Outrage and condemnation followed the revelation that Immigration minister Robert Jenrick had ordered murals of cartoon characters to be painted over at a reception centre for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, because they were “too welcoming”. Staff at the Kent intake unit (KIU) were said to be horrified at the command to delete the murals, which included images of Mickey Mouse and Tom & Jerry. The Home Office has revealed that some lone children arriving in small boats are as young as nine, but Kenrick is said to have decided that the murals “sent the wrong message”. His subsequent cover-up order sparked protest across the political spectrum and way beyond. In the Lords, Home Office minister Lord Murray attempted to mitigate the PR disaster by saying the murals had been painted by contract support workers and had not been approved by his department. But Lord Brownlow, a major Tory donor, said he was “ashamed” of the explanation, and the House and the wider community would have preferred to hear an admission that it had been a “mistake to paint over those murals, and that a contractor will be commissioned to repaint them.” While Tories struggled to justify the move in interviews, Labour said that Jenrick, a close ally of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, was “putting Britain to shame”, while the Liberal Democrats described the action as “the worst kind of trivial nastiness”. Social media has been awash with protest. Labour’s John McDonnell wrote on Twitter of the “inhumane” and “cruel” Tories and their treatment of “some of the most vulnerable and traumatised children arriving in our country, pleading for help and kindness.” Former Children’s Laureate, Michael Rosen, expressed his rage by posting a new poem in the style of Auden’s “Stop all the clocks”. It begins, “Paint over Mickey Mouse,” and ends with, “Abolish all hope.” Even those who broadly agree with “Stop the boats” targets have written that this treatment of children is a massive step too far. So while the murals were easily painted over, the command to erase them may not be so easily covered up come the next election.
