal for information after a group of people returning home from mosque are racially abused and the car they are travelling in is pushed and rocked outside the Old Chestnut pub in Earlswood. (Surrey Mirror, 28 June 2017)

2 July: Marchers at an Orange Order Parade through Glasgow are heard singing the famine song, which has been ruled racist by the Scottish Justiciary Appeal Court. (CommonSpace, 4 July 2017)

1 July: A couple travelling on a train in north Lanarkshire are racially abused by a group of men. (Glasgow Live, 11 July 2017)

3 July: NI police appeal for information after a series of racist incidents in south Armagh, the most recent on 17 June. (Armaghi, 3 July 2017)

5 July: Police appeal for information on a man wanted in connection with racial abuse and threats of violence outside a Primark in Plymouth. (DevonLive, 5 July 2017)

7 July: A man and his two children are racially abused as they stand outside a school in Redditch by a man passing in a car. (Redditch Standard, 7 July 2017)

8 July: Three sisters travelling on a train between Kings Norton and Redditch are racially abused by a man and threatened with his dog. (Birmingham Mail, 12 July 2017)

8 July: A 38-year-old Asian woman is racially abused, threatened and then followed by a white man in his mid-40s in Broughty Ferry, Dundee. (STV, 10 July 2017)

10 July: Police begin an investigation into allegations that a 14-year-old Asian girl was racially abused outside Priestnall School in Heaton Mersey, Stockport; video of the incident appeared online and the mother of the girl has withdrawn her from the school. (Manchester Evening News, 10 July 2017)

10 July: Nottingham police release pictures of three people wanted in connection with the racially and religiously motivated abuse of a Rushden shopkeeper on 2 June. (Northants Telegraph, 10 July 2017)

10 July: Northumbria Police release pictures of man wanted in connection with a racist attack on a woman in Hendon, Sunderland who was racially abused and threatened on 19 June. (ITV, 10 July 2017)

Violence and harassment: attacks on religious institutions

30 June: Finsbury Park mosque reports receiving deaths threats in racist hate mail in the aftermath of the Finsbury Park attack. (This is Local London, 30 June 2017)

3 July: The windows of the Masjid Umar Mosque and Islamic Centre in Radford, Nottingham, are broken; a 49-year-old man is later arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated criminal damage. (Notts TV, 4 July 2017)

8 July: A man racially abuses worshippers at a mosque in Bow telling them to ‘f**k off and go home’ when they deny him entry to the mosque because he is drunk. (The Sun, 9 July 2017)

Violence and harassment: online racism

30 June: Conservative Party councillor Rosemary Carroll is suspended by her party pending an investigation for sharing a racist joke on Facebook. The joke ‘compared an Asian person to a dog’. (BBC News, 30 June 2017)

Violence and harassment: charges

2 July: Jamie Mullins, 27, and Mathew Sarsfield, 30, are charged with racially aggravated pubic order offences after pork was smeared over the door of Al-Quba Masjid mosque in Sherwood. (Chad, 1 July 2017)

3 July: Jack Renshaw is charged with two counts of threatening/abusive/insulting words or behaviour in relation to comments made at an event in Yorkshire in February 2016 and Blackpool in March 2016, and comments made on social media. (Blackpool Gazette, 4 July 2017)

7 July: Craig Melville a SNP councillor and former aide to an SNP MP is ordered to stand trial in October after being accused of threatening and abusing a Muslim activist. (Scotsman, 7 July 2017)

8 July: Worcester man Ian James is arrested and charged with one count of possessing a prohibited weapon, two counts of racially or religiously aggravated harassment and one count of using threatening or abusive words/behaviour/disorderly behaviour likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress after being arrested at a local hotel. (Evesham Observer, 10 July 2017)

9 July: John Tomlin hands himself in to police and is later charged with GBH with intent in connection with an acid attack on Resham Khan and her cousin Jameel Muhktar, in Beckton, east London on 21 June. (Guardian, 10 July 2017)

11 July: An unnamed 18-year-old woman is arrested in Middlesbrough in connection with two racially motivated public order incidents and for failing to comply with a dispersal notice. (Northern Echo, 11 July 2017)

