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Alistair McConnachie

De-Fund the Immigration Industry


The UK Government has to stop giving our taxpayers' money to those people and organisations who are promoting open borders and working against a restrictionist immigration and asylum policy. We show how!


We expect that a Labour government, or a Conservative government, elected at the General Election on 4 July 2024, is unlikely to enact the policy we suggest here. Rather, we set out this policy for the benefit of those who are working to build a patriotic orthodoxy for the future.



It was announced on 23 May 2024 that over 1.2 million long-term immigrants entered the UK in 2023.

 

These numbers are incredible, and it's happening for a reason. We're paying for it!

 

This level of mass immigration into the UK is upheld by a complicit political class – across all the mainstream parties – who use our British Taxpayers money to fund a legion of Legal Firms, and pro-immigration Charities and NGOs, most of whom have a selfish financial interest, and/or an ideological interest in maintaining these extraordinary flows of people.

 

A UK Government which is serious about restricting immigration and asylum must set up a group to discover which Charities and NGOs are in receipt of its funding, and which ones are using that funding to oppose its restrictionist policy. It must then de-fund these groups of taxpayers' money immediately.

 

These groups will be big (Appendix 1), and these groups will be smaller (Appendix 2) but that's the long and the short of it.

 

We cannot hope to reduce the numbers if we are paying millions of pounds of taxpayers' money to people and organisations who advocate for these numbers to continue.

 

3 DE-FUNDING POLICIES

Any Parliament serious about stopping the flow of legal and illegal immigrants and "asylum" seekers into the UK, needs to:

 

1. Change the laws which justify the flow – which requires upsetting the entire UK legal profession which has become heavily reliant upon things like the "European Convention on Human Rights". That's the hard part because it involves a "revolution" of the political mind, but it has to come. We looked at that here, when we said:

 

To call into question, let alone up-end, the UN Refugee Convention and European Convention on Human Rights is a direct attack on the globalist, internationalist order which was established after WW2 in the West.

 

Both of these Conventions are central to the post-WW2 international settlement. They are of a piece with the entire post-WW2 settlement under which the modern West is constructed.

 

To throw them off will be a revolutionary act which may not occur until other societal changes converge to overturn that "settlement".

 

That's why some people get so shocked and angry. It is equivalent to saying – "the circumstances in which the modern world was created after WW2 no longer apply. We must now forge a new direction." 

 

But the good news is that more and more people are questioning how we got into this situation, and why our world is the way it is.

 

2. De-fund the very lucrative legal profession which uses British Taxpayers' money – through the receipt of Legal Aid – to campaign to defend and maintain current levels of mass immigration and asylum. Legal Aid should simply not be available for immigration or asylum matters. And it should only be available for British Citizens anyway!

 

3. Identify and de-fund the Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and Charities which are receiving British Taxpayers' money to maintain the flow – and often arguing for more – and whose behaviour amounts, in effect, to a form of people trafficking.

 

OUR DE-FUNDING of NGOs and CHARITIES POLICY

There should be this Policy:

 

Your group may be serving a certain purpose in, for example, helping some people with some temporary assistance to integrate locally, which may or may not be part of your core mission statement. However, the redline is when your group has – or you move your group to adopt – a political agenda which promotes more immigration and asylum, and/or actively campaigns against a restrictionist government policy on these matters; such as, but not limited to, campaigning in any manner for more immigration and asylum, and resisting deportation. If your group, charity, or NGO is in receipt of government funding and you are engaging in this activity then you shall be defunded entirely of such taxpayers' money with immediate effect.

 

This is not even controversial!

 

From the perspective of the government, it makes no sense for it to fund those groups which actively oppose its policies!

 

From the perspective of the group in question, it should not imagine it can bite the hand that feeds it without consequences!

 

HOW IT WOULD WORK

If such a group wants to continue to help immigrants in its community – and avoid being de-funded – then it will need to keep its corporate mouth shut and it must not do anything which activity opposes government policy on this matter.

 

In all likelihood, we will find that many of them will choose to keep their corporate mouths shut, and their heads down!

 

It will also help them to remember that the government could simply choose to de-fund all Charities and NGOs which deal with immigration, asylum and migrant issues, regardless of whether the organisations oppose government policy – and some people might prefer that approach! Therefore, such organisations have good reasons to tread carefully and go along with the new law.


