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Season 2 episode 4 of the Resist + Renew podcast, where we interview Savan from the No Evictions Network.
“Evictions, arresting people, kidnapping them – it has a long history… undermining human rights, disrespecting human beings”
– Savan
Show notes, links
No Evictions Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
A few extra links:
Transcript
ALI
This is Resist Renew,
KATHERINE
the UK based podcast about social movements,
SAMI
what we’re fighting for, why and how it all happens.
ALI
The hosts of the show are
KATHERINE
Me, Kat.
SAMI
Me, Sami,
ALI
and me, Ali.
SAMI
I’m recording this now, baby!
ALI
Shit, it’s a podcast!
KATHERINE
Okay, so here we go. Welcome to this episode of the Resist Renew podcast. Tonight we’re really glad to be joined by Savan from the No Evictions Network. Savan is originally Kurdish, he joined the No Evictions Network in January 2021. He’s a student studying Political Economy and Philosophy, as well as being a human rights activist and campaigner. Welcome. It’s so great to have you tonight.
SAVAN
Thank you very much, Katherine. And Sami, thank you for having me.
KATHERINE
Great.
So we’re gonna start with the first question, which is: What is the political context that you’re organising in? Can you tell us a little bit about that?
SAVAN
Yes, in general, well, I, I suppose answer on behalf of No Evictions, so what No Evictions does at the moment, we concentrate on a few things. One of them is basically what we stand for is No Evictions. We’re trying to see, we don’t want to see any eviction in Glasgow, in general because that’s our capacity in Glasgow, but also we’re trying to influence other organisations to do the same around Scotland and even in the UK.
We’re focusing on that, and also the new Immigration Bill’s one of the things I’m focusing on. I’ve got a group, we are trying to resist as much as possible and trying to raise awareness and also influence, influence the politicians to stand up against the Immigration Bill. And one of the things it was I’m sure you both familiar with the Kenmure Street event it was trying to obviously was about eviction and arresting people during the Muslim celebration. Trying to put two people again in the van and stuff like that, so we have a group monitoring the immigration van and trying to be there for them be there for the people who are at risk to be you know, we call that kidnapping in our you know, a way to say kidnapping and actually taking them to somewhere we don’t know and nobody else know. And we have a group focusing on raising awareness in East Ends and in those areas we focus in on those areas mainly refugees and asylum seekers learning.
And we trying to get in touch with the community, basically, be trying to raise awareness from the local community with the shop and you know, the neighbours and all of that. So we’re trying to let them know that’s what’s going on. If you notice something please give us a call or please stand up, you know, we’re trying to hold them off to we’re going to be there. And we’re trying to, you know, save lives as much as they possibly can. So that’s what we mainly broadly we focus in on.
KATHERINE
Thanks so much for sharing, it sounds like really varied work as well that you’re doing: both like on the ground stopping the kidnapping from happening, but also this raising awareness within the community so more people know. And, and for people that maybe are a little bit less familiar with what’s going on with the immigration system and with evictions, more generally, could you just share a little bit for us about, kind of, what’s, what’s happening at the moment: why why is this resistance needed?
SAVAN
Yes, sure. So we have, we have a broken immigration system, we have a very broken immigration system. And in recent years and under Priti Patel the Home Secretary it’s going to be more broken and demolished. So if eviction and arresting people and kidnapping them has been, it has a long history, actually: it’s not, it’s not a new thing. I know Camera Street highlighted that than any other time. But it’s been happening and it was happening and it’s still happening.
So basically what they’ve done is a people with ‘failed asylum seekers’, ‘failed asylum seekers’ are those people where they’ve been here for 10 years, over 10 years, though they’re undocumented migrants. And so, what the Home Office do, you know, usually they don’t even send a notice for for the applicant for the person. So they just go to their house: six o’clock in the morning, four o’clock in the morning. They simply go you know, they rack into a terror event, you know what I mean? So so they go, they’re arresting them while they’re sleeping, with no respect for their human rights and nothing like that. Put them in a van without letting them know where they go, how they go. All of all of this kind of stuff.
So they completely undermine the human rights and the human rights and they completely disrespecting human beings in general. And those people, at the end of the day, might not have a piece of paper say they’re legal, so to speak. But they have blood in me, like all of us, so they’re human and they need to be treated as the way we all been treated.
Even if you takes llegal action, do it in a legal way that you normally do for any other human being any EU citizen. So they make a big difference. They treat this human being just because they’re not citizen, a citizen or they don’t have citizenship, they don’t hold any citizenship. They treat them like very inhumanely; but whereas you know, in compare in, you know, in contrary, they treat other people, rightly with the justice system with legal. Let them know, give notice: that’s the court date, that’s where you’re going to go. All of these information, they don’t have these things and sometimes they go… ah, no, I talk too much, please stop me when whenever you want.
KATHERINE
No, it’s great.
SAVAN
So they put them in a deport centre without letting them know, without having a legal access. And even nowadays with new immigration law they’re trying to take so many more rights, legal rights away, they cannot challenge that. So I would like to stop.
SAMI
Amazing. Thank you, Savan. And I think firstly, no, please, please talk as much as you like. I think we’re definitely enjoying it. Yeah, thank you for that information about like, the broader context, the current like immigration system and things like that. Because and I think it’s really important what you said that, I also agree that people can act as if, if like evictions, like detention, deportation, all of these things can can be considered to be like quite like ‘new’ things and people will talk about the ‘hostile environment’ and so I think it’s really important to make the point that like these things have been going on way longer than the phrase ‘the hostile environment’ in the UK. For decades, if not longer, depending on what kind of stuff you’re bringing into scope. So I think it’s really important to ground, ground ourselves in that when we think about it.
So you said a little bit about No Evictions Network and the work you do, and you talked a little bit about having some like Glasgow-focused work because you’re there’s at least some kind of link with Glasgow in the No Evictions Network but please correct me if I’m wrong. But also you mentioned some wider stuff around, like, Scotland and maybe the wider UK and things like that. So could you say a little bit more about, like, what like, what what does your organisation kind of like focus on and what you’re about. Like, is it a Glasgow thing, it is a Scotland thing, is it a UK thing, like: what do you see as the focus of the group?
SAVAN
Very good question! So we have, so we basically work on events and on necessity. For example, in Glasgow we have the highest number of refugees compared, for example, to Ayrshire. In Ayrshire for example, we might have five or six refugees here. Although we are not thinking about ignoring them just because they are less numbers, though, out-numbered. But so the main focus is on Glasgow because, just because of the high number of refugees, and obviously when there is a high number of refugees and asylum seekers there will be a high number of events and incidents.
