On Thursday 24th September, over 200 international students who were wrongly accused of cheating on an English test havesigned and delivered a letter to the Prime Minister urging him “to put an end to our detention, deportation and humiliation”.
In 2014, about 34,000 students were wrongly accused of cheating in the Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC). Ever since they have been fighting to prove their innocence, and are now calling on Boris Johnson to take urgent action to end this injustice.Migrant Voice have been campaigning alongside the students for justice since 2017.
Calling on Boris Johnson’s intervention, Director Nazek Ramadan said,“These students have been living a nightmare for six years. Stripped of their rights and their futures destroyed, many are destitute and suffering severe mental health problems. There is a mountain of evidence that proves they are victims of a mammoth injustice – and the Government can ignore this no longer.
“We urge the Prime Minister: Listen to the students, look at the evidence and take the action needed to put this right.”
Stephen Timms to join students for protests outside Parliament Square
These students are stripped off their basic rights including the right to work in the UK, have virtually no financial assistance. They have been, particularly vulnerable during the coronavirus pandemic as they remain primarily unlisted in the NHS. Additionally, their fight to clear their name off the cheating scandal has accosted them with financial loans of thousands of pounds to front their appeals in court. The students’ letter will be delivered by post, but – subject to Covid-19 restrictions – a small number of the affected students will be demonstrating in Parliament Square and will be joined by Stephen Timms MP, a longstanding advocate for justice for these students.
These protests emerge after Home Office secretary Mathew Rycroft “agreed”last week that there were “some parallels” between the Windrush scandal and the TOEIC test scandal. While he acknowledged that the Home Office lacked “vigour” in allowing these students to clear their reputation, the Home Office also refused a review of their cases.
This injustice was the result of the same tendency to act based on “anecdote, assumption and prejudice” as identified by the Public Accounts Committee in its report last week. Reports by the National Audit Office, Public Accounts Committee and APPG on TOEIC last year exposed fundamental flaws in the evidence used by the Home Office against the students and proved that the decision to revoke or refuse tens of thousands of visas was wholly unjustified.
Terrified of catching virus and suffering depression students request for independent review of cases
Former Home Secretary Sajid Javid recognised the scale of this injustice and on his first day in office, Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised to address this issue. But students have seen no progress. On the contrary, Home Secretary Priti Patel has scrapped a scheme proposed by Javid that could have provided a route for students to clear their name, and failing to propose any other solution.
Frustrated by the delays and silence, the students are now making a direct appeal to the Prime Minister. The letter to Johnson reads,
“The Home Office has stolen our futures, branding us frauds and forcing us to bear a lifelong mark of shame. Many of us are destitute, barely able to survive or care for our families, having spent everything we own trying to clear our names. Many of us are suffering from severe stress and depression. Some of us have even attempted to take our own lives because we see no other way out.
“The coronavirus pandemic has made our situation even worse. Our support networks have collapsed, the charities we rely on have been closed, our friends and families are unable to help as they are struggling themselves. We are terrified of catching the virus and being hospitalised, or dying with a black mark still against our names. This is not the future we wanted or worked for.
“Allow us to prove our innocence by establishing a free and transparent scheme - independent of the Home Office - through which we can get our cases to be reviewed and clear our names.We came to the UK for a world-class education and to pursue our dreams, but that has been cruelly taken from us. We’re asking you, as the Prime Minister, to show leadership and allow us the chance to start rebuilding our lives as we come out of this pandemic. Let this be a fresh start for us all.”