If they do not do this, however, and find themselves de-funded of government money, then – if they want to continue to raise funds to support a pro-immigration, pro-asylum agenda – they will be free to do so from their own supporters, or from those members of the public that they can convince. And we can sit back and see how far they get with that!


As an example, in Appendix 2 we've listed 68 groups which have spoken out against government policy in this way, and to whom the above should (ideally) apply immediately!

 

IT MUST be a UK-WIDE LAW

This law must also be UK-wide, and it must cover those groups which might be funded by devolved administrations – otherwise the devolved administrations will do everything they can to get round it.

 

Instead of sticking plaster policies like Rwanda, we need to start de-funding the people and organisations who work to keep the flow running.

 

After all, we can't mop the floor until we turn off the tap.

 

Going forward, we need politicians who have the moral stamina to enjoin this fight for the survival of Britain as a coherent nation.


Letter in The Sunday Times, possibly on 19-3-23.


APPENDIX 1 – Example Paul Hamlyn Foundation

On 31 May 2023, the Daily Telegraph revealed that the pro-immigration Paul Hamlyn Foundation, which has a total worth of £900 million has been given £1.36m in government grants (our Taxpayers' Money) since 2020.

 

Here's the full article, which makes it clear that it doesn't need a penny of our money!

 

(Article begins>

Left-wing Paul Hamlyn Foundation has received government grants since 2020, according to Charity Commission accounts

Steven Edginton, The Daily Telegraph, 31 May 2023.

 

The Government is funding a pro-migration advocacy group that believes UK borders are "systemically racist", The Telegraph can disclose.

 

Charity Commission accounts show that the Paul Hamlyn Foundation (PHF), a Left-wing charity, received £1.36 million in government grants since 2020.

 

In that time, the foundation has given grant money to campaign groups such as Hope Not Hate, which has claimed that "government rhetoric around immigration is moving more and more in line with the extreme anti-migrant views of the far Right".

 

Other groups that received the money include Stop Funding Hate, which led an unsuccessful advertiser boycott campaign against GB News in 2021, and Detention Action, which is currently pursuing a court case against the Government's Rwanda deportation plan.

 

'A stain on our collective moral conscience'

The PHF was established in 1987 to support "general charitable purposes", including literacy programmes in Mexico and performances at the Royal Opera House.

 

Lord Hamlyn of Edgeworth, its eponymous founder, made his fortune as a book publisher and, upon his death in 2001, donated much of his wealth to the foundation.

 

The endowment fund created by this gift remains the main source of funding for projects that the foundation supports, and in 2022 had a total worth of almost £900 million.

 

The PHF also receives support from government grants, which it uses as part of its Act for Change fund.

 

This money is used to support campaigns such as the Kent Refugee Action Network, which has described the Government's approach to refugees as "a stain on our collective moral conscience", and the Phoenix Education Trust which helps teachers and pupils focus on "anti-racist culture creation & decolonising in school".

 

No 10 'Stokes Far-Right Anti-Migrant Activity'

Moira Sinclair, the PHF's chief executive, is also the current chairman of the Mayor of London's Cultural Leadership Board. Leticia Ishibashi, the PHF's head of migration, worked with Sadiq Khan and the Greater London Authority to provide greater services for London's migrant communities.

 

The PHF believes that the current immigration system has its "roots in colonial enterprise and racially hierarchical worldviews", and is "increasingly militarised, systemically racist and discriminatory against women and other groups… [and] shaped by populist narratives".

 

It has accused Number 10 of "stoking far-Right, anti-migrant activity" through its new Illegal Migration Bill, which is aimed at stopping small boats from crossing the Channel.

 

Documents on the group's website also claim that the current immigration system is dysfunctional because the Government's "response to Black Lives Matter downplays [the] role of structural racism" in UK institutions and that there is a "lack of diversity in the media".

 

'Influencing Policy or Legislation'

Through its funding, it aims to create "a wider social justice movement" that can overhaul UK border policy and "influence policy or legislation".

 

This includes providing financial support for the academic work of a member of the Government's Migration Advisory Committee (MAC), the quango set up by New Labour to provide the Home Office with "transparent, independent and evidence-based advice".

 

Madeleine Sumption, the director of the University of Oxford's Migration Observatory, has been a member of the committee since 2016.

 

Compas, her academic outfit, was the beneficiary of a 10-year funding grant from the PHF and will have received at least £2 million by 2028.

 

Ms Sumption also supports other projects funded by the PHF, including Reunite Families UK, where she serves as an advisory board member.

