Hello
You are a nice man
That's what the interpreter said when R's appeal hearing finished the other day
He was a nice man
You probably are
Most people are nice, aren't they?
When all's said and done?
So, just for the record
This letter isn't about you being not nice
It's about other stuff
It's a question, really
About what happened after the appeal hearing
When you called R back into the room
And gave her your decision
That she was fit for work
It was a bit of a shock, to be honest
Because R's case was supposed to be one of those 'easy' appeals
An open and shut case
A no brainer
Because of how demonstrably unwell she is
And how awful and nightmarish her life has been
And because of that report from her psychologist
Which was written a few years ago
When R was claiming asylum
Which went into graphic detail
About her terrible experiences
And how they have shaped her mental state
And how they have shaped her mental state
And how she would probably never recover
By the way, this isn't a naive letter
It isn't a hysterical rhetoric
About how the law isn't fair and needs to be changed
No
Because the law was clearly on R's side
In more ways than one
The third-party evidence about her said so, too
But you decided it didn't, for some reason
And you're The Judge
So what you say goes
It was baffling
And disheartening
And, for R, the start of another uphill struggle
Because now she has to go and sign on
And decide what kind of job she'd 'like to do'
And fill in her forms
And look for a job
And impress people at interviews
And if she doesn't look for a job in the way that she's told to
Which she probably won't because, frankly, she's too fucked to know what day of the week it is a lot of the time
Her money will stop
So, here is the question:
If you had a daughter in her early twenties
Who was made to watch her mother and sisters being raped and murdered
And was then taken by militia to a tiny cell
And chained up
And made to sleep on a concrete floor
And chained up
And made to sleep on a concrete floor
And systematically raped and tortured every day for two years
And beaten to a pulp
And who then one day managed to escape
Fearing for her life
Fearing for her life
And fled to another country on the other side of the world
And who slept in a tunnel for three days after arriving
Because she didn't know where to go
And who was terrified most of the time
And whose psychological report
Said that she had a severe depressive illness
And complex post-traumatic stress disorder
With symptoms including
Frequent nightmares
Flashbacks
Abject fear
Blinding headaches
Blinding headaches
And wanting to die
And that even if her life got markedly better
She would probably never recover from it
And who couldn't develop relationships with other people
Because she was too scared to look them in the eye
And who couldn't even function enough to notice that she needed to have a wash
And who spent most of her time sitting and staring into space
Because of the amount of horror in her head
Would you do everything you could to protect her
From the system
That you know can be very cruel indeed
Would you do everything you could to protect her
From the system
That you know can be very cruel indeed
And would you do everything in your power
To make sure that she got the massive rest she deserved
Or would you tell her to to go and look for a job?