But in terms of broad work together, when it comes to, for example, when the issue requires more collaboration for example, we had an act that we were working with every organisation in the UK, from London, Manchester around the UK, Edinburgh, all of Scotland, Wales, so it was it was gotten very y’know, collective. It was a it was against Mears Group so we’re trying to expose the you know the managers and stuff like that. So for that, it was collection work around all around the UK, because Mears Group also had a house in, for example, in Manchester and places like that. So we have shared values and organisation came together.
Obviously, unity is one of the things we are focusing on, we’re trying to be united we’re trying to be an organisation to come together because I think together we have stronger voice and we have stronger influence on, on the policy, on, on, on government. So, but when the situation only requires one particular area, for example, in Glasgow, we have more capacity in Glasgow because actually No Evictions was in Glasgow so the beginning of No Evictions was started in Glasgow. It was the time that Serco was changing the locks. So basically you are going out, you’re a migrant and you are going out to see your friend, and coming home, your lock will change. So you were evicted and you were homeless, and then and your stuff was right outside of the door.
So No Evictions started resisting to make a lot of change. So that’s why our members are mainly in Glasgow, but we are working we trying very hard, and we’ve been successful at gathering other organisation and to have a collective work.
SAMI
Great.
SAVAN
I hope I answered your question.
SAMI
You definitely did. And you, you gave me a lot of thoughts which mean I want to ask you a follow up question as well if that’s okay. Which is: you… It sounds like you, in terms of what your group focuses on, what No Evictions Network focuses on, it sounds like there’s a bit of a balance of a few different, kind of, tactics; is this fair? Like, it sounds like there’s a little bit of stuff around what maybe you could call like ‘direct action’, or like kind of like direct resistance work of like, trying to stop evictions, kidnappings, as they happen: trying to stop people getting detained in immigration raids, things like that. And there’s also an aspect of it, which is more, like, kind of, maybe campaigning work, which is maybe what you mentioned with the campaign against Mears, which I’m sure will probably ask you another question about maybe later.
SAVAN
You’ve absolutely got it right. That’s what No Evictions does. We we have our priority. I think the urgent matters for us is the eviction matters. Obviously, when when you talk about human rights and protecting others, it’s always urgency, the urgency. But some some matters are more urgent than others. So eviction, when we know some people are going to be evicted. So we have more direct action. So what we’ve done: we organise communities in each area. For example we have in Pollokshields, so we have group each so that they can go act as quick as possible. So we managed to organise that, and it works quite well. So we have always few people there. And to let us know if there is something going wrong.
But in terms of campaigning, yes, of course we have a group. All of us: we’re doing that, and we’re doing the campaigning work as well. And the campaigning side now is focusing on the new Immigration Bill.
SAMI
Amazing, thank you. And I think it’s, I think it really, what what I’m getting from partly from your answer is, like, how important it is to have that really, like, locally grounded and, like, locally rooted resistance stuff. Because like you mentioned, for people that aren’t like maybe Glasgow familiar like East End, Pollokshields, these places you’re mentioning, they’re like areas of Glasgow, right? And so, like, having that really, like, locally, locally, rooted locally grounded resistance sounds really important. And it’s, and I think that focus on Glasgow, because there is a high density of like, people who can, like, coordinate and can struggle together. That sounds very, like tactically sensible.
I think, like I come from my perspective, I’m part of a group, which does work against like immigration raids, in like a, in a borough of London as well. So I’m seeing like, I see a lot of affinity there, which makes sense, because I’ve also, I think, I’ve had chats with people from No Evictions Network before about immigration raid-y stuff. But I think, yeah, it reminded me there’s a, there’s a resource that we made in our anti raids group to map where immigration raids happen in London, to give people an idea in places where they’re not already organising against immigration raids to say like, if you live in this place, like this would be a really good thing to struggle around. Because, like, there are a lot of immigration raids that happen. There’s a lot of attempted kidnappings that the state will do in our communities, and there’s stuff you can do about it. And I think No Evictions Network Chemyou Street and otherwise is like a really good model for that. So. So thank you, thank you for your work, Savan! So, I’ll stop gushing. Katherine!
SAVAN
No, I enjoy listening to you.
KATHERINE
Yeah, you should gush, gushing is great.
[musical break]
SAMI
I am interested to know like, how does being, like, What does being part of No Evictions Network look like? If you can give it, paint a bit of a picture? Like as in, do you have like, like regular meetings? Like, do you have different meetings, for like the different bits of stuff because you mentioned some campaign things, you’ve mentioned some, like more direct action things. Do people like, is there like different working groups for folks from different bits? Like, how does it, how does it work? You don’t necessarily need to share loads of detail if you’re not comfortable with it, because obviously sometimes groups when they’re like, you know, struggling against the state don’t want to lay out all of the detail of what they do and how they do it! But if there’s anything you could speak to
SAVAN
Sure, of course
SAMI
That’d be really interesting.
SAVAN
I think I’m the most layout person with authority. You know, I’ve always went to protests, everyone say when the police come in and say, ‘Who organised this’ and everyone say, ‘Oh, we just we all organise it.’ I say, ‘I organised it.’ Because I know I’m there for a good reason and I’m not there to do something stupid, so unlike, you knows what they do to the people.
So basically No Eviction got every month meeting and got different group as well. So we approved anti raids group we have, we have group, the no immigrant, anti anti no Immigration Bill, the new Immigration Bill. We have a group, a campaign, you know that. And we have a comms group are dealing with, you know, the communications, press conference, not press conference, not that big yet! But press release and stuff like that, sorry. Also, we have response group. So what we do is not just campaigning and activism and resisting to eviction, we also have a response team that we’re helping asylum seekers and refugee with food and clothes and stuff like that.
Because what’s so great about No Eviction: we have people from every walks of life, we have people manager in the charity show, we have people we have PhD doctor we have, we kind of have people in every sector of the, in the society. So when asylum seeker asked for help, we always got someone to stand up and say, Okay, I can offer something. So we have the response team who has to helping asylum seekers out in their daily needs and basic thing.
We have anti roots groups. Now they have different focus. They’re trying to raise awareness, and sharing leaflets and stuff like that. We have our group, the new Immigration Bill, anti Immigration Bill, we are trying to campaign and protests most likely.
So we have regular meeting, each group got their different timing for meetings and different ways that they organise events and stuff like that. Be we all do it under one umbrella, which is No Evictions. And then No Evictions is under one umbrella, which is human nature.
