In 2018 we launched No Borders Manchester. Originally under the name of Manchester Refugee Rights Collective, we are an activist group which aims to challenge border regimes in the UK and across Europe.
We are a collective made up of various strands and working groups. Firstly, we run campaigns to raise awareness and challenge the Home Office on issues like deportation and the rights of asylum seekers. We have run a number of successful fundraisers, with money sent to Help Refugees, Paris Ground Support and Refugee and Asylum Seeker Participatory Action Research. More recently, we have been supporting people with no recourse to public funds throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.
We also run English classes for various levels with Alexandra Library, which currently run online. Other projects include our signing support network, community football, and conversation classes.
In March 2020, we ran our first day-long No Borders Festival, where we were joined by many different Manchester community organisations, speakers and artists. Whilst physical space has always been integral to our work, in the current global pandemic we have been shifting a lot of our work online. Through the No Borders Zine, we hope to keep our discussions alive and continue to work with the activist networks we have established in the last few years.
If you have anything you would like to contribute to our zine, or you would like to get involved in our other work, then please get in touch!