Bishop of Durham speech at Action Foundation Dinner

Last Sunday morning I was stood outside a church in County Durham talking with an Iranian woman I had just confirmed. She was doubly excited as a few days before she had received her notification of ‘leave to remain’. Her attitude to the future revealed joy, passion and determination. She told me she loved being a Maths teacher and that now she longs to teach maths here. ‘Even if I have to retrain from scratch and it takes 4 years I will do it. I just love teaching Maths.’ She never stopped smiling as she told me.

She epitomises my regular experience of asylum seekers and refugees. They are consistently people of resilience, determination, skills, a longing to work and to serve. They are people who smile.

I am very grateful to Julian and the team at Action Foundation for inviting me to speak this evening on this 10th anniversary celebration. It is an honour to speak. As you have heard earlier Action Foundation’s work is inspiring, exciting and greatly needed. Their approach is fully rooted in the conviction that every person matters, is to be valued and treated with dignity. It is rooted in love that takes flesh.

How we view people impacts and shapes deeply how we treat them. How we frame situations shapes how we respond to them.

So in my few minutes I want to pose a question about how we frame the question of asylum seekers and refugees. What happens if we view migration as gift that enhances human life? What different words might we start using if we see asylum seekers and refugees as gift rather than problem, threat, curse or hostile?

What words come to mind if we approach migration issues from an attitude of Gift?

Gift and giving in itself speaks of generosity. The clear attitude of the young woman I began with is that she wants to give. She wants to offer her love of maths and skills as a teacher to the well-being of the nation. I think of Ali excitedly telling me of 35 years driving taxis in Damascus without ever having an accident wanting to use this gift on the streets of Newcastle but struggling to be helped to make it happen because he could not read the questions on the theory test, although he did know what all the signs meant.

A generous response to the gift that comes in the asylum seeker and refugee will always be one that recognises them as a fully equal human being deserving of respect and dignity. Generosity of response and welcome will want to offer adequate, even good, housing not begrudgingly finding the cheapest places to rent and cramming houses over fully. Action Foundation’s approach to housing provision shows this approach. Generosity will also certainly attend to the cultural needs of each person. It will recognise cultural and faith traditions and practices with deep respect.

Gift implies generosity.

My last point under generosity also points towards treating every asylum seeker and refugee with individuality. Each one has their own story. Each one comes from their own village or city, within their home country. Each one has their own story of why they decided to flee. Each one has their own journey to tell, often filled with trouble and pain. I was listening, for example, to another Iranian woman this past week tell of her rescue from death in a boat crossing.

Now these stories are often of persecution and abuse, of fear and pain. They regularly tell of traumatic journeys that have included exploitation, violence, and further abuse. Such realities often leave the individuals bashed down and squashed. They often arrive distrustful of authorities, fearful of uniforms and institutions. They are exhausted.

But listen again and these are individuals who have been resourceful, persistent and determined. They have shown adventure, been entrepreneurial and often come loaded with skills, training and abilities of all kinds. These are amongst the most resourceful human beings on the planet. They are amongst those who most want to succeed and to contribute well to the life of a nation that offers them sanctuary, freedom and hope. Surely thus each individual, each family group is a gift. One whose individuality is to be respected and valued.

This being so then my third word is Flourishing. We should want every individual asylum seeker and refugee to flourish as the person they have been created to be.

I readily acknowledge that not everyone who arrives and present themselves as an asylum seeker should be given refugee status. There are those whose claims do not stand up. There are those for whom it is entirely safe for them to return home at the end of the process. But I still think we want them to flourish whilst here so that when they return voluntarily, or even if they have to be deported, they should be in a better place to flourish when they return than when they arrived.

It obviously goes without saying that all who are given refugee status we must want to flourish for that has to be in both their own best interests and that of our society as a whole. The best for refugees is that they are helped to contribute very fully to the life of the nation – and they do. In her summing up of a debate on poverty and inequality in the House of Lords yesterday  Baroness Barran reminded the house that she is a daughter of a refugee. Refugees become successful and significant contributors to our whole society.

