Back campaign for Bicester refugees - "Don't vote Nazi" won't stop local

Submitted by Anon on 22 April, 2003 - 3:29

By Mark Sandell

In Spring 2002, Bicester was earmarked as one of the proposed sites in a pilot scheme to house asylum seekers in Accommodation Centres. The Bicester Centre will house 750 asylum seekers in a rural area about four miles outside the town, adjacent to a military base and a prison. Residents will be expected to remain in the centre and to participate in "structured activities". They will stay there until their applications for asylum have been processed. They will not be allowed to work and will be expected to live on a welfare payment set far below standard benefit levels.
Bicester Action Group (BAG) was formed by villagers living close to the proposed site. They put posters up in Bicester warning the town of increased crime, a threat to our culture and a drop in house prices if the centre went ahead. The British National Party and National Front, riding on the xenophobia encouraged by BAG, began campaigning locally.

The siting of the Bicester Centre in a rural area is against the Home Office guidelines for these centres, especially as it is near an MOD military training site with gun fire a regular occurrence.

The Government are calling this camp a "trial", but as the current public enquiry have made clear, whatever the results of the trial the centre will stay in Bicester.
Stopping the Bicester Camp is a task of national importance for the left. With this "camp" the Government are taking one step closer to internment for all refugees demanded by the Tories.

Bicester Refugee Support have linked up with the Campaign against the Campsfield Detention Centre near Oxford and turned to the local trade union movement for support. They have held regular stalls in Bicester and lobbied the public enquiry.

However the reaction of the left in the area has been divided. Many socialists have done all they can to support Bicester Refugee Support. Actions and meetings are planned with the support of Oxford and District TUC.

But the SWP have approached the issue as an opening for their front organisation, the Anti-Nazi League. Without approaching other anti-racist campaigns, they organised a meeting in Oxford to launch an Oxford ANL. The SWP's approach at the meeting was that the NF and BNP must be exposed as Nazis and that was the key issue. Soft racists like those who set up the racist anti-asylum BAG, supported by the local Tory MP, would be welcome in the ANL, and if they could only be split from the Nazis the ANL's job would be done.

In the run up to local elections, with the NF stating they would stand in Bicester, the ANL (SWP) organised a meeting in Bicester and a speaker from the Bicester Refugee Support Group was invited. She did not want to be advertised as a platform speaker, yet was on the leaflets. When she protested about this she was told that people had to stop sitting on their arses and do something about the Nazis.

A "don't vote Nazi" campaign in Bicester is not the answer. This can only mean voting for the vile racist local Tories "to keep the Nazis out", while leaving the vital issue of fighting anti-asylum seeker racism on the sidelines. The SWP's behaviour also shows a disgusting disregard for a brave local campaign that has taken up the challenge of anti-asylum seeker racism.

  • Get your union to affiliate to Bicester Refugee Support and look at their website for up coming events. Bicester Refugee Support, PO Box 231, Bicester. OX26 6ZN
  • Bicester Refugee Support website: www.bicesterrefugeesupport.org.uk

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