The home secretary says she wants to protect some of the world’s most vulnerable women. Her proposals will achieve just the opposite
When Priti Patel stood up in parliament last week to unveil her plans to overhaul the asylum system, she told us she was making all this effort not for votes, not to keep out foreigners, not to appease nationalists… but for women. With a plaintive tone, she observed that those we see in small boats out on the Channel are so often men and asked: “Where are the vulnerable women and children that this system should exist to protect?”
If the home secretary really wants to find them, I can introduce her to some of these women. Indeed, I could take her this week to meet a woman I know very well – I’ll call her Gloria. Gloria comes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where the government persecutes dissidents with impunity. Gloria was involved in opposition politics. One night, soldiers came to her home, gang-raped her and took her to prison. After some time, a prison guard gave her to a stranger who said that he would help her.