SAMI
Amazing. Thank you. I love it as a description. And I think it’s, I think it’s really, I really like the model of all of those different things existing within one group. Because in some places, you’d have like, maybe there’d be like a direct support group that would do like support with food and stuff like that. And maybe you’ll have another group that will do, like, eviction, resistance stuff. And then you’ll have another group that will do, like, campaigning: that’s often the case in London, where I live, because just because so many people. There are so many groups and things like that, that it can become a little bit more specialised. So I think it’s really nice that in No Evictions Network, you’ve got all of those things kind of all working together under one under one banner. I imagine it makes the collaboration between the different bits easier than if they were all different groups.
SAVAN
Absolutely. Yeah. Because we have, I mean, where some of us are focusing on the New Immigration Bill? When there is a need? In response to I’ll go. When there is a need in the comms group, I’ll go and vice versa. So it’s like, we always we’re very interconnected together.
SAMI
Mm. Resilience, that’s what they call that., right? Like, each bit can support each other bit. Love it.
KATHERINE
So good. And yes, I think you mentioned already, but we’re just wanting to bring attention to what you’re focusing on now. And you mentioned the new Immigration Bill, is an area of work that you’re currently working on. I’m just wondering if you could share a bit more about about that?
SAVAN
Yes, of course. So I’m not trying to take any credit. But once the new Immigration Bill before, started going into the first reading in the House of Commons. So we started shouting out on Twitter. It was so hard to make people aware of what’s going on. If for some, you know, one can say ‘I’m not politically engaged, I don’t even know what does that mean?’ So it was very hard one for me to put a big statement for a four statement, putting it out on Twitter, begging people to please share, tagging people and do that. So I made a lot of noise about that. And then I brought that so first, for No Evictions, even for No Evictions it was something we were kind of thinking about considering or not. So I was like you would do it or I will do myself individually. So I was very determined about it because i’ve i’ve read the Bill, I knew what was going on.
So I’m very fortunate that No Evictions responded very positively. And then they said, We’ll help you, So we made a group, different group it’s still a part of No Eviction. Then we start focusing on the new Immigration Bill. What we were trying to concentrate on, just highlight, because it was too much information: very, very, it was too much, very informative.
KATHERINE
Yeah.
SAVAN
And it was a lot of law inserted, lot of law was deleted, removed. So we tried to focus on the damage, highlight the damage, and we made a poster. So we shared the poster on Twitter and everywhere and with our network. So we wrote a lot of a rose awareness at the time, we had a good response from everywhere from MPs, MSPs. And they were trying to get engaged. And after that, we’ve done that. And when we put a, we got press, we got press to cover our, our concerns.
And then what we’ve done, we tried to organise, we’ve organised the protests in front of Scottish Parliament, obviously, for some people was nonsense, because the immigration matter is a reserved matter, why would we go into Scottish in front of Scottish Parliament and asking Scottish Government to act. But we thought like Scottish government can do something more than just saying, ‘Oh, it’s a reserved matter.’ So we we went there, we have MPs and MSPs coming out: Please let us talk and let us share our concern and we were happy.
So we managed to send a clear message: Say it loud and say it clear, refugees are welcome here. So we sent that message, that was our message. At least, you know, with, at least in Scotland, in Scotland, we have the politician somehow, you know, calling refugees, ‘new Scots’: very good approach. So we rose that. So the new Immigration Bill was something that’s got to government through the protests, they confirmed that they are against it. And they know they’re not cooperating for example, and one of the things they said we know they’re going to cooperate in an new Immigration Bill that says we use in the barracks and an army base to house asylum seekers. And the Scottish government responded to say, We will not going to do that. So great achievement.
SAMI
I have a sorry, I have our follow up question. But it’s not about that, Katherine.
KATHERINE
Go, on, you go.
SAMI
And it was because you also mentioned, and it comes to my mind because you mentioned the barracks and stuff. You also mentioned that you have a campaign going on against Mears? Which, correct me if I’m wrong, Savan, they’re the one of those big shady conglomerates that does loads of stuff like G4S and Serco and all those kind of things and what they do, what I know them for is they do a lot of the immigration housing in the UK. Is that right? Could you talk a little bit about Mears and the work that you’ve been doing around that?
SAVAN
Yeah, sure. So it was a campaign, we launched the campaign, I think, if I’m not wrong, it was somewhat few, several months ago. So really, really bad from you know, from memory, I’ve got a very bad memory. But so we launched we launched a campaign against Mears Group because Mears was treating asylum seekers terribly. Put them in a house: very bad food, bad hygiene people was it was in the middle of the pandemic. It wasn’t COVID COVID secure and Mears Group was trying to get the cheapest the cheapest cheapest house for asylum seekers, they were actually moving asylum seekers from their house to do hotels. That was something else, was one thing that amazed me when I spoke to one of the Mears director – II think was director – and I asked him I was like, I’ll just I’m just wondering because the UK government’s saying you’re not allowed to. The hospitality sector was totally closed. Hotel, hotel for me is the hospitality sector, but you’re using those sector for asylum seekers? If it’s okay for for asylum seekers, why is not okay for other people? If it is not okay for the people? Why is it okay for asylum seekers? So, so I was like, Is it like something that COVID-19 will recognise your citizenship or your legal status or COVID-19 will treat you will, you know, contract with every human being? How can you put 200 people in a hotel? And how can you, you know, how’s that safe for them? And in response, they say, Oh, we’re trying our best and stuff like that.
And I’ll share one information with youse that I never shared with anyone else. So in, I was like, I was really interested why these house conditions are very bad. So I managed to get someone that they were housing, they were giving houses for Home Office and Serco and stuff like that. That was a temporary accommodation to provide, they show me the picture of the house. Brilliant house you would love to live in. But do you know what he said, he said, ‘They took us our contract away because our house was too good.’ Too good for them. So they were like, basically they told us very, very clearly: We look for the cheapest house with the worst condition. That rat playing football in a kitchen. You know, so molten moulding, all of that. So basically, what Mears done a profit maker. That’s what happens when you have private companies taking over of something I could call humanitarian crisis.
So we’ve got 1 billion pound contract, and they’re trying to spend as minimum as possible. They were paying the staff very, very, you know, minimum wage. And they’re treating the staff and asylum seekers, like, very inhumanely. So we stood up for that and we will compare and contrast the asylum seekers house to the director’s stuff. So we made a website called landro the landlord landlord asylum seekers. So we we’ve done that. We found out one of the directors got living in a house worth two point something million pound when he was the one saying, ‘Oh, putting four people, or putting 25 people in the barracks is okay is appropriate,’ but he was living in 2.3 million house just right next to the barracks in Sheffield. So we put that, his photo, put on the website and share it. So that’s basically what we were what we were doing against Mears. And I could say they really feared of our campaign because we exposed a lot of information about them.
