STOP DANGEROUS DRIVERS! NO MORE WH DEPORTATION TOURS!
Public demo at WH Tours offices, Kelvin Way, Crawley
Saturday, 27th March 2010
Meet 11am at Crawley train station / 11.30am outside WH Tours. Bring banners and instruments.
WH Tours is a coach company based in Crawley, near Gatwick airport. Part of the company's business is leisure: coach excursions, sightseeing tours and so on. Another part, however, is much more sinister: the company provides coaches for transporting detained migrants facing deportation from immigration prisons to airports to be deported on commercial or specially chartered flights.
Forcible deportations tear apart people's lives as they are split from their families and communities and their right to freedom of movement is denied. On top of this, the vast majority of deportations have been to countries devastated by wars and armed conflicts (often caused by western colonial interests) such as Afghanistan, Iraq, DR Congo, Nigeria, Jamaica, Sri Lanka and so on. After being forcibly deported, many have been kidnapped, imprisoned, tortured and killed. Others have had to change their identities or move again to avoid persecution.
By providing coaches to transport deportees to the airport, WH Tours is complicit in the human tragedies that forcible deportations cause.
Deportees, including families and children, are also treated as criminals. They are typically handcuffed and accompanied by two private security guards each. There have been many reports of racial and violent abuse suffered by deportees at the hands of private 'escorts'. WH Tours is complicit in these illegal acts too.
London No Borders and No Borders Brighton are calling for WH Tours to immediately end its contracts with G4S, the UKBA and any other other private or government body involved in the deportation machine.
We are calling for all individuals, schools and companies that use WH Tours to boycott them until the company ends its involvement in deportation. See model letter to send to WH Tours here.
We are also calling for a public demo ouside WH Tours office, (The Kelvin Centre, Kelvin Way, Crawley RH10 9SF) on Saturday, 27th March, to express our disgust at its shameful involvement in this inhumane industry.