Friday, 1 April 2022 — Institute of Race Relations

As the House of Commons reinstates most of the clauses of the Nationality and Borders Bill removed by the Lords, this is no time to give up. Months of brilliant campaigning and steadfast support in the Lords means that the legislation has now entered what is commonly referred to as the ‘ping pong’ stage, where the Commons votes, and the Lords, with its powers of delay, sends the legislation back. The bill, which relies for its legitimation on the Brexit state’s promise of ‘strong borders’, aims to further embed the hostile environment for migrants and refugees. But as research by Sophia Siddiqui, published this week on IRR News shows, it also emboldens far-right vigilantes to exploit gender issues, hunting down ‘immigrant criminals’, in the name of protecting women. In Weaponising violence against women, Siddiqui homes in on the far-right campaign that followed the tragic murder in Tullamore, Ireland, of schoolteacher Ashling Murphy, as well as the formation of a Polish so-called ‘citizens police’ which, in the name of ‘defending our women’, has attacked students and others, mainly from Africa and south Asia, fleeing the war in Ukraine.

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