SAMI
Great, thank you Savan. And I think that the those kind of those kind of struggles against, like commendation for refugees, migrants asylum seekers, I think is it feels like it’s really been like a key point of struggle in the last 12,18 months because of COVID. But it’s not, I think, I guess it’s really important to also reflect on the fact that it’s not a one off: it’s not a COVID thing. Like, migrants are housed in terrible conditions. They were housed in terrible conditions before COVID and they’ll probably continue to be housed in terrible conditions as we start to transition out of like, out of COVID times regardless of how true that is. Because there’s a lot of virus around.
SAVAN
You’re absolutely right, you point out a very, very good point. You know, the housing was terrible. Always been terrible. Because Because always been in the hands of private companies and private companies always focus on one thing, which is profit.
SAMI
Yeah. I think, and I think even when even when it’s been state run, like it’s like the thing I think of often is like prisons, as I think people talk about with prisons. Like obviously, there’s, there’s an element of prisons and detention, which is like when prisons are run for private profit, then that can be a thing that is really, like exacerbating like really making worse some of the really horrific elements of prison, but then even when they’re run by the state it’s still terrible, like it’s still a prison. And so like, and I think that’s often the case with like, migrant accommodation as well, like, even when it’s run by the state it’s still often really bad. Like I think of people struggles that I see, people who are like friends, friends of friends in the area that I live.
SAVAN
Sami I mean, I would say I would say I would add one more thing to that so, the you know, the prison kind of thing. So the prison example, if it was run by a profit, a private company, and versus run by government, so we can give we can have two example. One of the examples is Serco running a prison in Scotland in HMP Kilmallock. So this prison, so how do you have a perfect service by giving those people who provide the service good wage and respect and you know, they’re working 40, 40 hours per week? I know our situation is not prison, but: 40 hours per week they get 18,000 per year so basically nine pounds per hour and become a prisoner of 7,12 hours they all shut it in. Obviously they don’t have that, you know they’re all depressed and they’re all like thinking about their life; they’ve been thinking about the wage of this is wage I’m getting you know, it’s not worth it. So obviously they’re not they’re not do their best, you know, to rehabilitate our prisons and stuff like that.
But versus that we have, we have prison run by government, we have Netherland we have we in Netherland we have a prison there. And one can say I wish to live in that prison because it’s run by government, it’s very nice and calm and they actually rehabilitate people. So the situation with obviously in the UK it’s very different. It’s a capital, it’s very capitalist in the way, like, everything’s about profit.
But I wish that was government, you know, UK government was running all of this kind of stuff, prisons, housing, accommodation, and all that stuff. Because it’s all subcontract. They give a billion pound to me, here’s Mears going looking for cheaper, and that company looking for cheaper, and then you get the cheapest quality. That’s the problem with that.
SAMI
Yeah, 100%. And I think we can, I’ll try and not sidetrack us into a big conversation around, like, prisons and rehabilitation and all this kind of stuff. Because I think we could get sidetracked for ages. Yeah, but i think that, i think the point that you make is a really good one around like that what, like what, what often matters, and what can be a real site of struggle is like, is the conditions regardless of what causes them, right? Like the, the point is that conditions are really bad, and like that is the site of struggle. And let’s maybe let’s park that one and come back to it maybe later.
And I think there’s another question that we wanted to ask you, a little bit of a tangent, is: How do you like live the values of No Evictions network in whatever sense, you’ve got them in the outward facing work that you do, like what do you do to put your values into practice?
SAVAN
So it was a good question and it’s all are good questions. And so what we do, basically we’re raising awareness in the communities and basic, but we raise awareness around ourself as well. So we refresh ourselves, what we stand for, and what we against what we stand for, and why we against those things.
For example, in any meeting, we go, the first thing we do: reading, reading out a statement, and in that statement we’re talking about equality, sorry, we’re talking about equality, we’re talking about respect, we’re talking about, you know, all of these kind of virtues. So what we do, we refresh ourselves all the time, it doesn’t mean all of all of us, all of us always, you know, practice the, you know, as best as possible. But we try as best as possible to be as respectful as possible. And we try to reflect on our works and with our colleagues, and also with those people we approach.
So, I know I’ve got 10 minutes to talk about that. So I couldn’t say, I can I can give you one, one thing about it. So obviously, this group, we have seen value, that’s why we all came together. So it reminds me something of Aristotle saying, When you have a good virtue, which is, one with a good virtue, you will always do good. So we hopefully what we do, and he says regardless, he says, Regardless where they go, and regardless what they do, regardless, when they do, they always do good, because they have good virtue. So people with good virtue, I hope we are one of them. So we try to reflect to our colleagues and to our friends as much as possible.
SAMI
Great, thank you. I think that’s a very fair point. That’s a very concise answer in terms of the question, so thank you for that. And Katherine.
KATHERINE
Yeah, so I feel like because you’ve named so many of the amazing campaigns that you’re working on and a lot of different kinds of actions that you’re you’re doing and have done over the last while, some of our listeners might be wanting to know how they could get involved with No Evictions Network and I was just wondering if you could share with us how people might be able to join you or work with you if they wanted to?
SAVAN
Of course though, that’s a great chance to asking people to join us. They can join us through our social media. Our Twitter is NoEvictionsNetwork and our Facebook is No Evictions Network Glasgow – I don’t use Facebook but I’m sure that’s what it is. And it’s the same for Instagram.
And we’ve got phone numbers on our website as well: just write down No Evictions Glasgow you’ll see our website and there’s phone number there, there’s detail that you can you can get in touch with us obviously. We are very, very happy you know, to expand our our group as much as possible, and we love to hear from anyone who’ve got the same virtues.
KATHERINE
That’s great, thank you and we can share in the show notes, the links to the Twitter and the website and their social media. So thanks so much.
ALI
Thanks once again to Savan from No Evictions Network for being on this episode. As already mentioned, you can follow them on Twitter and Instagram they are @no_evictions. And their Facebook page is Glasgow No Evictions Campaign. As always, thanks to Klaus and Kareem Samara for letting us use their music for backing tracks.
And if you want to find out more about Resist + Renew, you can also follow us on socials. Our website is Resist Renew calm where you can find the transcripts for all the episodes. And we also have a Patreon, so if you want to support them production of this podcast and future episodes, please consider giving there.
Thanks so much for listening and see you next time.
