Oscar nominee Colin Firth on Labour's turn-off refugee policy

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By Paul Canning

The Oscar nominated actor Colin Firth cites the government's refugee policies as the reason he won't vote for them again. Writing in a new book 'Why vote LibDem' (part of a series on political parties for the UK election) he says:

As a once committed Labour voter I, like so many, have been appalled by the abandonment of the values they advocated while in opposition, each Labour Home Secretary seeking to outdo the last in sheer viciousness. For me, their conduct on asylum alone is reason enough never to be able, with any conscience, to contemplate voting for them again. Increasingly I’ve found that when I’ve appealed for help on these issues the only sympathetic and engaged responses I’ve had have been from the Lib Dems.

Firth has been a long-term supporter of the Refugee Council. He told the Evening Standard:

‘These people are not freeloaders,’ says Firth, about asylum seekers. ‘If you have got an Iraqi dissident who has had the guts to get out of Iraq and come over here, does that sound like a sponging freeloader to you?

The Refugee Council says that it costs us each 33 pence a year to support asylum seekers. I would rather spend 33p a year helping someone flee torture, than buy more weapons or build the Millennium Dome. And yet people are far more upset about the money being spent on immigration than on that ridiculous piece of shit that nobody wants.

He has successfully intervened in cases, such as that of a nurse due to be deported to the Democratic Republic of Congo.