Violence and harassment: convictions

23 June: Benjamin Richard Doggrell, 21, pleads guilty to threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour and is fined £150 plus compensation, victim surcharge and costs. (Somerset Live, 27 June 2017)

27 June: Daniel Skelton, 29, is jailed for 28 months after admitting racially aggravated grievous bodily harm on Swansea City FC official photographer, Dimitris Legakis, who had his arms broken in the attack last year. (Gazette Live, 27 June 2017)

28 June: John Taylor, 60, pleads guilty to threats to kill and sending a threatening communication after making threats in a phone call on 22 May, the day after the Manchester Arena bombing. He is given a three-year conditional discharge and fined £300, with victim surcharge and costs. (Lynne News, 29 June 2017)

28 June: Christopher Gragan, 55, is jailed for five months after being found guilty of causing racially aggravated alarm and harassment and distress to a 24-year-old pregnant woman in a Brighton pub on 23 April last year. (Brighton & Hove News, 28 June 2017)

28 June: Brian Watson pleads guilty to acting aggressively towards a Wishaw shopkeeper, repeatedly refusing to leave his shop and making threatening and racial remarks towards him, and is ordered to perform 180 hours’ of unpaid work. (Daily Record, 5 July 2017)

29 June: Callum O’Brien, 20, is jailed for 16 weeks after pleading guilty to racially aggravated assault on a Sikh couple in Peterborough. He racially abused them and knocked the man onto the floor. (Peterborough Today, 3 July 2017)

30 June: Alex Chivers, 36, admits racially aggravated assault in Enfield on a teenage Muslim girl whom he slapped in the face with bacon, saying ‘you deserve this’. He is sentenced to 38 weeks in custody. (Metro, 30 June 2017)

30 June: A man with 27 previous convictions avoids prison after pleading guilty to racially aggravated harassment and racially aggravated assault on a police officer; he receives a 12-week jail sentence, suspended for 12 months and is ordered to attend 15 days of Rehabilitation Activity. (Plymouth Herald, 30 June 2017)

30 June: Robert Anderson, 27, who filmed himself racially abusing Celtic player Scott Sinclair on 21 May, is ordered by Glasgow Sheriff Court to carry out 250 hours of unpaid work after admitting threatening or abusive behaviourr. (STV, 30 June 2017)

1 July: Karen O’Malley, 48, is jailed for 12 weeks after pleading guilty to racially aggravated harassment of a Tesco shop worker in Leigh and a police officer who came to deal with her. (Leigh Observer, 1 July 2017)

3 July: Hull man Michael Puplett, 59, is fined £120 with costs, for racially aggravated threatening, abusive or insulting words. (Hull Daily Mail, 3 July 2017)

3 July: Peter Scotter, 56, is jailed for 15 months after ripping the niqab off a woman in Sunderland a few weeks after the Brexit vote and abusing her. (Guardian, 3 July 2017)

3 July: Jade Whitworth, 15, is banned from Rochdale town centre for racially abusing taxi drivers and assaulting police officers. (Manchester Evening News, 7 July 2017)

3 July: Debra Wright, 38, pleads guilty to using racially aggravated threatening behaviour after shouting ‘f*** off you Muslim c***’ in Bath town centre and is fined £135, with victim surcharge. (Bath Chronicle, 3 July 2017)

4 July: Gordon Brodie is jailed for two months for breaching an injunction banning him from Beverley Road in Tilehurst after he carried out a five-month campaign of racist abuse. (Reading Chronicle, 4 July 2017)

4 July: Philip Eastwood is given a 12-month community order after pleading guilty to racially aggravated threatening behaviour to his Ipswich neighbour. (Ipswich Star, 4 July 2017)

6 July: Somerset man, Matthew Lord, 48, is jailed for 18 weeks for racially aggravated threatening behaviour and assault. (Weston Mercury, 6 July 2017)

7 July: Paul Thorhill, 49, is jailed for eight weeks and ordered to pay £100 compensation to his victims who were racially abused in York; one man was called a ‘foreign b*****d’ and told ‘you don’t belong here, go back to your own country’. (York Press, 8 July 2017)

