Over the last few days, we have witnessed scenes that ought to alarm every one of us.
In Northern Ireland, migrant and racialised communities have faced intimidation, violence, and organised hostility. Families have been forced to fear for their safety. Homes and communities have been targeted. People are being singled out because of who they are, where they come from, or how they are perceived by others.
Make no mistake about it: these events are not isolated incidents.
For years, many have both witnessed and warned that migrant communities would increasingly be made scapegoats for deepening social and economic crises. This is nothing new. As living standards fall, public services deteriorate, housing becomes increasingly unaffordable or inaccessible, and political institutions fail to meet people’s basic needs, anti-migrant movements have worked to redirect anger away from the real causes of these problems and towards those made most vulnerable by the systems that govern our society.
History shows that when people are encouraged to blame migrants for social and economic crises, the targets may differ but the process remains the same. Across the world, communities facing insecurity and hardship are encouraged to turn on those who are denied rights, protections, and security rather than those responsible for creating or benefiting from those conditions.
For years, anti-migrant movements have built their organisations, spread their narratives, sharpened their tactics, and deepened hostility towards migrants within an already existing state-sanctioned hostile environment. What we are witnessing today is neither the beginning nor the end of a process. It is the result of years of scapegoating, years of anti-migrant organising, and years of poison peddled by politicians, sections of the media, and organised anti-migrant forces.
We are now seeing the consequences.
It is the reality that migrant and racialised communities have been living through and warning about for years. For many people and families, this is not a prediction of what may come. It is what is already happening.
And unless it is confronted, it will not stop here.
The crises facing our society are deepening. Economic insecurity, political instability, climate breakdown, war, growing inequality, and increasingly concentrated wealth and power are reshaping the political landscape around us. More and more people are searching for explanations and answers.
The question is who will provide them.
One path leads towards greater division, dehumanisation, authoritarianism, nationalism, and the continued targeting of migrants and racialised communities.
Another allows the status quo to continue: worsening insecurity, declining living standards, and ever harsher treatment and blame of those already pushed to the margins.
But there is another possibility: a future built on solidarity, dignity, people-led democracy, and collective power. A future in which people come together across communities to challenge exploitation, reject division, and build something better—a society where all people, regardless of where they were born or their immigration status, can enjoy their rights fully and unconditionally.
Which path we take will depend on what we do now.
That is why what we are building together through the Migrant Workers’ Rights Coalition is so important.
At a moment like this, no single organisation can meet the challenge alone. Trade unions, migrants’ rights and migrant-led organisations, community groups, social justice organisations, researchers, legal advocates, campaigners, and organisers all have a role to play.
We need a shared understanding of the threats we face and a collective strategy capable not only of defending migrant workers and migrant communities, but of advancing our rights, building collective power, and securing human security for all.
We need stronger relationships, deeper commitments, greater coordination, and a clearer vision of the future we are fighting for.
Many of us have spent years producing research, organising workplaces, building campaigns, supporting migrant communities, and strengthening solidarity across sectors. We know what is happening. We know what is at stake. But ultimately our task is much simpler than that: to ensure that when people are told to fear and hate their neighbours, they choose to stand with them instead.
To build communities capable of resisting division, protecting one another, and collectively demanding the rights, dignity, and security needed for everyone to live and thrive.
We Keep Each Other Safe
Moments like this remind us that solidarity is not a slogan, tagline, or brand.
It is a practice. It is a commitment. It is choosing to stand with one another when others would have us turn against each other.
Solidarity is measured not by what we believe, but by what we are prepared to risk for one another.
When institutions fail to protect people, we protect one another. When fear is used to divide us, we build stronger bonds. When migrants are targeted, we stand together—across communities, across backgrounds, and across immigration statuses.
The months and years ahead will demand real courage, organisation, and determination from all of us. But we are not facing them alone.
We have each other.
Let us continue building the relationships, trust, and collective power that will be needed not only to defend our communities today, but to shape a more just future tomorrow.
The Migrant Workers’ Rights Coalition (MWRC) is a growing coalition of over 40 trade unions, migrant-led groups, frontline support and advice organisations, and research bodies building collective power to advance and defend the rights of all migrant workers in the UK.
The Migrant Workers’ Rights Coalition is coordinated by Regularise.