For the first time in COP’s history, organisations from across the UK’s migrant rights sector have come together to issue an urgent call for solidarity with people forced to move because of the impacts of the climate crisis.

The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, Migrants Organise and City of Sanctuary UK released a statement today – ‘Solutions Day’ – the last day of COP27. It calls for improved access to rights and justice for people on the move in an era of climate breakdown.

They state: “As organisations that work with people on the frontlines of climate breakdown, we know first-hand that for many, migration is already a survival strategy. We must act now to create safe avenues for people who have been forced to move by the impacts of climate breakdown. ”

Zrinka Bralo, CEO of Migrants Organise said:

“As the climate and ecological crisis deepens, we are seeing more and more people forced to leave their homes. Most often, it is communities who have contributed the least to climate breakdown that are experiencing the worst climate loss and damage. “

It’s estimated that the richest 1% of the world’s population cause twice as much carbon dioxide as the poorest 50%, who live overwhelmingly in countries most vulnerable to climate change.

The UN has warned of a ‘climate apartheid’, as wealthy nations pay to escape overheating, hunger and conflict while the rest of the world is left to suffer. These injustices are not an accident – they are rooted in colonialism. Rainforests, wetlands, grasslands and minerals were decimated as a result of resource extraction, and indigenous communities were enslaved, displaced and murdered so that colonisers could exploit their land to increase their own wealth and power.

This exploitation and extraction are major drivers behind climate chaos and the poverty that has left the most affected countries struggling to adapt to it and where many of the practices of colonialism survive.

Zehrah Hasan, Director of Advocacy at JCWI said:

“People move, they always have and they always will – migration is the story of human history. People move for love, for work, for study, and as climate breakdown escalates, we know that more communities will have to move to survive.

“Yet, just as the need to move becomes more necessary, we’re seeing politicians across Europe ramp up anti-migrant rhetoric and try to strip away the rights of those fleeing danger. We must reject this politics of hostility, accept that migration is part of the solution, and demand dignity and justice for people forced to move.”

Instead the UK government describes the arrival of migrants as an “invasion”, detains them in overcrowded and unsanitary camps, dumps them without accommodation or suitable clothing on the streets of London and threatens to deport them to Rwanda, a country accused of “extrajudicial killings, deaths in custody, enforced disappearances and torture.”

This latest plan has been stalled for months amid challenges in the courts, as well as the refusal of several airlines to carry out the removals. But there are fears that the UK government is trying to operate a similar scheme away from the public gaze.

Sri Lankan asylum seekers stranded on Diego Garcia, a remote island in the British Indian Ocean Territory, are expected to be transported to Rwanda for medical treatment, the British Foreign Office has confirmed. “This could be the precursor to the Rwanda plan,” said Janahan Sivanathan, a paralegal at the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants.

Sian Summers-Rees, Chief Officer of City of Sanctuary UK said:

“We cannot have conversations about climate change without also talking about migrant rights. Instead of punishing and criminalising those who seek safety, we must act now to create safe avenues for people who have been forced to move by the impacts of climate breakdown.”

JCWI recently held a webinar on these issues, which can be viewed here.

In a separate initiative, Refugee Action are calling on the government to life the ban on asylum seekers from working. The organisation estimates that lifting the ban would benefit the UK economy by more than £300 million a year through savings and new tax.