Thread by @GeorgeMonbiot

1. Every time I express my disgust about the UK's treatment of refugees (not just from Ukraine), people jump up to say: "so you'll be offering your spare room then?"
There's a short answer: I don't have a spare room.
There's a shorter answer: eff off.
And a longer one: Thread/

2. The demand that individuals solve systemic problems caused by government policy, economic inequality etc is fundamental to neoliberalism. Neoliberalism denies the role of collective action and effective politics. It seeks to individuate both the blame and the solutions.

3. Governments constantly play to this. While, with the government’s encouragement, it is commendable – in fact wonderful – that people with spare rooms are offering them to refugees, this is no substitute for effective state policy.

4. Many refugees arriving from Ukraine and elsewhere have multiple and complex needs, including the effects of extreme trauma. They need professional help covering the whole spectrum: housing, legal, employment, access to welfare and services, psychotherapy etc.

5. Needless to say, the funds for professional help remain at rock bottom, miles below the level of need. However caring the families who accept refugees may be, they do not have the skills or capacity to fill this gap.

6. There's a real danger that this turns into a Cameron-style Big Society fob-off. Using people’s kindness as an excuse to keep state spending to the barest minimum lets the government appear to do the right thing while appeasing its mean-minded, xenophobic base.

7. I would take a hefty bet that the people responding to my disgust at government policy by suggesting I sort the problem out myself belong to that mean-minded, xenophobic base.
So on second thoughts, scrub all that.
Just eff off.