| Refugees in the Media
Press Myths?
Refugees in British History
Refugees in the Media
 The
media can have a significant impact on the lives of refugees. Negative
media can have a double effect -
- It can influence the public to see refugees as a burden, not
an asset, which can lead to the government seeking ways to prevent
refugees from entering the country.
- By dehumanising refugees with provocative and racist language,
it can put them in danger from aggressive sections in society.
The Refugee Council believe that since the implementation of the
Immigration and Asylum Bill 1999 and the new dispersal system, that
press articles have become more frequent and vitriolic.
Daily Mail 1938 - "The way stateless Jews from Germany
are pouring in from every port of this country is becoming an outrage."
Daily Mail 1998 - "Why do we let in this army of spongers?....So
many asylum seekers are pouring into this country….to milk
the system…many are involved in criminal activity."
Press Myths?
- The Daily Express 2001 - "Refugees are flooding
into the UK like ants"
- Refugee Council 2002 - "The UK takes a tiny fraction
of the world's refugees. The truth about refugee moment is that
the vast majority flee on foot to neighbouring poor countries.
Iran currently hosts 2 million refugees, Pakistan has 1.2 million.
In comparison, the UK had just 71,700 applications for asylum
last year."
- The Mail on Sunday 2001 - "Around 80 per cent of
those who claim refugee status are eventually judged to be bogus."
- Refugee Council 2002 - "Last year, 31% of asylum
seekers were granted either refugee status or were given exceptional
leave to remain, for humanitarian reasons. We estimate that at
least 51% of asylum seekers were successful in 2001."
- The Sun 2001 - "We resent the scroungers, beggars
and crooks who are prepared to cross every country in Europe to
reach our generous benefits system."
- Refugee Council 2002 - "Asylum seekers are not allowed
to claim mainstream welfare benefits. An adult receives £37.77
a week, which is only70% of regular income support."
- The Mail on Sunday 2001 - "Asylum cheats are a threat
to the future."
- Refugee Council 2002 - "Refugees make an enormous
contribution to the economic and cultural life in the UK. Refugees
bring with them a wealth of skills and experience, many have professional
qualifications, and they often fill gaps across the labour market.
Home Office research shows that people born outside the UK (including
refugees and asylum seekers) are an asset and not a taxpayer's
liability, they add to prosperity, motivated as they mostly are
by a powerful work ethic."
A mori survey on public attitudes to refugees carried out for
Reader's Digest in November 2000 found that after a year in which
the Daily Mail had run more than 200 stories about asylum seekers
and refugees,
- 80% of adults believed that refugees came to Britain because
they regard it as a soft touch
- 66% thought there are too many immigrants in Britain
- 63% considered too much is being done to help immigrants
The Refugee Council have developed an email network that when
an inaccurate, inflammatory or discriminatory article appears in
the media, they email over 4,000 people on its network, who will
then log on a complaint to the publication or regulatory authority.
(This is generally the Press Complaints Commission). They feel that
this is a way of countering the newspapers' usual defence that they
have not received many objections.
Refugees in British
History.
1560-1575
Dutch Protestants fled religious persecution in the Spanish Netherlands
and settled in London and east England.
1665
Jewish people were allowed to settle in England, provided that they
converted to Christianity. Those Jews who settled in England were
mostly of Spanish and Portuguese origin, but living in the Netherlands.
1685-1700 The Huguenots
100,000 French Protestants, known as Huguenots, fled to Britain
and Ireland from the persecution of Louis XIV.
1780-1900
Roman Catholics and aristocracy fled the 1789 French Revolution
and came to Britain.
1848-1880
The year of revolutions, 1848, caused royalists, socialists, liberals
and republicans to seek sanctuary in the UK, fleeing from conflicts
across the European mainland.
1880-1914 Russian Jewish Refugees
During the 1880's, tens of thousands of Russian Jews fled pogroms
(organised massacre) and sought sanctuary in Britain. Jewish people
also fled Poland, Romania and Galicia, part of the Austro-Hungarian
Empire.
1914-1918 The First World War
More than 250,000 Belgian refugees fled to the UK, escaping the
fighting of the First World War.
1937 Basque Refugee Children
4,000 Basque refugee children fleeing General Franco's fascism in
the Spanish Civil War arrived in the UK.
 1933-1939
Jewish Refugees
The British government responded to the persecution of Jews in Europe
in the 1930's and the Second World War and 50,000 people fleeing
Nazi Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia were admitted.
1939
Nearly 100,000 refugees from Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Denmark
and Norway came to the UK, fleeing from the advancing Nazi German
army. Almost all of them returned in 1945 at the end of the Second
World War.
1939-1950 Refugees from Communism - Poles
250,000 Polish refugees settled in the U.K. They arrived during
the Second World War or came in 1945 as part of a group of Polish
soldiers who fought in the British Army. Later, Polish refugees
fled the new communist government in Poland.
1945-1960
More than 50,000 refugees from the Soviet Union, Romania and Czechoslovakia
arrived in the UK. Many were political opponents of the new communist
governments in Eastern Europe.
 1956
Hungarians
21,000 Hungarians who fled their country following the 1956 uprising
against the communist regime were among the most well received refugee
groups in post-war Britain.
1972 Ugandan Asians
The British government accepted some 28,000 Ugandan Asians who were
expelled by Idi Amin in 1972.
1973 - 1979 Chileans
3,000 Chileans fleeing the violence of General Pinochet's regime
were allowed to enter the UK.
1975 - 1992 Vietnamese
Around 24,000 Vietnamese refugees entered the UK under a resettlement
programme. The exodus from Vietnam included South Vietnamese former
government officials fleeing from the communists, and ethnic Chinese
people who fled Vietnam when China invaded in 1979.
1992 - 1996 Bosnians
2,500 Bosnians fleeing the war in the former Yugoslavia were given
temporary protection status by the British government under a small
quota resettlement programme.
1995 - 1999 Kosovans
More than 4,000 mostly ethnic Albanian Kosovan refugees were given
temporary protected status in the UK. Housed initially in resettlement
centres around the country, the vast majority returned home within
months. Several thousand more Kosovans applied independently for
asylum.
1980's to the present day
Asylum seekers from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Cyprus, Iran, Iraq Afghanistan,
Ghana, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Somalia, Turkey, Congo, Burundi, Sudan,
Angola, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Kenya, Algeria, Nigeria, Zimbabwe,
Colombia, the former Soviet Union and eastern European countries
have sought asylum in the UK.
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