Philip Rudge – A Tireless Campaigner for Refugee Rights in Europe

By Martin Barber and Jeff Crisp

We were both working at the British Refugee Council (BRC) in 1984, when Philip Rudge arrived to set up the office of the modestly-named European Consultation on Refugees and Exiles (ECRE) on the top floor of 3-9 Bondway, in Vauxhall in London, the home of the BRC. ECRE had started life in the Netherlands as a project of the Dutch Refugee Council. The decision to set up a formal office in London arose from an understanding among a small group of key European NGO partners that their advocacy for refugees would benefit from the support of a central hub led by an energetic activist. They could not have found anyone better suited to the task than Philip.

Philip was a tireless advocate for the cause of refugees and effectively launched ECRE, now called the European Council on Refugees and Exiles, as one of the most important European civil society organisations working on issues of refugees and asylum. After 13 years in the job, Philip handed over the reins and the ECRE office moved first to other locations in London and then to Brussels. Philip’s intelligence, determination and empathy, and his fluency in many European languages inspired the confidence that enabled him to steer this important institution through the years of its early growth and expansion.

As one friend has pointed out, in later years Philip had a long struggle with misfortune, including several serious illnesses and the loss of his long-time partner, Mike. Philip confronted these setbacks with extraordinary fortitude.

Philip and Mike were also generous donors to the arts, facilitated by Philip being able to operate from his wonderful flat on the 32^nd floor in the Barbican. Several young artists were able to pursue their careers as a result of Philip’s philanthropy.

As one of his last projects, Philip put together, from film he had shot in Vientiane, a unique visual record of life in Laos, where he was working at a teacher training college in the mid-1970s. Fifty years later, his former students, now scattered across the world as refugees in Australia, Canada, the UK and the US, have offered a moving tribute to an influential and much-loved teacher.

We have been friends of Philip for many decades, but our abiding memory will be of Philip banging on about refugee rights and the importance of standing up against the shameful efforts of European governments to deny those rights. Nobody was more knowledgeable than Philip about what was really going on and how to confront the abuses. In his travels around Europe he helped many new groups of activists to turn themselves into effective advocacy groups. His legacy is in those organisations.

Martin Barber was Director of the British Refugee Council from 1982 to 1988 and Jeff Crisp was Policy Officer at the British Refugee Council from 1983 to 1987.