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Season 2 episode 4 of the Resist + Renew podcast, where we interview Savan from the No Evictions Network.
“Evictions, arresting people, kidnapping them – it has a long history… undermining human rights, disrespecting human beings”
– Savan
Show notes, links
No Evictions Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
A few extra links:
Transcript
ALI
This is Resist Renew,
KATHERINE
the UK based podcast about social movements,
SAMI
what we’re fighting for, why and how it all happens.
ALI
The hosts of the show are
KATHERINE
Me, Kat.
SAMI
Me, Sami,
ALI
and me, Ali.
SAMI
I’m recording this now, baby!
ALI
Shit, it’s a podcast!
KATHERINE
Okay, so here we go. Welcome to this episode of the Resist Renew podcast. Tonight we’re really glad to be joined by Savan from the No Evictions Network. Savan is originally Kurdish, he joined the No Evictions Network in January 2021. He’s a student studying Political Economy and Philosophy, as well as being a human rights activist and campaigner. Welcome. It’s so great to have you tonight.
SAVAN
Thank you very much, Katherine. And Sami, thank you for having me.
KATHERINE
Great.
So we’re gonna start with the first question, which is: What is the political context that you’re organising in? Can you tell us a little bit about that?
SAVAN
Yes, in general, well, I, I suppose answer on behalf of No Evictions, so what No Evictions does at the moment, we concentrate on a few things. One of them is basically what we stand for is No Evictions. We’re trying to see, we don’t want to see any eviction in Glasgow, in general because that’s our capacity in Glasgow, but also we’re trying to influence other organisations to do the same around Scotland and even in the UK.
We’re focusing on that, and also the new Immigration Bill’s one of the things I’m focusing on. I’ve got a group, we are trying to resist as much as possible and trying to raise awareness and also influence, influence the politicians to stand up against the Immigration Bill. And one of the things it was I’m sure you both familiar with the Kenmure Street event it was trying to obviously was about eviction and arresting people during the Muslim celebration. Trying to put two people again in the van and stuff like that, so we have a group monitoring the immigration van and trying to be there for them be there for the people who are at risk to be you know, we call that kidnapping in our you know, a way to say kidnapping and actually taking them to somewhere we don’t know and nobody else know. And we have a group focusing on raising awareness in East Ends and in those areas we focus in on those areas mainly refugees and asylum seekers learning.
And we trying to get in touch with the community, basically, be trying to raise awareness from the local community with the shop and you know, the neighbours and all of that. So we’re trying to let them know that’s what’s going on. If you notice something please give us a call or please stand up, you know, we’re trying to hold them off to we’re going to be there. And we’re trying to, you know, save lives as much as they possibly can. So that’s what we mainly broadly we focus in on.
KATHERINE
Thanks so much for sharing, it sounds like really varied work as well that you’re doing: both like on the ground stopping the kidnapping from happening, but also this raising awareness within the community so more people know. And, and for people that maybe are a little bit less familiar with what’s going on with the immigration system and with evictions, more generally, could you just share a little bit for us about, kind of, what’s, what’s happening at the moment: why why is this resistance needed?
SAVAN
Yes, sure. So we have, we have a broken immigration system, we have a very broken immigration system. And in recent years and under Priti Patel the Home Secretary it’s going to be more broken and demolished. So if eviction and arresting people and kidnapping them has been, it has a long history, actually: it’s not, it’s not a new thing. I know Camera Street highlighted that than any other time. But it’s been happening and it was happening and it’s still happening.
So basically what they’ve done is a people with ‘failed asylum seekers’, ‘failed asylum seekers’ are those people where they’ve been here for 10 years, over 10 years, though they’re undocumented migrants. And so, what the Home Office do, you know, usually they don’t even send a notice for for the applicant for the person. So they just go to their house: six o’clock in the morning, four o’clock in the morning. They simply go you know, they rack into a terror event, you know what I mean? So so they go, they’re arresting them while they’re sleeping, with no respect for their human rights and nothing like that. Put them in a van without letting them know where they go, how they go. All of all of this kind of stuff.
So they completely undermine the human rights and the human rights and they completely disrespecting human beings in general. And those people, at the end of the day, might not have a piece of paper say they’re legal, so to speak. But they have blood in me, like all of us, so they’re human and they need to be treated as the way we all been treated.
Even if you takes llegal action, do it in a legal way that you normally do for any other human being any EU citizen. So they make a big difference. They treat this human being just because they’re not citizen, a citizen or they don’t have citizenship, they don’t hold any citizenship. They treat them like very inhumanely; but whereas you know, in compare in, you know, in contrary, they treat other people, rightly with the justice system with legal. Let them know, give notice: that’s the court date, that’s where you’re going to go. All of these information, they don’t have these things and sometimes they go… ah, no, I talk too much, please stop me when whenever you want.
KATHERINE
No, it’s great.
SAVAN
So they put them in a deport centre without letting them know, without having a legal access. And even nowadays with new immigration law they’re trying to take so many more rights, legal rights away, they cannot challenge that. So I would like to stop.
SAMI
Amazing. Thank you, Savan. And I think firstly, no, please, please talk as much as you like. I think we’re definitely enjoying it. Yeah, thank you for that information about like, the broader context, the current like immigration system and things like that. Because and I think it’s really important what you said that, I also agree that people can act as if, if like evictions, like detention, deportation, all of these things can can be considered to be like quite like ‘new’ things and people will talk about the ‘hostile environment’ and so I think it’s really important to make the point that like these things have been going on way longer than the phrase ‘the hostile environment’ in the UK. For decades, if not longer, depending on what kind of stuff you’re bringing into scope. So I think it’s really important to ground, ground ourselves in that when we think about it.
So you said a little bit about No Evictions Network and the work you do, and you talked a little bit about having some like Glasgow-focused work because you’re there’s at least some kind of link with Glasgow in the No Evictions Network but please correct me if I’m wrong. But also you mentioned some wider stuff around, like, Scotland and maybe the wider UK and things like that. So could you say a little bit more about, like, what like, what what does your organisation kind of like focus on and what you’re about. Like, is it a Glasgow thing, it is a Scotland thing, is it a UK thing, like: what do you see as the focus of the group?
SAVAN
Very good question! So we have, so we basically work on events and on necessity. For example, in Glasgow we have the highest number of refugees compared, for example, to Ayrshire. In Ayrshire for example, we might have five or six refugees here. Although we are not thinking about ignoring them just because they are less numbers, though, out-numbered. But so the main focus is on Glasgow because, just because of the high number of refugees, and obviously when there is a high number of refugees and asylum seekers there will be a high number of events and incidents.
