There must be an independent inquiry into Penwith's policy of bullying discrimination

Last week's report on the eviction in Penzance of seven Polish migrant workers after a dawn raid by Penwith District Council officers raises some disturbing questions.

It was reported that the evictions took place 'after dawn raids revealed their rented home to be overcrowded and unsafe'. Seven people were sharing a three bedroom house. Overcrowded? Neither the legal definitions of overcrowding nor that of the Housing Health and Safety Rating Scheme suggests that the property was overcrowded. Did the council give the legally required 24 hours' notice that it intended visiting the property for the purpose of seeing if it should take any action about overcrowding or to measure rooms to establish the permitted number of people allowed to live there? Was the council required to serve a notice of eviction? Did the council make any constructive suggestions to improve the safety of the premises? Why were the migrants given only two hours to vacate the house? Is that reasonable or lawful?

Mr Turnbull, Penwith's senior environmental health officer, admitted that early morning raids 'could seem heavy-handed but claimed it is the only way to find out how many people are living in a property'. Nonsense. The council can serve a notice requiring the occupier or landlord to provide the authority, within 14 days, with details of the persons sleeping in the premises. It is an offence not to comply. And a day of surveillance, or interviews with the landlord, tenants or neighbours would have sufficed to establish the facts. In these circumstances, a dawn raid is both heavy handed and disproportionate. Mr Turnhill should understand that he is dealing with citizens with rights. They are not criminals.

In an attempted defence of all this, Katrina Islam, Penwith's housing advice co-ordinator, reassured us that B&B accommodation was provided for one family and advisers were 'on-hand' to help with others. For how long was the B&B provided? Was it, as in a similar case last year also involving the abrupt eviction of migrant workers from premises in Penzance, just for a few days before the family was ordered to leave?

But we can measure the usefulness of the advice given by Katrina Islam's team by the outcome: seven people who were 'overcrowding' a three bedroom house are now sharing a hotel room or are street homeless. Did the on-hand advisers offer anything beyond: "Sorry, we can't help"?

If the tenants had been English, would the council have acted in this way? Certainly not.

If the council had a statutory duty to re-house them, would they still have been evicted? Probably not. As Katrina Islam helpfully points out, the council does not have such a duty. If it did, there can be little doubt that the policy towards the migrant workers might have been one of turning a blind eye rather than dawn raid eviction.

A witness of the raid said that the manner of the evictions made him feel embarrassed to be English. Quite so, or, nearer to home, embarrassed, angry and ashamed to be associated with this district council and its methods.

The St Ivean calls for an independent inquiry into this shameful affair.

Mr Turnbull, breathtakingly, attempts to suggest to us that he and his team were doing the seven men and women he put out onto the street at dawn on a February morning a favour by saving them from unscrupulous landlords. On the contrary, rather than a constructive policy of compassionate support for some of our fellow workers in need, what we seem to have here in Penwith is an aggressive policy of bullying discrimination.