Recordings
As much as possible, we record online events to make them available in English and French for the public. The recordings are available below, listed from most recent to least recent.
Learning session: New UK and France immigration bills – what’s at stake for the UK-France border and resisting hostile politics in the UK and France - May 2023
This session provided an overview of the major issues at stake in the UK and France’s respective new immigration bills and what they mean for the shared border. We also discussed organising in response to these bills, and how we can build solidarity across borders.
Summary:
ILPA (Immigration Law Practitioners' Association) presented the British Illegal Migration Bill (now Illegal Migration Act) and what it means for Channel crossings and migrants' rights more broadly.
On the French side, le Gisti (Groupe d’information et de soutien des immigré·e·s), a national migrants’ rights organisation, spoke about the Projet de loi asile immigration and CSP75 (Coordination 75 des Sans Papiers), an autonomous Paris-based collective of undocumented migrants, shared how undocumented migrants have been organising in response to the bill and linking it to the social movement on pension reforms.
New UK and France immigration bills - May 2023
PSM Report launch, February 2023
On 2 February 2023, we organised an online launch event for two reports, newly translated in English and published by the Plateforme des Soutiens aux Migrant.e.s (PSM). The reports provide a detailed account of 30 years of bilateral agreements between the UK and France, which has created a high-security, highly policed border at which migrants have been systematically violently harassed and surveilled. These reports were launched in February to mark 20 years since the Touquet agreements between the UK and France, which introduced juxtaposed controls and increased militarisation of the UK-France border.
Summary:
Pierre Bonnevalle, one of the report authors, and Clara Houin from the PSM presented the reports, their research process, and key findings. Caitlin Boswell from JCWI also joined to provide a UK-perspective on the relevance of the report findings, these bilateral agreements, and immigration policies from a crossborder perspective.
CBF: Launch of English Translations Of PSM Reports
CBF Study Day: Deconstructing the border and building bridges: Towards a critical collective analysis of the French-British-Belgian border, November 2021
The UK’s border with France and Belgium has been increasingly visibilised over the last year, particularly with the increased number of crossings of the Channel in small boats and the ever-worsening situation of people stranded in this cross-border area. This study day brought together activists, NGO representatives and researchers from different sectors and disciplines to discuss various aspects of border-building, including new forms of control, but also ways in which different actors can challenge them together. The study day was organised by the Crossborder Forum, a collective of organisations from the UK, France and Belgium working on issues of asylum and migration policy. The aim of this event was, on the one hand, to collectively deconstruct the legal and political foundations of this border and, on the other hand, to build bridges beyond it.
Four topics have been developed:
A historical perspective on border controls and the externalisation of the British border
Criminalisation and containment - what the border generates
Funding the border and the delegation of control to non-state actors
Pathways for action and advocacy
Photography: Abdul Saboor
Interpreters: Sarah Baily and Magali Liebens
Thank you to Migreurop for hosting this information and the videos since February 2022.
A historical perspective on border controls and the externalisation of the British border.
Funding the border & the delegation of control to non-state actors.
Criminalisation and containment: what the border generates.
Pathways for action and advocacy.
The interventions and exchanges, which were recorded and are available on video, have been summarised.