A reminder we've always been sh.t to refugees

[Fishnut]

Saturday marks the 85th anniversary of the first arrivals to the UK of the Kindertransport. I'm sure we've all seen the incredibly emotional That's Life segment from 1988 where the efforts of Nicholas Winton in the scheme were publicly acknowledged for the first time. It's often held up as an example of the UK doing the right thing by refugees - offering a safe space to people fleeing violence, war and persecution. And it's easy to believe that and not think much more about it.

But this article goes through the difficulties faced by those trying to save people from the Nazis.

The first thing I'd never really asked is, why children? More specifically, why just children?

...prime minister Neville Chamberlain’s government was reluctant to offer refuge to Jews, fearing for the UK’s security, the cost and the anti-foreign and antisemitic sentiments of some of the electorate. So, it came up with the compromise of only admitting unaccompanied children rather than whole families.

The emotional impact of being separated from your family and then, in many cases, surviving while everyone else was murdered in concentration camps or ghettos, can't be overstated. And it was largely done to appease antisemites.

The government also refused to provide any help - financial or organisational - to the efforts, leaving it to volunteers. In fact, not only did they not help the refugees, they demanded a "guarantee" of £50 per child "to indemnify against any expense". This strategy has been copied in more recent times,

Following the refugee crisis of 2015, [the government] launched the community sponsorship scheme, which relied on volunteers to raise £4500 per adult they wished to sponsor.

And after the invasion of Ukraine by Russia in 2022, the UK government once again looked for volunteer hosts via the homes for Ukraine scheme.

They also refused to accept any child with disabilities or "additional needs",

Even children whose parents had mental health problems were rejected. Born on April 26 1926, Herta Baumfeld was not accepted for the Kindertransport because her mother was in a psychiatric institution. Herta was subsequently murdered at the Maly Trostinec concentration camp in Belarus on September 18 1942.

In fact,

Some MPs expressed the view that only those children who would be of benefit to the UK should be admitted.

This is an attitude that I'm sure some of current MPs have expressed about modern refugees.

Honestly, I think the Kindertransport is yet another myth we tell ourselves about how enlightened the country was. Yes, it was a worthy scheme and every life saved is valuable, but it could have been so much more. And by holding it up as this shining example of humanism we fail to see its limitations and how that suspicion of refugees has perpetuated ever since.

[Fishnut]

And we continue to be sh.t to refugees...

Simon Ridley, a senior civil servant, told MPs he did not know the whereabouts of most of the 17,316 asylum applicants whose cases have been withdrawn in the past year.

Mr Ridley, the second in command at the Home Office, was being questioned with his boss Sir Matthew Rycroft, the permanent secretary, over a quadrupling in the number of withdrawn asylum applications from 4,260 in the previous year.

The surge has led to claims they are being wiped off the list without being fully assessed to help meet Rishi Sunak’s target of clearing the “legacy” backlog of asylum cases older than June 2022 by the end of this year.
...
Questioning the officials, Tim Loughton, a Commons home affairs committee member, asked: “Isn’t it strange that conveniently, when faced with a very stiff target, there has been a three-fold increase [in withdrawals] for undetermined reasons, people magically not going forward with their claims, and where are those people?”

Mr Ridley replied: “In most cases, I don’t know where those people are.” Asked whether they had returned to their home countries, he said: “I don’t know.”
...
Sir Matthew has admitted that the Home Office does not have a “Plan B” if the Government fails to get its Rwanda policy off the ground.

So that's great news given all the legal barriers it's facing.

[Grumble]

I do want to point out that the kindertransport was all the more worthy of acclaim because of the obstacles it overcame. It shouldn’t ever been seen as a mark of how kind Britain was, but only of how hard Nicholas Winton worked to save people. I’m sure he would rather have saved whole families.

[Fishnut]

I do want to point out that the kindertransport was all the more worthy of acclaim because of the obstacles it overcame. It’s shouldn’t ever been seen as a mark of how kind Britain was, but only of how hard Nicholas Winton worked to save people. I’m sure he would rather have saved whole families.

Very much so. Even in the 1988 That's Life episode they point out that he said he wished he could save more. As you say, the problem is the obstacles but the fact is the government put those obstacles there and then subsequent governments have used the Kindertransport as positive propaganda while putting just as many - if not more - obstacles in place for refugees.

[El Pollo Diablo]

I don't know how familiar people are with the MS St Louis, but it's another case of horrific pre-WWII attitudes to refugees and Jewish people, this time with a much sadder ending than the kindertransport.

In the last few months before the war began, 937 people, mostly Jewish refugees, gathered at Hamburg on the MS St Louis, captained by Gustav Schroeder, seeking asylum to escape Nazi persecution. They arrived at Havana two weeks later, and were denied entry. Even though the passengers held legal tourist visas, President Federico Laredo Brú refused to allow them to enter the country, other than 28 passengers - 22 with US visas, four Spanish and two Cubans.