11 July: The 4th Viscount St Davids, Rhodri Philipps, is found guilty of two counts of sending menacing material via a public communication network after calling anti-Brexit campaigner, Gina Miller a ‘boat jumper’ and saying that she should be run over. (Guardian, 11 July 2017)

12 July: Stephen Lawrence: 47, is sentenced to 15 weeks and ordered to pay £115 costs after displaying racially aggravated writing, sign or other visible representation which was threatening, abusive or insulting at the London Colney Islamic Centre, with intent to cause harassment, alarm or distress, on 4 June. (Herts Advertiser, 12 July 2017)

12 July: Neil Hotchkiss admits two religiously aggravated public order charges in an incident caught on film. Hotchkiss is ordered to pay two lots of £50 compensation, an £85 victim surcharge and £180 costs. He is also given a 12 month community order and must wear an electronic monitoring tag until October. (Worcester News, 12 July 2017)

12 July: Sarah Jane McCullion, a 35 year old Blackburn woman, pleads guilty to racially aggravated threatening behaviour. She is fined £120 with £85 costs and £35 victim surcharge. (Lancashire Telegraph, 12 July 2017)

Violence and harassment: research and statistics

28 June: ChildLine call centres in Glasgow and Aberdeen receive almost double the usual number of calls about race and faith-based bullying, following the Westminster attack. (Scotsman, 28 June 2017)

2 July: Fifty places of worship apply for funding to protect them against racist attacks in a funding stream which opened on 3 April. (Independent, 2 July 2017)

3 July: The Centre for Hate Studies at the University of Leicester publishes a report commissioned by Amnesty International: Hate Crime: Identifying and Dismantling Barriers to Justice, download the report here.

7 July: The Independent reports on statistics obtained under Freedom of Information requests on religious and racially motivated hate crime, with recorded crimes soaring at an unprecedented rate since Brexit. (Independent, 7 July 2017)

Policing and criminal justice

June: The Journal of the European Group for the Study of Deviance and Social Control calls for papers for a special edition on: ‘Minorities, Crime and (In)justice,’ view the call here (pdf file, 60kb).

29 June: The National Audit Office publishes Mental health in prisons, download the report here.

29 June: Cuts to the legal aid budget have denied justice to the most vulnerable in society, according to new research. Download the report Access Denied? LASPO four years on: a Law Society review here. (Law Society, 29 June 2017)

29 June: New research from the Criminal Justice Alliance (CJA) finds that young people believe that stop and search is not used fairly. Read the report, No respect: Young BAME men, the police and stop and search, here . (Guardian, 29 June 2017)

2 July: Home secretary Amber Rudd is accused of sitting on a critical report into deaths in police custody. (Guardian, 2 July 2017)

3 July: The family of Habib ‘Paps’ Ullah mark the ninth anniversary of his death on 3 July after a police stop and search in High Wycombe; they have also launched a civil claim again Thames Valley Police. (Buck Free Press, 3, 4 July 2017)

4 July: New research from the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research finds that black people are twice as likely to be searched by police in Scotland than whites, and Travellers and Gypsies are five times more likely to be searched. (Herald, 4 July 2017)

4 July: Neville Lawrence, the father of Stephen Lawrence, agrees to chair a Met police community reference group holding the police to account over knife crime and their relationship with London’s communities. (Guardian, 4 July 2017)

4 July: The inquest into the death of 32-year-old Sarah Reed, who suffered mental health problems and died in Holloway prison, is told that her supervision was reduced and she was unable to access her anti-psychotic medication. (Guardian, 4 July 2017)

5 July: The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) publishes its investigation into the police handling of the racist murder of Bijan Ebrahimi, an Iranian refugee who died after being set alight in Bristol in July 2013. It finds that Avon & Somerset Police systematically discriminated against Ebrahimi, who was ‘failed completely’. Download the report and other documents here. (Bristol Post, 5 July 2017)

6 July: The IPCC publishes a Follow-up review on police handling of allegations of discrimination, download it here (pdf file, 350kb).

