A collection of poems written by survivors, domestic violence sector workers and their allies were spread across the Tube network.

The poems document the real stories of women and non-binary people who have found themselves locked up in prison, locked out of refuges and locked in violent relationships.

The Southeast London Sisters Uncut group distributed 300 copies of the poems, designed to mimic the famous ‘Poems of the Underground’ posters, across the Central, Northern, Victoria and Piccadilly lines.

In the poems, authors describe how they fear fleeing violent relationships because of their insecure immigration status, while others share experiences of being imprisoned in detention centres after reporting the domestic abuse they suffered to police.

The group believe the Government’s ‘hostile environment’ towards migration means that women and non-binary people with an insecure immigration status are barred from accessing publicly-funded domestic violence services and also risk being arrested, detained and deported when reporting abuse to police and local authorities.

Last summer, Southeast London Sisters Uncut exposed the practice of covert immigration officers being embedded in local-authority run domestic violence services, in an attempt to catch those with unstable immigration status when they attempted to disclose abuse.

BME women’s groups have raised concern at how the threat of immigration removal is subsequently being “used by abusers against women – to scare them into not seeking help.”

Nadia Bell, Sisters Uncut activist, said: “This International Women’s Day, it is important to recognise the work that still needs to be done to guarantee safety for ALL survivors, regardless of their race, gender, sexual orientation or immigration status.”

Some of the poems also focus on the Government’s Domestic Abuse Bill, which places a large focus on expanding police powers.

Sisters Uncut are concerned that this will further criminalise survivors of domestic violence, as in the USA, similar policies have led to an increase in the number of survivors being arrested.