 

Reunite Families UK campaigns for easier visa routes for family members of migrants, and has said migrants are being "used as a pawn in a war of increasingly hostile and outright racist policies by the Government".

 

Earlier this year, she spoke at a meeting organised by Migrant Voice, which received £200,000 from the PHF.

 

The event was entitled A Better Deal for Migrants, and attendees sought to "discuss tactics, messaging and how we can learn from other campaigns" to change the visa and immigration system.

 

Migrant Voice is an outspoken critic of the Government's Illegal Migration Bill, saying that it perpetuates "increasingly toxic, misleading rhetoric on migrants".

 

A Home Office document, seen by The Telegraph, showed the influence that the MAC has on policymakers' decision-making, with officials saying they "would be guided by the Migration Advisory Committee… on any required changes" to the immigration system that sought to bring overall numbers down.

 

Sir John Hayes, the chairman of the Common Sense Group of Conservative MPs said: "The UK can't afford to be governed by unelected quangos like the MAC. It's time the Government closed this quango down and saved the taxpayer a tonne of cash.

 

"This would give ministers a chance to control our borders and lower the numbers coming into the country."

 

Pauline Latham, a Tory MP and member of the Commons international development committee, said: "The Government needs to axe the MAC and free ministers to do what they think is best for the country, and what we were elected by the British public for."

 

Latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show that net migration reached a record 606,000 in 2022. But last year, the MAC urged Downing Street not to focus on tackling the number of people entering the country.

 

It said in its annual report: "We would caution the Government in becoming too focused on particular net migration numbers, and any change in objective would need to be consistent with the fiscal rules that the Government have in place."

 

The same report also urged ministers to adopt a new rural visa programme to boost migration in the countryside, saying: "It is in the interest of the UK Government to pilot and evaluate a rural visa targeted at areas facing depopulation."

 

In 2021, the MAC urged ministers "to review the ban on employment for asylum seekers" who have arrived in the country illegally, and claimed "there is clear evidence of the harm that this causes".

 

This is despite concerns that such a move would be a further pull factor and help the business model of people smugglers.

 

A Department for Culture, Media & Sport spokesman said: "Charity law permits campaigning by charities that is in line with their charitable purposes, provided they do so in a non-party-political way.

 

"Where concerns are raised that a charity is acting outside of its charitable purposes, or is acting in a politically partisan way, then the Charity Commission can investigate impartially and take regulatory action where appropriate."

 

The Home Office was contacted for comment.

<Article ends)



APPENDIX 2 – Example of 68 ORGs likely to be in Receipt of Government Money to Oppose Government Policy 

On Friday 15 December 2023, a letter was published in The Guardian opposing government policy and calling for the closure of the Bibby Stockholm barge, upon which several asylum seekers were being housed. The letter was signed by 68 signatories representing 68 pro-immigration and pro-asylum organisations, and 3 MPs.

 

The signatories and groups were listed in full at "HIAS+JCORE joins more than 65 organisations in calling for the Bibby Stockholm's urgent closure" 15-12-23, (downloaded 28-5-24). For completeness and posterity, we've also listed them below.

 

Some of these groups will be big and others will be fairly small. However, most are likely to be in receipt of some amount of government funding; and for many it will be the main source of their funding.

 

Yet these groups are biting the hand that feeds them!


They must be entirely de-funded of British Taxpayers' money!

 

(List begins>

Nicola David, One Life to Live

Tim Naor Hilton, Chief Executive, Refugee Action

Enver Solomon, Chief Executive, The Refugee Council

Sophie Wickham, Director, Action for Refugees in Lewisham (AFRIL)

Aderonke Apata, Founder and CEO, African Rainbow Family

Maya Esslemont, Director, After Exploitation

Gee Manoharan, Co-Director of Policy and Influencing, Association of Visitors to Immigration Detainees (AVID)

Paul Hook, Director, Asylum Matters

Kat Lorenz, Director, Asylum Support Appeals Project

Pierre Maklouf, Legal Director, Bail for Immigration Detainees

Andrew McCarthy, Acting CEO, Bristol Refugee Rights

Yvonne Rendell, Chair, Bromsgrove and Redditch Welcome Refugees.

