[continued from previous message] 
  
 families who did not leave could be broken up, with the children taken 
 into care; 
  
 * Free NHS treatment was removed from failed asylum seekers (except in 
 emergency cases) by regulations in 2004; 
  
 * Policies allowing those from war-torn countries temporary leave were 
 abolished, leaving failed asylum seekers from Iraq, Afghanistan, 
 Somalia and Zimbabwe in limbo and at risk of removal; 
  
 * AIDS patients and others with chronic illness began to be deported in 
 the early 2000s, in the knowledge that they would die without the 
 expensive treatment their condition required. 
  
 Suspects' rights removed 
  
 Where the foreigner has committed an offence, or is suspected of 
 terrorism, his or her rights are given even shorter shrift. 
  
 * Even those with over 20 years' residence, with parents, siblings, 
 children and grandchildren here, face deportation under the new rules 
 creating a presumption in favour of deportation; 
  
 * Despite continuing allegations of incommunicado detention and torture, 
 deportations of suspected terrorists to Algeria continue, and the 
 government is seeking to deport terror suspects to torturing states 
 including Libya, Jordan and Egypt under memoranda of understanding 
 which provide 'diplomatic assurances' against torture; 
  
 * The government is seeking to persuade the European Court of Human 
 Rights to remove the ban against expulsion to a real risk of torture; 
  
 * Active complicity in 'extraordinary rendition' (ie illegal removal of 
 terror suspects to torturing states) has been established; 
  
 * A 1972 ban on inhuman and degrading treatment of prisoners was lifted 
 for suspected 'insurgents' in army custody in Iraq. 
  
 Executive v judiciary 
  
 As the Blair government has passed tougher and tougher laws restricting 
 the rights of asylum seekers and other groups seen as undesirable, it 
 has tried to insulate the laws from the scrutiny of the judges, who 
 have frequently condemned the executive for abuse of power. The most 
 egregious example of this was the attempt in 2004 to remove the normal 
 rights of appeal and judicial review from immigrants and asylum 
 claimants, leaving them with no legal remedy against legal errors by 
 adjudicators. A coalition of refugee groups, lawyers and senior judges 
 defeated the attempt, but the government has weakened legal protections 
 in other ways. 
  
 Weakening legal protection 
  
 * Claims deemed 'clearly unfounded' by Home Office officials cannot be 
 appealed until after the claimant's return home (Nationality, 
 Immigration and Asylum Act 2002); 
  
 * Statutory presumptions such as the presumption of safety in countries 
 of transit ('third safe countries') and in specified countries of 
 origin ('the white list', abolished when Labour came to power and 
 brought back in 2002), the presumption of adverse credibility (brought 
 in in 2004, which deems conduct such as a late asylum claim or travel 
 on false documents as damaging credibility) mean fewer legal challenges 
 and less scope for judicial intervention and discretion; 
  
 * The presumption in favour of deportation, introduced in 2006 
 following the 'foreign criminals' tabloid-generated outcry, has been 
 followed by provision for mandatory deportation of foreign criminals in 
 the 2007 UK Borders Bill; 
  
 * Suspected terrorists are not allowed to see much of the evidence 
 against them, and judges have been warned not to interfere with the 
 government's assessment of the needs of national security; 
  
 * Under the Human Rights Act, passed in 1998, judges cannot strike down 
 laws which contravene basic human rights, but can only declare them 
 incompatible with human rights, leaving the government with the choice 
 to revise the legislation or not; 
  
 * Changes in legal aid rules have driven many solicitors out of 
 business or away from publicly funded immigration work. 
  
 Entrenching xeno-racism 
  
 The Blair government was the first to acknowledge the reality of 
 'institutional racism' with the ground-breaking Macpherson inquiry into 
 the death of Stephen Lawrence. But in parallel with that recognition 
 and the extension of anti-racist legislation to public bodies in 2000, 
 the policies of segregation and marginalisation of asylum seekers, and 
 Blair's fixation with detaining, refusing and removing them en masse 
 and as fast as possible, have been a major ingredient in the 
 legitimation of anti-asylum seeker racism. The policy of 'managed 
 migration' has seen a large increase in legal economic migration 
 (frequently at the expense of the south, as in the recruitment of 
 doctors and nurses from sub-Saharan Africa), but simultaneously, asylum 
 claimants with hugely valuable skills and qualifications have been 
 banned from working, as part of the deterrent policy to stop them 
 coming, and their resultant, reluctant dependency on asylum support has 
 fed back in to media and popular racism, which, in turn, has fuelled 
 yet more state racism. 
  
 The attitude of enlightened superiority which has been a hallmark of 
 Blair's attitude to the disastrous and brutal intervention in Iraq is 
 also evident in his government's moves to restrict British citizenship 
 to those sharing 'British' values. The 2002 Nationality, Immigration 
 and Asylum Act introduced new requirements (knowledge of language and 
 life in Britain) as a condition of acquiring citizenship and allowed 
 citizenship to be removed from the unworthy. 
  
 The hope that the Blair government would set its face against popular 
 racism, and would seek to educate the country about why people need 
 refuge from persecution - or simply a chance to earn a livelihood - has 
 gradually turned into disillusion and then to anger, as Blair sought 
 instead to prove his toughness through inhuman policies towards asylum 
 seekers and radical encroachments on civil liberties in his 
 anti-terrorism policies. As Blair leaves office, he leaves a country 
 more divided - by race, class and status - than he found it. 
  
 [Frances Webber is a leading human rights lawyer at Garden Court 
 Chambers.] 
  
  
  
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