But in terms of broad work together, when it comes to, for example, when the issue requires more collaboration for example, we had an act that we were working with every organisation in the UK, from London, Manchester around the UK, Edinburgh, all of Scotland, Wales, so it was it was gotten very y’know, collective. It was a it was against Mears Group so we’re trying to expose the you know the managers and stuff like that. So for that, it was collection work around all around the UK, because Mears Group also had a house in, for example, in Manchester and places like that. So we have shared values and organisation came together.
Obviously, unity is one of the things we are focusing on, we’re trying to be united we’re trying to be an organisation to come together because I think together we have stronger voice and we have stronger influence on, on the policy, on, on, on government. So, but when the situation only requires one particular area, for example, in Glasgow, we have more capacity in Glasgow because actually No Evictions was in Glasgow so the beginning of No Evictions was started in Glasgow. It was the time that Serco was changing the locks. So basically you are going out, you’re a migrant and you are going out to see your friend, and coming home, your lock will change. So you were evicted and you were homeless, and then and your stuff was right outside of the door.
So No Evictions started resisting to make a lot of change. So that’s why our members are mainly in Glasgow, but we are working we trying very hard, and we’ve been successful at gathering other organisation and to have a collective work.
SAMI
Great.
SAVAN
I hope I answered your question.
SAMI
You definitely did. And you, you gave me a lot of thoughts which mean I want to ask you a follow up question as well if that’s okay. Which is: you… It sounds like you, in terms of what your group focuses on, what No Evictions Network focuses on, it sounds like there’s a bit of a balance of a few different, kind of, tactics; is this fair? Like, it sounds like there’s a little bit of stuff around what maybe you could call like ‘direct action’, or like kind of like direct resistance work of like, trying to stop evictions, kidnappings, as they happen: trying to stop people getting detained in immigration raids, things like that. And there’s also an aspect of it, which is more, like, kind of, maybe campaigning work, which is maybe what you mentioned with the campaign against Mears, which I’m sure will probably ask you another question about maybe later.
SAVAN
You’ve absolutely got it right. That’s what No Evictions does. We we have our priority. I think the urgent matters for us is the eviction matters. Obviously, when when you talk about human rights and protecting others, it’s always urgency, the urgency. But some some matters are more urgent than others. So eviction, when we know some people are going to be evicted. So we have more direct action. So what we’ve done: we organise communities in each area. For example we have in Pollokshields, so we have group each so that they can go act as quick as possible. So we managed to organise that, and it works quite well. So we have always few people there. And to let us know if there is something going wrong.
But in terms of campaigning, yes, of course we have a group. All of us: we’re doing that, and we’re doing the campaigning work as well. And the campaigning side now is focusing on the new Immigration Bill.
SAMI
Amazing, thank you. And I think it’s, I think it really, what what I’m getting from partly from your answer is, like, how important it is to have that really, like, locally grounded and, like, locally rooted resistance stuff. Because like you mentioned, for people that aren’t like maybe Glasgow familiar like East End, Pollokshields, these places you’re mentioning, they’re like areas of Glasgow, right? And so, like, having that really, like, locally, locally, rooted locally grounded resistance sounds really important. And it’s, and I think that focus on Glasgow, because there is a high density of like, people who can, like, coordinate and can struggle together. That sounds very, like tactically sensible.
I think, like I come from my perspective, I’m part of a group, which does work against like immigration raids, in like a, in a borough of London as well. So I’m seeing like, I see a lot of affinity there, which makes sense, because I’ve also, I think, I’ve had chats with people from No Evictions Network before about immigration raid-y stuff. But I think, yeah, it reminded me there’s a, there’s a resource that we made in our anti raids group to map where immigration raids happen in London, to give people an idea in places where they’re not already organising against immigration raids to say like, if you live in this place, like this would be a really good thing to struggle around. Because, like, there are a lot of immigration raids that happen. There’s a lot of attempted kidnappings that the state will do in our communities, and there’s stuff you can do about it. And I think No Evictions Network Chemyou Street and otherwise is like a really good model for that. So. So thank you, thank you for your work, Savan! So, I’ll stop gushing. Katherine!
SAVAN
No, I enjoy listening to you.
KATHERINE
Yeah, you should gush, gushing is great.
[musical break]
SAMI
I am interested to know like, how does being, like, What does being part of No Evictions Network look like? If you can give it, paint a bit of a picture? Like as in, do you have like, like regular meetings? Like, do you have different meetings, for like the different bits of stuff because you mentioned some campaign things, you’ve mentioned some, like more direct action things. Do people like, is there like different working groups for folks from different bits? Like, how does it, how does it work? You don’t necessarily need to share loads of detail if you’re not comfortable with it, because obviously sometimes groups when they’re like, you know, struggling against the state don’t want to lay out all of the detail of what they do and how they do it! But if there’s anything you could speak to
SAVAN
Sure, of course
SAMI
That’d be really interesting.
SAVAN
I think I’m the most layout person with authority. You know, I’ve always went to protests, everyone say when the police come in and say, ‘Who organised this’ and everyone say, ‘Oh, we just we all organise it.’ I say, ‘I organised it.’ Because I know I’m there for a good reason and I’m not there to do something stupid, so unlike, you knows what they do to the people.
So basically No Eviction got every month meeting and got different group as well. So we approved anti raids group we have, we have group, the no immigrant, anti anti no Immigration Bill, the new Immigration Bill. We have a group, a campaign, you know that. And we have a comms group are dealing with, you know, the communications, press conference, not press conference, not that big yet! But press release and stuff like that, sorry. Also, we have response group. So what we do is not just campaigning and activism and resisting to eviction, we also have a response team that we’re helping asylum seekers and refugee with food and clothes and stuff like that.
Because what’s so great about No Eviction: we have people from every walks of life, we have people manager in the charity show, we have people we have PhD doctor we have, we kind of have people in every sector of the, in the society. So when asylum seeker asked for help, we always got someone to stand up and say, Okay, I can offer something. So we have the response team who has to helping asylum seekers out in their daily needs and basic thing.
We have anti roots groups. Now they have different focus. They’re trying to raise awareness, and sharing leaflets and stuff like that. We have our group, the new Immigration Bill, anti Immigration Bill, we are trying to campaign and protests most likely.
So we have regular meeting, each group got their different timing for meetings and different ways that they organise events and stuff like that. Be we all do it under one umbrella, which is No Evictions. And then No Evictions is under one umbrella, which is human nature.
