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Move to UK like jumping 'from frying pan into fire': Hongkong activists
Staff reporter 31 Jan 2023
Hongkongers "jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire" when they left for the United Kingdom, which the former director of public prosecutions, Grenville Cross, says is a disaster zone with soaring inflation and collapsing public services.
This came as UK media reported Hongkongers in the country have called on Home Secretary Suella Braverman to drop controversial amendments to a public order bill, which they find similar to "repressive measures that threaten to paralyze the entire social movement."
The proposed changes will give police the right to intervene before protests escalate to serious disruptive levels such as road blocks and allow arrests of people suspected of causing disruptions.
A letter was sent by Democracy for Hong Kong - a group of former residents in the UK who organize actions in support of the SAR's democratic movement and on behalf of southeast Asian communities.
The group wrote: "Many of us are, or represent and work with, Hongkongers who have recently arrived in the UK in hopes of a better life for ourselves and our loved ones - where we can exercise our rights and freedoms without fear."
The group voiced concerns about the proposed serious disruption prevention orders that can name people and ban them from protesting.
"We are concerned that Hongkongers and allies seeking to protest for democracy and human rights in Hong Kong could be given SDPOs, which could prohibit them from protesting and subject them to harsh restrictions on their liberty," it said.
"Also of great concern to us is the public order bill's expansion of stop-and-search powers to the protest context.
"Many Hongkongers have experienced traumatic interactions with the police in our home city."
Cross, who was born and raised in the UK but has lived in the SAR for more than four decades, said yesterday that Hongkongers who moved to his home country were "sold a false prospectus."
He added: "These people were tricked by people like the SAR's last governor Chris Patten and HK Watch's Benedict Rogers into leaving Hong Kong, and were urged to move to the 'promised land.'
"Instead, they have found a disaster zone, where inflation is at record levels, the health service is collapsing, the worst recession in 300 years is getting under way, and public services everywhere are being paralyzed by strikes - even lawyers, doctors and nurses have been striking."
Cross said police powers in the UK are now being extended. "Rights of protest are being clamped down on, with individual liberties being cut back in many areas," he said.
However, he said many Hongkongers who migrated there have burned their bridges and cannot escape back to Hong Kong.
"They are trapped there, which is why one recently took her own life in despair," the king's counsel said, referring to the suicide of a 27-year-old female master's graduate in London in November.
However, Cross said Hong Kong should welcome back its people they still have the funds to return.
If not, the SAR should offer them financial support when they want to return home.
"After all, everybody makes mistakes, and we should try to help our people who cannot stand it anymore in the UK, and realize how badly they have been conned," he said.
About 76,000 people from Hong Kong settled there between July 2021 and June 2022.
www.thestandard.com.hk
Staff reporter 31 Jan 2023
This came as UK media reported Hongkongers in the country have called on Home Secretary Suella Braverman to drop controversial amendments to a public order bill, which they find similar to "repressive measures that threaten to paralyze the entire social movement."
The proposed changes will give police the right to intervene before protests escalate to serious disruptive levels such as road blocks and allow arrests of people suspected of causing disruptions.
A letter was sent by Democracy for Hong Kong - a group of former residents in the UK who organize actions in support of the SAR's democratic movement and on behalf of southeast Asian communities.
The group wrote: "Many of us are, or represent and work with, Hongkongers who have recently arrived in the UK in hopes of a better life for ourselves and our loved ones - where we can exercise our rights and freedoms without fear."
The group voiced concerns about the proposed serious disruption prevention orders that can name people and ban them from protesting.
"We are concerned that Hongkongers and allies seeking to protest for democracy and human rights in Hong Kong could be given SDPOs, which could prohibit them from protesting and subject them to harsh restrictions on their liberty," it said.
"Also of great concern to us is the public order bill's expansion of stop-and-search powers to the protest context.
"Many Hongkongers have experienced traumatic interactions with the police in our home city."
Cross, who was born and raised in the UK but has lived in the SAR for more than four decades, said yesterday that Hongkongers who moved to his home country were "sold a false prospectus."
He added: "These people were tricked by people like the SAR's last governor Chris Patten and HK Watch's Benedict Rogers into leaving Hong Kong, and were urged to move to the 'promised land.'
"Instead, they have found a disaster zone, where inflation is at record levels, the health service is collapsing, the worst recession in 300 years is getting under way, and public services everywhere are being paralyzed by strikes - even lawyers, doctors and nurses have been striking."
Cross said police powers in the UK are now being extended. "Rights of protest are being clamped down on, with individual liberties being cut back in many areas," he said.
However, he said many Hongkongers who migrated there have burned their bridges and cannot escape back to Hong Kong.
"They are trapped there, which is why one recently took her own life in despair," the king's counsel said, referring to the suicide of a 27-year-old female master's graduate in London in November.
However, Cross said Hong Kong should welcome back its people they still have the funds to return.
If not, the SAR should offer them financial support when they want to return home.
"After all, everybody makes mistakes, and we should try to help our people who cannot stand it anymore in the UK, and realize how badly they have been conned," he said.
About 76,000 people from Hong Kong settled there between July 2021 and June 2022.
Move to UK like jumping 'from frying pan into fire'
Hongkongers "jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire" when they left for the United Kingdom, which the former director of public prosecutions, Grenville Cross, says is a disaster zone...
www.thestandard.com.hk
