Final countdown to Labour conference: help us get free movement discussed

Posted: 10 August 2022

The situation for migrants’ rights in the UK is dire and becoming worse. Free movement has ended, claiming asylum is being criminalised, and refugees are being deported to Rwanda. The Tory Party leadership campaign has been a bidding war for racist border controls. 

At the moment, Labour is saying and doing very little about this situation, but in September we will have a huge opportunity to change that. At Labour Party conference this year, we will be putting forward a motion to make Labour a party of migrants’ rights and solidarity. 

But we need your help to do this. In order to get our motion discussed, we need as many CLPs as possible to submit it as their motion.

The deadline for motions is September 15th, so you need to propose the motion now. To do this:

1. Find the email address of your CLP secretary. This is probably the same email address that sends you notice of local party meetings
2. Copy and paste the below motion into an email
3. Send it to your CLP secretary, making clear that you want the motion to be discussed and voted on to be the CLP’s conference motion for 2022
4. Once you’ve done this, please tell us that you have done it, by emailing info@labourfreemovement.org

Finally, if you’re coming to conference as either a delegate or a regular member, please let us know by filling in this form. 

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Migrant solidarity: towards a humane, internationalist and socialist immigration policy

The government’s inhumane immigration policy is illustrated by its treatment of Ukrainian and Afghan refugees, Windrush scandal victims, and everyone crossing the Channel; the Nationality and Borders Act’s assault on the right to asylum; and the brutal Rwandan deportation scheme.

Attacks on migrants are attacks on the labour movement. Making migrant workers precarious diminishes our power to resist.

Conference applauds PCS trade unionists considering striking against dangerous maritime “pushback” plans.

Labour must build solidarity and campaign for migrants’ rights and an antiracist, internationalist alternative.

Labour will work in power, and campaign in opposition and at the grassroots, to:

• repeal the Nationality and Borders Act and all anti-migrant legislation;
• reject immigration systems based on numerical caps, minimum income/wealth requirements, or utility to employers;
• guarantee safe, legal routes for asylum seekers, day-one rights to work, education and social security, and expand family reunion rights;
• abolish “no recourse to public funds”, NHS access restrictions and all Hostile Environment policies;
• replace Settled Status with an automatic Right to Stay;
• introduce a simple process for all UK residents to gain permanent residency;
• grant all UK residents equal voting rights;
• close all detention centres; end all immigration raids, detention, and deportations, including racist “double sentencing”;
• support workers refusing to implement deportations, Hostile Environment measures and pushbacks;
• level up domestic workers’ rights to equal other workers;
• reenter Europe’s free movement area, and pursue free movement agreements with other countries, including in all future trade deals, with the goal of equal free movement for all.