SAMI
Amazing. Thank you. I love it as a description. And I think it’s, I think it’s really, I really like the model of all of those different things existing within one group. Because in some places, you’d have like, maybe there’d be like a direct support group that would do like support with food and stuff like that. And maybe you’ll have another group that will do, like, eviction, resistance stuff. And then you’ll have another group that will do, like, campaigning: that’s often the case in London, where I live, because just because so many people. There are so many groups and things like that, that it can become a little bit more specialised. So I think it’s really nice that in No Evictions Network, you’ve got all of those things kind of all working together under one under one banner. I imagine it makes the collaboration between the different bits easier than if they were all different groups.
SAVAN
Absolutely. Yeah. Because we have, I mean, where some of us are focusing on the New Immigration Bill? When there is a need? In response to I’ll go. When there is a need in the comms group, I’ll go and vice versa. So it’s like, we always we’re very interconnected together.
SAMI
Mm. Resilience, that’s what they call that., right? Like, each bit can support each other bit. Love it.
KATHERINE
So good. And yes, I think you mentioned already, but we’re just wanting to bring attention to what you’re focusing on now. And you mentioned the new Immigration Bill, is an area of work that you’re currently working on. I’m just wondering if you could share a bit more about about that?
SAVAN
Yes, of course. So I’m not trying to take any credit. But once the new Immigration Bill before, started going into the first reading in the House of Commons. So we started shouting out on Twitter. It was so hard to make people aware of what’s going on. If for some, you know, one can say ‘I’m not politically engaged, I don’t even know what does that mean?’ So it was very hard one for me to put a big statement for a four statement, putting it out on Twitter, begging people to please share, tagging people and do that. So I made a lot of noise about that. And then I brought that so first, for No Evictions, even for No Evictions it was something we were kind of thinking about considering or not. So I was like you would do it or I will do myself individually. So I was very determined about it because i’ve i’ve read the Bill, I knew what was going on.
So I’m very fortunate that No Evictions responded very positively. And then they said, We’ll help you, So we made a group, different group it’s still a part of No Eviction. Then we start focusing on the new Immigration Bill. What we were trying to concentrate on, just highlight, because it was too much information: very, very, it was too much, very informative.
KATHERINE
Yeah.
SAVAN
And it was a lot of law inserted, lot of law was deleted, removed. So we tried to focus on the damage, highlight the damage, and we made a poster. So we shared the poster on Twitter and everywhere and with our network. So we wrote a lot of a rose awareness at the time, we had a good response from everywhere from MPs, MSPs. And they were trying to get engaged. And after that, we’ve done that. And when we put a, we got press, we got press to cover our, our concerns.
And then what we’ve done, we tried to organise, we’ve organised the protests in front of Scottish Parliament, obviously, for some people was nonsense, because the immigration matter is a reserved matter, why would we go into Scottish in front of Scottish Parliament and asking Scottish Government to act. But we thought like Scottish government can do something more than just saying, ‘Oh, it’s a reserved matter.’ So we we went there, we have MPs and MSPs coming out: Please let us talk and let us share our concern and we were happy.
So we managed to send a clear message: Say it loud and say it clear, refugees are welcome here. So we sent that message, that was our message. At least, you know, with, at least in Scotland, in Scotland, we have the politician somehow, you know, calling refugees, ‘new Scots’: very good approach. So we rose that. So the new Immigration Bill was something that’s got to government through the protests, they confirmed that they are against it. And they know they’re not cooperating for example, and one of the things they said we know they’re going to cooperate in an new Immigration Bill that says we use in the barracks and an army base to house asylum seekers. And the Scottish government responded to say, We will not going to do that. So great achievement.
SAMI
I have a sorry, I have our follow up question. But it’s not about that, Katherine.
KATHERINE
Go, on, you go.
SAMI
And it was because you also mentioned, and it comes to my mind because you mentioned the barracks and stuff. You also mentioned that you have a campaign going on against Mears? Which, correct me if I’m wrong, Savan, they’re the one of those big shady conglomerates that does loads of stuff like G4S and Serco and all those kind of things and what they do, what I know them for is they do a lot of the immigration housing in the UK. Is that right? Could you talk a little bit about Mears and the work that you’ve been doing around that?
SAVAN
Yeah, sure. So it was a campaign, we launched the campaign, I think, if I’m not wrong, it was somewhat few, several months ago. So really, really bad from you know, from memory, I’ve got a very bad memory. But so we launched we launched a campaign against Mears Group because Mears was treating asylum seekers terribly. Put them in a house: very bad food, bad hygiene people was it was in the middle of the pandemic. It wasn’t COVID COVID secure and Mears Group was trying to get the cheapest the cheapest cheapest house for asylum seekers, they were actually moving asylum seekers from their house to do hotels. That was something else, was one thing that amazed me when I spoke to one of the Mears director – II think was director – and I asked him I was like, I’ll just I’m just wondering because the UK government’s saying you’re not allowed to. The hospitality sector was totally closed. Hotel, hotel for me is the hospitality sector, but you’re using those sector for asylum seekers? If it’s okay for for asylum seekers, why is not okay for other people? If it is not okay for the people? Why is it okay for asylum seekers? So, so I was like, Is it like something that COVID-19 will recognise your citizenship or your legal status or COVID-19 will treat you will, you know, contract with every human being? How can you put 200 people in a hotel? And how can you, you know, how’s that safe for them? And in response, they say, Oh, we’re trying our best and stuff like that.
And I’ll share one information with youse that I never shared with anyone else. So in, I was like, I was really interested why these house conditions are very bad. So I managed to get someone that they were housing, they were giving houses for Home Office and Serco and stuff like that. That was a temporary accommodation to provide, they show me the picture of the house. Brilliant house you would love to live in. But do you know what he said, he said, ‘They took us our contract away because our house was too good.’ Too good for them. So they were like, basically they told us very, very clearly: We look for the cheapest house with the worst condition. That rat playing football in a kitchen. You know, so molten moulding, all of that. So basically, what Mears done a profit maker. That’s what happens when you have private companies taking over of something I could call humanitarian crisis.
So we’ve got 1 billion pound contract, and they’re trying to spend as minimum as possible. They were paying the staff very, very, you know, minimum wage. And they’re treating the staff and asylum seekers, like, very inhumanely. So we stood up for that and we will compare and contrast the asylum seekers house to the director’s stuff. So we made a website called landro the landlord landlord asylum seekers. So we we’ve done that. We found out one of the directors got living in a house worth two point something million pound when he was the one saying, ‘Oh, putting four people, or putting 25 people in the barracks is okay is appropriate,’ but he was living in 2.3 million house just right next to the barracks in Sheffield. So we put that, his photo, put on the website and share it. So that’s basically what we were what we were doing against Mears. And I could say they really feared of our campaign because we exposed a lot of information about them.
