Three Iraqi men who risked their lives working for the British forces in Iraq got their first glimpse of life in England yesterday – in Slough.

Although the town is near the quintessentially British institutions of Windsor Castle and Eton College, the men, their wives and 12 children will begin their programme to get to grips with English culture with a tour of Slough High Street.

The interpreter, staff supervisor and mechanic and their families were the first to arrive after a campaign by The Times that highlighted the plight of those branded traitors in Iraq for working with the British Forces. Eight months ago the Government announced a review of their status and agreed to relocate those at risk.

Yesterday the three families were the first to touch down in Oxfordshire at 3am after a seven-hour flight from Basra. Now up to 2,000 Iraqis could come to Britain since they claim their lives are in peril because they chose to work with the British forces.

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BACKGROUND

• Story of brothers who worked for the British

• I’ve no regrets, says interpreter

• What’s Arabic for ‘we’ll stand by you’?

• Abandoned: the 91 Iraqis who risked all

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At RAF Brize Norton a visibly tired Abdul, 71, Abdullah, 30, and Abdul, 58, and their families were greeted by RAF personnel and introduced to two volunteers from the British Red Cross and the Migrant Helpline team.

They spent two hours filling in immigration forms – they have been granted “indefinite leave to enter” – before being taken by bus to their hotel in Slough.

Described as “exhausted”, they slept until 6pm, before beginning their first part of a two-day orientation course at the hotel. They will be taught how to adjust to their new lives in Britain as well as to understand their rights and obligations as citizens. They will also be told of the benefits, healthcare and schooling available to them and their children.

At their hotel they were handed the Iraqi UK Programme Welcome Booklet, complete with flash cards of, among other things, the currency, a three-pin plug, bank machines and, of course, the traditional British bobby, red post box and phone booth.

After being handed “pocket money” by staff from the charity, which is funded by the Home Office, they were shown pages in the pamphlet about what they could expect to buy for £10; a shopping basket containing a cabbage, coconut, pack of couscous, frozen peas, butter, bread, rice, eggs and 200g of beef.

They will then be ushered out into the streets of Slough, but only after being shown more flash cards of the inclement weather they should expect for much of the year.

During the “urban orientation” section of their course, they will be invited to tour the streets noting the signs for banks, post offices and chemists’ shops that they have already studied in their workbook. The trip will also include an explanation of how to use a pedestrian crossing and withdraw money from a cash machine.

Abdul, the only pensioner among the new intake, learnt his English interpreting skills in the 1970s while living in Bristol and working at an aircraft engineering firm before returning to Iraq. He was deeply moved to be back in Britain.

After reading a story about his arrival in The Times, he was said to have marvelled at how much more modern the country’s roads now appeared compared with 35 years ago.

After the course they will move to northeast Scotland, where they are being rehoused for six months and given cash handouts for three. Their booklet explains the need for them to obtain a national insurance number to claim benefits including jobseeker’s allowance. Another session will focus on the differences in British political life compared with Iraq.

“In the UK the police are independent from the Government,” the booklet states under a photograph of a smiling blonde-haired policewoman. “They are helpful and you should contact them if you feel threatened or if you think the law is being broken.”

While Slough, forever linked to the comic corporate culture of The Office, may seem an unusual place to greet newcomers to Britain, it has been a destination for Pakistanis, Poles, Ukrainians and Indians since the end of the Second World War, when its status as a thriving industrial centre was established.

Government figures show that 75 Iraqi staff have applied for assistance from Britain after working with British troops in Basra. More than 60 have opted for a cash settlement, while 12 others are moving to Britain.

Here and there

— Slough (population 119,067) has been the home of the Mars Bar since production began in 1932

— It is also famous for Astronomer Royal Sir William Herschel and the Cox’s Orange Pippin

— The National Audit Office named it Britain’s 7th most antisocial place

— Basra (population 2.6 million) is Iraq’s largest port, and historicially exported wool, cereal and dates

— It was founded by Umar I in AD 638 and in 665 became home to the country’s first architecturally significant mosque

— In H.G. Wells’s The Shape of Things to Come it is at the centre of a world state

Source: Times database

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