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Concrete steps towards community cohesion and tackling racial hatred in Bracknell will be made a year on from anti-migration protests in the country.
A series of protests took place in towns and cities in the UK after Axel Rudakubana murdered Elsie Dot Stancombe, Bebe King and Alice da Silva Aguiar in Stockport in July last year.
Rudakubana was born in Cardiff, the child of a Rwandan family.
Councillor Helen Purnell introduced a motion at a full Bracknell Forest Council meeting affirming its commitment to community cohesion and denouncing all forms of racial hatred.
Cllr Purnell (Labour, Easthampstead & Wildridings) said: “It’s coming up to the one year anniversary of the sickening riots that swept across the UK following the harrowing murder of three young children in Stockport.
“Speculation, fearmongering, mis and disinformation led to the persecution of the predominantly Muslim communities.
“Violence and criminal damage left the men, women and children of these communities across the UK living in fear.
“We were fortunate not to see any violence in Bracknell Forest. However, that did not stop members of our very own community from being frightened.
“This is not acceptable.”
Afghan refugees have arrived in Bracknell through the Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme initiated by the previous Conservative government in 2022.
The scheme involves providing housing to re-home refugees in a process begun by the council’s previous Conservative administration in 2023.
It is understood that Afghan families are staying at a ‘transitional hotel’ while the seven homes in that scheme are being prepared.
Vloggers Truth Hurts 101 UK and Mitch Media have visited Bracknell to do videos on the Grange Hotel in the town centre.
A council spokesperson has clarified that the people in the transitional hotel have indefinite leave to remain in the UK.
Cllr Purnell added that she met the refugees with a church leader, an imam and a veteran.
She continued: “We met men, women and children who have arrived in Bracknell in search of a safe and peaceful life.
“A life where their little girls can go to school and achieve their dreams and aspirations.
“We all offered our help and support, and I was humbled by their gratitude and their desire to integrate into their new communities. What a different life we’ve been able to offer them.”
The motion was then debated. It also binds the cabinet to co-produce a new communities strategy.
Cllr Nick Allen (Conservative, Owlsmoor & College Town) said: “This is part of our borough’s core principles, it’s what we do.
“However, I still think this is a vanity motion, I don’t think it does anything positive for our residents.
“Whilst I believe in community cohesion, I do not believe vacuous motions such as this are a way to achieve it.”
Cllr Mike Forster (Liberal Democrats, Sandhurst) said: “I get the sense that our Conservative colleagues using such words as ‘vacuous’ and ‘vanity’ are not going to support this motion.
“That’s genuinely shameful. I’m at a loss for words. As community leaders, we need to show that cohesion.”
He added that leaders have to “raise their game” to promote cohesion given its fragility, as he experienced when serving during the Yugoslav Wars in the 1990s.
The motion was approved at the meeting on July 9, with 26 for, six against and three abstentions.