But this emphasis on flourishing leads me to some very specific points about policy and action that pick up on some of the key factors we found when producing the ‘Refugees Welcome’ report 2 years ago and backed up by the work of others both before and since.

English language is critical to helping people integrate well. It is also a valuable asset in every country in the world. So good access to English language learning from day one of arrival would help all asylum seekers flourish regardless of the final outcome of their claim. Ongoing English language support for refugees once granted status is also key to good long term integration. The best English language education contains both formal education and opportunity for informal, every day conversation. Action Foundation have a great record on English language provision. As a whole we need nationally to significantly improve this provision for all, from day one.

Flourishing also comes through healthy diets and good healthcare, physical and mental. So from the very outset we should ensure that all are adequately provided for with allowances that mean healthy food can be bought. Good access to GPs and wider health services also need to be in place. This includes a longer term recognition that the mental traumas suffered may only emerge at later dates so ongoing mental health support is essential.

Work skills can whither. They need nurturing. There is inevitably need for retraining into a different cultural context. So I believe asylum seekers should be allowed access to work from an early stage. The current ban on work for asylum seekers is entirely counter productive and fails to assist any flourishing. So we should Lift the Ban.

In all these matters if from the outset good healthcare is provided, healthy food is available in adequate to good housing, English language learning is readily available and work is allowed each individual is much more likely to flourish. The short term extra cost is outweighed by the longer term likelihood of each person being a significant contributor to national life.

Anyone who then found themselves returning to their home nation because they are not given refugee status will do so in a far better position to flourish back home.

Everyone granted refugee status will be far more ready to contribute to national life and integrate well immediately their status is granted.

Viewing people as gift must surely lead us to want their lives to be marked by flourishing.

This leads me to my final Gift word; Thankfulness.

When a family arrives here under the current Syrian Resettlement scheme whether they be received through Community Sponsorship or a local authority the event is always marked by thankfulness. There are so many thank yous said by the arriving family, and by the welcoming community. Over the subsequent early days ‘Thanks’ are often spoken. Smiles are the order of the day.

Community Sponsorship groups when they tell their side of the story often speak of how much more thankful they have become for what they realise they have come to take for granted in life. Thankful for clean water; hot running water; schools; homes; peace and security and so much more. There is a recognition of all that we have in our land. But they then often tell after a few weeks and months of welcoming a family how their thankfulness now includes reflections on all that the refugee family has brought to them. There is a reciprocity of gift that is experienced that leads to deep thankfulness. The refugees have often opened peoples eyes to new things, new possibilities and new understandings. Community Sponsorship itself is a gift that has come to us from Canada. It is a different way of welcoming refugees and integrating them into local community life. It is developing slowly. I sincerely hope that before too long the Government will recognise those who arrive this way as ‘additional’ to the agreed number of refugees coming through the VPRS scheme. I hope too they will open it up as a route not simply for Syrian families but also families from other areas of significant conflict.

Where welcome is done well; where refugees are treated with deep respect and dignity; where adequate provision is made from the outset then thankfulness for the gift flows for all involved and concerned.

I obviously approach this whole question from my position as a follower of Jesus Christ who finds himself as a bishop in the Church of England. As such I am in the privileged position of being able to try and impact and shape policy on these matters.

But my primary approach is simply as a follower of Jesus who said that he came to bring life, life in all its fullness. I follow a Jesus who welcomed the outcast and sought to see the poor lifted up and included. I follow the God who I am convinced is the God of the refugee.

This helps me shape this vision of Gift. Life is a gift to be received and enjoyed.

But I believe that looking at asylum seekers and refugees as Gift works as a way of framing all the questions that flow for us all.

It moves us away from hostility, and from problematising to seeing hope and opportunity.

If we see those who arrive in our midst as asylum seekers and refugees as gift then we will treat them with Generosity, and the Individuality they deserve. We will want them to flourish and we will discover a mutual thankfulness.

The spin off, if you like, will help create a society and nation marked out by an attitude to all people marked by generosity, respect for every individual, the flourishing of all and a thankfulness for what we have and who we are. This strikes me as the kind of society that actually we all want. How we respond to and treat the asylum seeker and refugee ultimately tells us just what kind of society we really want to be.