SAMI
Great, thank you Savan. And I think that the those kind of those kind of struggles against, like commendation for refugees, migrants asylum seekers, I think is it feels like it’s really been like a key point of struggle in the last 12,18 months because of COVID. But it’s not, I think, I guess it’s really important to also reflect on the fact that it’s not a one off: it’s not a COVID thing. Like, migrants are housed in terrible conditions. They were housed in terrible conditions before COVID and they’ll probably continue to be housed in terrible conditions as we start to transition out of like, out of COVID times regardless of how true that is. Because there’s a lot of virus around.
SAVAN
You’re absolutely right, you point out a very, very good point. You know, the housing was terrible. Always been terrible. Because Because always been in the hands of private companies and private companies always focus on one thing, which is profit.
SAMI
Yeah. I think, and I think even when even when it’s been state run, like it’s like the thing I think of often is like prisons, as I think people talk about with prisons. Like obviously, there’s, there’s an element of prisons and detention, which is like when prisons are run for private profit, then that can be a thing that is really, like exacerbating like really making worse some of the really horrific elements of prison, but then even when they’re run by the state it’s still terrible, like it’s still a prison. And so like, and I think that’s often the case with like, migrant accommodation as well, like, even when it’s run by the state it’s still often really bad. Like I think of people struggles that I see, people who are like friends, friends of friends in the area that I live.
SAVAN
Sami I mean, I would say I would say I would add one more thing to that so, the you know, the prison kind of thing. So the prison example, if it was run by a profit, a private company, and versus run by government, so we can give we can have two example. One of the examples is Serco running a prison in Scotland in HMP Kilmallock. So this prison, so how do you have a perfect service by giving those people who provide the service good wage and respect and you know, they’re working 40, 40 hours per week? I know our situation is not prison, but: 40 hours per week they get 18,000 per year so basically nine pounds per hour and become a prisoner of 7,12 hours they all shut it in. Obviously they don’t have that, you know they’re all depressed and they’re all like thinking about their life; they’ve been thinking about the wage of this is wage I’m getting you know, it’s not worth it. So obviously they’re not they’re not do their best, you know, to rehabilitate our prisons and stuff like that.
But versus that we have, we have prison run by government, we have Netherland we have we in Netherland we have a prison there. And one can say I wish to live in that prison because it’s run by government, it’s very nice and calm and they actually rehabilitate people. So the situation with obviously in the UK it’s very different. It’s a capital, it’s very capitalist in the way, like, everything’s about profit.
But I wish that was government, you know, UK government was running all of this kind of stuff, prisons, housing, accommodation, and all that stuff. Because it’s all subcontract. They give a billion pound to me, here’s Mears going looking for cheaper, and that company looking for cheaper, and then you get the cheapest quality. That’s the problem with that.
SAMI
Yeah, 100%. And I think we can, I’ll try and not sidetrack us into a big conversation around, like, prisons and rehabilitation and all this kind of stuff. Because I think we could get sidetracked for ages. Yeah, but i think that, i think the point that you make is a really good one around like that what, like what, what often matters, and what can be a real site of struggle is like, is the conditions regardless of what causes them, right? Like the, the point is that conditions are really bad, and like that is the site of struggle. And let’s maybe let’s park that one and come back to it maybe later.
And I think there’s another question that we wanted to ask you, a little bit of a tangent, is: How do you like live the values of No Evictions network in whatever sense, you’ve got them in the outward facing work that you do, like what do you do to put your values into practice?
SAVAN
So it was a good question and it’s all are good questions. And so what we do, basically we’re raising awareness in the communities and basic, but we raise awareness around ourself as well. So we refresh ourselves, what we stand for, and what we against what we stand for, and why we against those things.
For example, in any meeting, we go, the first thing we do: reading, reading out a statement, and in that statement we’re talking about equality, sorry, we’re talking about equality, we’re talking about respect, we’re talking about, you know, all of these kind of virtues. So what we do, we refresh ourselves all the time, it doesn’t mean all of all of us, all of us always, you know, practice the, you know, as best as possible. But we try as best as possible to be as respectful as possible. And we try to reflect on our works and with our colleagues, and also with those people we approach.
So, I know I’ve got 10 minutes to talk about that. So I couldn’t say, I can I can give you one, one thing about it. So obviously, this group, we have seen value, that’s why we all came together. So it reminds me something of Aristotle saying, When you have a good virtue, which is, one with a good virtue, you will always do good. So we hopefully what we do, and he says regardless, he says, Regardless where they go, and regardless what they do, regardless, when they do, they always do good, because they have good virtue. So people with good virtue, I hope we are one of them. So we try to reflect to our colleagues and to our friends as much as possible.
SAMI
Great, thank you. I think that’s a very fair point. That’s a very concise answer in terms of the question, so thank you for that. And Katherine.
KATHERINE
Yeah, so I feel like because you’ve named so many of the amazing campaigns that you’re working on and a lot of different kinds of actions that you’re you’re doing and have done over the last while, some of our listeners might be wanting to know how they could get involved with No Evictions Network and I was just wondering if you could share with us how people might be able to join you or work with you if they wanted to?
SAVAN
Of course though, that’s a great chance to asking people to join us. They can join us through our social media. Our Twitter is NoEvictionsNetwork and our Facebook is No Evictions Network Glasgow – I don’t use Facebook but I’m sure that’s what it is. And it’s the same for Instagram.
And we’ve got phone numbers on our website as well: just write down No Evictions Glasgow you’ll see our website and there’s phone number there, there’s detail that you can you can get in touch with us obviously. We are very, very happy you know, to expand our our group as much as possible, and we love to hear from anyone who’ve got the same virtues.
KATHERINE
That’s great, thank you and we can share in the show notes, the links to the Twitter and the website and their social media. So thanks so much.
ALI
Thanks once again to Savan from No Evictions Network for being on this episode. As already mentioned, you can follow them on Twitter and Instagram they are @no_evictions. And their Facebook page is Glasgow No Evictions Campaign. As always, thanks to Klaus and Kareem Samara for letting us use their music for backing tracks.
And if you want to find out more about Resist + Renew, you can also follow us on socials. Our website is Resist Renew calm where you can find the transcripts for all the episodes. And we also have a Patreon, so if you want to support them production of this podcast and future episodes, please consider giving there.
Thanks so much for listening and see you next time.
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