• MY family came to the UK as refugees and welcomed by the borough’s voluntary and council services we were able to restart our lives and build a home in a community we have contributed back into ever since.

Ours is not a unique story, in Camden or the UK. Our country has been made richer and better thanks to the contributions made by refugees and immigrants to it.

A number of my fellow Camden Labour candidates also share a similar refugee and immigrant background and we are proud of our manifesto pledge to make Camden a “Borough of Sanctuary” that would take strong action to welcome refugees.

Building on this pledge would see us set up: a board to bring together organisations in the borough supporting refugees; a befriending service to make sure all refugees are linked to a community organisation; training for residents to become sanctuary ambassadors; 10 new sanctuary homes for refugees by growing Camden’s scheme to buy back homes lost to right-to-buy; and making sure all children seeking asylum have a place at a nursery, school or college.

The government continues to callously use refugees and immigrants as a political football, with Priti Patel’s shocking Rwanda policy the latest example of a prime minister and his government who are overseeing a cost of living crisis, and have been caught lying and breaking their own laws, using a discriminatory and cruel policy against refugees to shift attention from their own failures.

SAGAL ABDI-WALI
Labour Candidate for Camden Square ward