On behalf of the EMNRN, we today sent a letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson regarding the consequences of having ‘no recourse to public funds’ faced by members of the diverse ethnic minority communities in Scotland.
You can see this letter in full here.
The main text of the letter is reproduced below
Dear Prime Minister,
RE: No recourse to public funds (NRPF)
As community organisations that work directly with individuals and families who experience the direct consequences of having ‘no recourse to public funds’ (NRPF), we urge you to timeously respond to your commitment made at the UK Parliament Liaison Committee on Tuesday 27th May 2020 to ensure that citizens “who live and work here should have support of one kind or another.”
Our members, networks and clients are more likely to live in poverty and overcrowding and work in zero-hours contract and low paid jobs.
Despite our membership, clients and networks contributing significantly to frontline public services like the NHS and fulfilling key-worker positions maintaining the nation’s infrastructure, cleanliness and sustenance supplies, these workers affected by NRPF do not have access to the same state rights and support as their friends, neighbours and colleagues.
For those in employment, this is case for ‘child tax credit’. For those whose employment has collapsed due to Covid-19 and who were already engaged in precarious self- or zero-hour contract employment, there is no safety net of furloughing or state support. These people, including a significant number of young families presently, have no income and no formal state support.
We remind the UK and devolved Governments that the International Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) to which the UK is a signatory prohibits discriminatory treatment on the basis of nationality and conclude that the continuation of this policy, enhanced at a time of national emergency, represents a material and unjustifiable denial of the human rights of some workers, students and others on an equal basis with other citizens due to their nationality.
Thus, we call on the UK Government to immediately discard the NRPF policy and enable everyone in the country to access state support on an equal and fair basis, on the basis of need, to the benefit of our entire society.
On behalf of the Ethnic Minority National Resilience Network Scotland (EMNRN)
