Dr Brian Gallen

Meet Dr Hari Reed, another Piddington resident. Hari signed this open letter around a year ago… Hari is also the joint CEO of the charity “Asylum Welcome”, who wrote the open letter. Open letter coordinated by Asylum Welcome bel: - “We are deeply concerned by the escalating hostility being directed towards people seeking asylum who are currently housed in our county. Dehumanising language, as well as actions such as intimidating asylum seekers or filming outside hotels, should have no place in our communities. They cause real harm, fuelling division and danger, and inflict fear and distress on already vulnerable people.  It is vital to remember that people in hotel accommodation are here because they are fleeing war, dictatorship, persecution, and terrorism. They are men, women and children seeking safety and waiting for their claims to be processed. They did not choose to live in hotels; the Home Office decides where they are housed. Families and individuals in our county have no control over these arrangements.  Vulnerable people are being used as a political football.  Our clients tell us they feel frightened and unwelcome when they see hostility directed at the places where they are forced to live. Many are already traumatised by what they have endured, and these actions deepen their isolation and despair.  At the same time, we also witness asylum seekers’ resilience, dignity, mutual solidarity and eagerness to contribute to British society. Their perspective, and the compassion shown by many local people, is too often missing from public debate.   Asylum Welcome has around 300 volunteers: local people who choose to give their time and energy to welcome newcomers. They see first-hand the difference that kindness makes — and they embody the Oxfordshire tradition of hospitality that should define us all.  Oxford and Oxfordshire are proud of their traditions of welcome. We call on political representatives, community leaders, and residents to affirm unity, reject hate, and ensure our county remains a place of safety. Facts matter: •Seeking asylum is a legal right under UK and international law, regardless of how someone arrives. Article 31 of the 1951 Refugee Convention — which the UK helped draft — makes clear refugees must not be penalised for entering a country irregularly to claim asylum.  •People in hotels are following the process required of them. The use of hotels is a Home Office policy, not the choice of asylum seekers, who are banned from working and survive on less than £10 a week for all essentials beside food.  •These are not “luxury hotels” – they are former hotels taken over and run by private companies working for the Home Office. Conditions are basic: shared rooms, poor-quality food, isolation, and long periods of waiting with no control over their lives.  •People seeking asylum are not a single group. They include families, children, LGBTQ+ people facing persecution, political activists, journalists, religious minorities, and young men escaping forced conscription. Men who make the journey ahead of their families are doing so because they are risking their own lives first, in the hope of later bringing loved ones through safe and legal routes — routes which are now extremely limited or closed.  •International law does not require refugees to seek asylum in the first safe country they reach. If it did, only border states would take responsibility, and the global asylum system would collapse. The UK currently receives fewer than 1% of the world’s refugees.  •There is no credible evidence that people seeking asylum commit more crimes than the UK-born population. Claims to the contrary are fuelled by misinformation.  We ask everyone in Oxfordshire to uphold our values of dignity, humanity, and neighbourliness. We stand together in solidarity with people seeking asylum.”