Eleanor Brown, Managing Director, Community Action for Refugees and Asylum Seekers (CARAS)

Steve Smith, Chief Executive, Care 4 Calais

Emma Stevenson, Deputy CEO, Choose Love

Thomas Martin, Director, City of Sanctuary Sheffield

Sian Summers-Rees, Chief Officer, City of Sanctuary UK

Mauricio Silva, Co-Ordinator Dialogue and Migrant Ministries, Columbans in Britain

Leyla McLennan, Director, Connected Routes CIC

Nathalie Marytsch, Deputy Co-Ordinator, Fatima House, Birmingham

Sonya Sceats, Chief Executive, Freedom from Torture

Gisela Renolds, Executive Director, Global Link Lancaster

Traci Kirkand, Head of Charity, Govan Community Project

Kerry Smith, Chief Executive, Helen Bamber Foundation

Rabbi David Mason, Executive Director, HIAS+JCORE

Roger Wilson, Trustee, Hope and Aid Direct

Maddie Harris, Director, Humans for Rights Network

Naima Khan, Director, Inclusive Mosque Initiative

Sarah Teather, Director, Jesuit Refugee Service

Aria Danaparamita, Advocacy Director, Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI)

Sheila Rushforth, Director, Journey LGBT+ Asylum Group

Gisela Valle, Director, Latin American Women’s Rights Service

Rosario Guimba-Stewart, CEO, Lewisham Refugee and Migrant Network

Ruth Ehrlich, Head of Policy and Campaigns, Liberty

Mark Rowland, Chief Executive, Mental Health Foundation

Lara Parizotto and Alex Bulat, Co-Directors, Migrant Democracy Project

Brian Dikoff, Legal Organiser, Migrants Organise

Fizza Qureshi, CEO, Migrants’ Rights Network

Nazek Ramadan, Director, Migrant Voice

Debbie Royle, Deputy Director, Nottingham & Nottinghamshire Refugee Forum

Amos Schonfield, CEO, Our Second Home

Bridget Young, Director, NACCOM

Rob Hooper, Pastor, Oasis Church Edgbaston

Susannah Baker MBE, Trustee and Director, The Pickwell Foundation

Sally Daghlian OBE, CEO, Praxis

Leila Zadeh, Executive Director, Rainbow Migration

Nick Beales, Head of Campaigning, RAMFEL

Tigs Louis-Puttick, Director, Reclaim The Sea

Mia Hasenson-Gross, Executive Director, Rene Cassin

Kate Higgins, Chief Operating Officer, RefuAid

Carly Whyborn, Executive Director, Refugees at Home

Jenny Longford, Chair, Refugee Support Devon

Jeremy Thompson, Manager, Restore (Birmingham Churches Together)

Eiri Ohtani, Director, Right to Remain

Katie Morrison, CEO, Safe Passage

Sabir Zazai, CEO, Scottish Refugee Council

Taz. Mohammed, CEO, Slough Refugee Support

Nikki Walters, Chair, Southampton Action

Mariko Hayashi, Executive Director, Southeast and East Asian Centre

Sara Robinson, Director, St Augustine’s Centre

Emily Crowley, Chief Executive, Student Action for Refugees

Nick Watts, Director, Together with Migrant Children

Professor Bridget Anderson, Migration Mobilities Bristol Director, University of Bristol

Joanne MacInnes, Director, West London Welcome

William Gomes, Director, The William Gomes Podcast

Dora-Olivia Vicol, CEO, Work Rights Centre

Paola Uccellari, CEO, Young Roots

Nadia Whittome, MP for Nottingham East

Kim Johnson, MP for Liverpool Riverside

Olivia Blake, MP for Sheffield Hallam

<List ends)


APPENDIX 3 – Example of charity "Asylum Aid", and the "Helen Bamber Foundation"

On the 21 May 2024, the charity "Asylum Aid" filed legal action at the High Court in London, claiming that the UK government's Rwanda policy was unlawful.

 

Asylum Aid is another example of a charity which exists on UK government funding, paid for by the British Taxpayer, yet spends its time countering UK government policy!

 

For example, in February 2024, the Centre for Migration Control released a report (downloadable as a PDF at the link below) listing 106 organisations which were opposing the Rwanda plan, and which have received £209 million in British taxpayer funding in the last 3 years!

 

Among them was the "Helen Bamber Foundation" which has been in receipt of £295,940 of our money. On its webpage, "Asylum Aid" describes itself as "Part of the Helen Bamber Foundation Group".




OUR IMMIGRATION-RELATED ARTICLES

De-Fund the Immigration Industry (28-7-24)



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