The ship sailed with its remaining passengers to the US, Cordell Hull (Secretary of State) and FDR refused to intervene to allow the boat to dock at Florida. Coastguard vessels were mustered to prevent the ship deliberately running aground.

As conditions on the boat worsened, as Captain Schroeder tried anything and everything to negotiate a haven for the passengers, various people in Canada tried to convince the government there to help. PM William Lyon Mackenzie King and Frederick Blair were hostile to Jewish immigration and refused them landing. Blair was pivotal in convincing the government not to intervene.

The ship was forced to return to Europe, docking at Antwerp.

Neville Chamberlain agreed to take 288 passengers who travelled to the UK on other boats. 225 were taken by France, 214 by Belgium and 181 by the Netherlands. Obviously, after Germany won control of all those countries, all those Jews were placed at high risk. Later tracing found that 254 of them were murdered during the Holocaust, mostly at death camps. 87 were able to emigrate prior to the invasion.

Following this, Schroeder was awarded the order of merit, and posthumously named as one of the Righteous Among the Nations. In contrast, the US formally apologised in in 2012, and Canada in 2018. Frederick Blair's nephew apologised on his behalf in 2000.

And this is why we have international conventions about the treatment of refugees.

[headshot]

An honourable mention must go to a local hero of ours, Frank Foley.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Foley

Foley is primarily remembered as a "British Schindler". In his role as passport control officer, he helped thousands of Jews escape from Nazi Germany. At the 1961 trial of Adolf Eichmann, he was described as a "Scarlet Pimpernel" for the way he risked his own life to save Jews threatened with death by the Nazis. Despite having no diplomatic immunity and being liable to arrest at any time, Foley would bend the rules when stamping passports and issuing visas, to allow Jews to escape "legally" to Britain or Mandatory Palestine, which was controlled by the British. Sometimes he went further, going into internment camps to get Jews out, hiding them in his home, and helping them get forged passports. One Jewish aid worker estimated that he saved "tens of thousands" of people from the Holocaust.

[IvanV]

I was wondering about "always", thinking in particular about Huguenots. There is some kind of historical meme that England was happy to accept refugee Huguenots, and so many came here. So I thought I'd look into that in more detail.

It seems there was a trickle coming here from about 1565 onwards, though in tiny numbers in comparison to the approx 1.2m of them in France at the time, about 10% of the French population. The main exodus of Huguenots from France in the 16th century and earlier parts of 17th century appears to have been towards overseas colonies - the Americas, South Africa, etc. The main movement to England occurred much later, in and around 1700, when around 50,000 Huguenots came to England, with some financial assistance provided by the English. In 1708, the Foreign Protestants Naturalization Act was passed, which permitted their permanent settlement.

1700 seems a very long time after things kicked off in the mid 16th century. There had been intermittent crises, and England supported the Huguenots in a war against the French king in 1627-29. But the main refugee crisis occurred following the repeal of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, which removed all protestant rights in France. Around 100,000 went to the Netherlands fairly quickly following that, and 50,000 to various German states, and smaller numbers to various other places in Europe with protestant toleration. It appears that England was a little slow to facilitate their movement here in larger numbers, and ultimately playing a more modest role than the Netherlands.

So actually, rather similar to our behaviour to refugees at other times, rather slow and reluctant to get involved, then bigging up what limited help in fact we did provide.

[Hunting Dog]

I was wondering about "always", thinking in particular about Huguenots. There is some kind of historical meme that England was happy to accept refugee Huguenots, and so many came here. So I thought I'd look into that in more detail.

It seems there was a trickle coming here from about 1565 onwards, though in tiny numbers in comparison to the approx 1.2m of them in France at the time, about 10% of the French population. The main exodus of Huguenots from France in the 16th century and earlier parts of 17th century appears to have been towards overseas colonies - the Americas, South Africa, etc. The main movement to England occurred much later, in and around 1700, when around 50,000 Huguenots came to England, with some financial assistance provided by the English. In 1708, the Foreign Protestants Naturalization Act was passed, which permitted their permanent settlement.

1700 seems a very long time after things kicked off in the mid 16th century. There had been intermittent crises, and England supported the Huguenots in a war against the French king in 1627-29. But the main refugee crisis occurred following the repeal of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, which removed all protestant rights in France. Around 100,000 went to the Netherlands fairly quickly following that, and 50,000 to various German states, and smaller numbers to various other places in Europe with protestant toleration. It appears that England was a little slow to facilitate their movement here in larger numbers, and ultimately playing a more modest role than the Netherlands.

So actually, rather similar to our behaviour to refugees at other times, rather slow and reluctant to get involved, then bigging up what limited help in fact we did provide.

Possibly off-topic but according to my grandparents surnames I'm 75% Huguenot. So apparently 400 years ish later we still hadn't integrated!?