6 July: The first of three specialist separation prisoners’ units, dubbed ‘jihadi jails’, has been opened at HMP Frankland, near Durham. Isolation units for Islamist extremist prisoners was a key recommendation of the Acheson review, with the three units (also at Long Lartin, Worcestershire and Full Sutton, near York) expected to hold up to 28 prisoners. (Guardian, 6 July 2017)

7 July: The funeral takes place of Leroy ‘Junior’ Medford, who died in hospital after becoming unconscious in Loddon Valley Police station. (ITV, 8 July 2017)

10 July: PC Claire Boddie is charged with the common assault of Judah Adunbi in January 2017 after an incident in which the 63-year-old race relations advisor was tasered by two Bristol police officers. (Bristol Post, 11 July 2017)

13 July: The Prisons & Probation Ombudsman has publishes its Annual Report 2016-17, download it here (pdf file, 2.2mb).

Education 

3 July: Researchers find that teachers and college staff are concerned about the increased stigmatisation of Muslim students resulting from the Prevent duty. What the Prevent duty means for schools and colleges in England: An analysis of educationalists’ experiences can be downloaded here. (BBC News, 3 July 2017)

6 July: The Runnymede Trust and NASUWT publish a report by Dr Zubaida Haque, Visible Minorities, Invisible Teachers BME Teachers in the Education System in England, download it here.

6 July: Holyrood’s Equalities and Human Rights Committee finds racist and anti-gay bullying is on the rise in Scotland. Download the report, It is not Cool to be Cruel: Prejudice-based bullying and harassment of children and young people in schools here (pdf file, 11.8mb). (Herald, 6 July 2017)

Far Right

27 June: The Polish interior minister sacks the commander of police in Radon after far-right protesters attack an anti-government protest. (Associated Press, 27 June 2017)

28 June: Kenyan novelist Ngugi wa Thiong’o withdraws from the Gothenburg Book Fair in solidarity with 200 Swedish authors protesting the presence of the newspaper Nya Tider, connected to the far-Right Nordic Resistance Movement. A further twelve European national cultural institutions write to the festival organisers urging them to rethink. (The Local, 28 June 2017)

3 July: A 23-year-old man is charged with terror offences for an alleged plot to assassinate President Macron. A self-styled ‘nationalist’, he went online saying he wanted to commit an attack (his other favoured targets are ‘black, Arabs, Jews and homosexuals’), and applauded the actions of Anders Breivik who killed 77 people in Norway in 2011. (The Local, 3 July 2017)

5 July: It is reported that Tommy Robinson, aka Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, met with members of Manchester’s Jewish community in Prestwich and gave a speech outlining his views on Islam. (Independent, 5 July 2017

6 July: Marian Lukasik, a Britain First supporter living in Enfield, is filmed at a Birmingham rally calling for Angela Merkel to be shot because she has allowed Muslim refugees to settle in Europe. (Guardian, 6 July 2017)

10 July: It is revealed that Britain First carried out a security training day, including knife defence and martial arts, at a leisure centre in Erith, Kent. (This is Local London, 10 July 2017)

Party politics

2 July: It is reported that Ukip has received an influx of new members in an apparent attempt to bolster the leadership hopes of Anne Marie Waters, a leadership candidate who has been criticised for her stance on Islam. (Guardian, 2 July 2017)

8 July: At a press conference at the G20 Summit in Hamburg, French president Emmanuel Macron is  asked why there is no Marshall Plan for Africa and replies  that Africa has ‘civilisational ‘problems with development hampered by the fact that  in some countries they ‘still have seven to eight children per woman’. (Independent, 11 July 2017)

Discrimination

5 July: The closing date for responses to the consultation: ‘Caste in Great Britain and equality law: a public consultation‘ has been extended to 18 September 2017. See further details here.

Employment

7 July: Martin Gutaj, 44, is jailed for 14 months after being found guilty of health and safety breaches on two counts of corporate manslaughter after two Polish workers, Tomasz Procko, 22, and Karol Symanski, 29, were killed after a balcony collapsed in central London. The now-defunct company was fined £1.2m. (BBC News, 7 July 2017)

Media

12 July: A protest is held outside the AGM of Marks and Spencer in protest at its policy of advertising in the Daily Mail. Read a letter about the campaign here. (Global Justice, 12 July 2017)