Glasgow Asylum Evictions - First Battle Lost, Ready for Next One
Categories: Articles:Asylum & Refugees |
Published: 20/05/2013 |
Views: 1515
In Glasgow Sheriff Court (17/05/13) the Sheriff ruled in favour of the YMCA in their eviction proceedings against one of the refused refugees. There were two grounds: 1 The YMCA's advocate argued that the consequence of eviction in this case was not destitution as the defendant still had recourse to Section 4 Hard Case Support. This appears technically to be true in this case but as all those who have experience of Section 4 applications knows it is a brutal and humiliating experience resulting in most cases in failure.
2. The main case for the defendant was that the YMCA should be considered to be acting on behalf of the government as a landlord of asylum seekers therefore the Human Rights Act, particularly Articles 3 and 8 should apply. However the Sheriff supported the argument that, as the eviction proceedings had begun after their contract with the government had ended, the YMCA were no longer in that position and therefore the Human Rights Acts did not apply. There will be a 6 week period before further proceedings are taken, meanwhile the defence lawyers will consider whether to follow through the Section 4 route and/or appeal the ruling.
Further information from Glasgow Campaign to Welcome Refugees, c/o Fire Brigades Union, 52 St Enoch's Square, Glasgow G1 4AA glascamref@googlemail.com
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