DR PETE WIDLINSKI’S father was a Ukranian refugee who came to Britain after walking for more than two years across a post-Second World War Europe plunged into turmoil. He spoke little of his arduous journey to his son but could not hide from him the reality of the racism that met him after he settled in England.

It was those experiences, and his later work as a trade unionist, that awoke Dr Widlinski to the plight of refugees and asylum seekers.

However, it was not until many years later, when a journalist referred to him as the son of a refugee that he would come to consider himself as such.

“I remember when I was around five having to hide behind a door as a neighbour came back from work and wanted to fight as my mother was British and my father Eastern European,” he says.

“So I was conscious of this from an early age but really, it was my passion for trade unions that taught me about equal rights, about human rights and that passion has been there most of my adult life.”

Driven by the desire to help those seeking asylum as his father had, Dr Widlinski has devoted his career to helping those who have fled war and persecution, helping to found Stockton-based charity Justice First and being instrumental in other organisations, including the Mary Thompson Fund, the Tees Valley Sanctuary Group and the North of England Refugee Service.

Over decades, he has encountered and assisted countless vulnerable individuals and families, all with tales to tell of a system he says is dangerously flawed.

Along the way, he has had death threats, been under the spotlight of the nation’s media and played a part in anti-deportation campaigns that attracted the ire of politicians including Jack Straw and David Blunkett.

With a mischievous glint in his eye, he says he was once banned from Holme House Prison after protesting outside, eventually letting off fireworks as campaigners demanded the release of 50 immigration detainees kept there.

“The governor refused to come to see me and threatened to call the police if I didn’t leave their premises – I basically said “bring it on it as it will give us more publicity”.

“After a brief stand-off, I left the building and informed the media what had happened. e decided we had made a point and highlighted the unfair treatment of innocent people being held in prisons.”

Justice First assists asylum seekers whose appeals have been rejected by conducting research, uncovering new evidence and working with immigration solicitors, offering support as people navigate a complex system.

The charity supports hundreds of individuals, many whom are left in limbo for years, unable to work with no recourse to public funds.

AT the end of the month, 65-year-old Dr Widlinski will retire from the organisation, stepping back from the front line to move to a small-holding on the North York Moors. Those he has helped, and those still in need, will never be far from his mind.

Sipping from a Jeremy Corbyn mug, Dr Widlinski speaks of often unfathomable decisions as he recalls a tale of two brothers who grew up in the same tragic circumstances but were given different caseworkers. One was granted leave to stay and the other refused asylum.

He remembers a doctor who fled from the Democratic Republic of Congo after being targeted by the police and military. “The DRC is the rape capital of the world and it’s used as a form of control – he was targeted after campaigning against it but was refused asylum here three or four times,” he says. “He was a professional person whose skills we could have used but he wasn’t allowed to work or study.

“Eventually, he got his status and was then joined by his wife and child he’d never met, that was incredibly emotional after a four year fight.”

He describes the work of Justice First as “so, so important”, saying: “People come to us when they have nowhere else left to go, we’re a last resort.”

It is never easy and he describes his career as an emotional rollercoaster but there is nothing Dr Widlinski would rather have done, he says, than help those in need, those who come to know him as Mr Pete and who often become friends and colleagues.

If there is something he would like people to learn from his life’s work, he says, it is to recognise “that someone seeking asylum is fleeing from war, from persecution or death, that those who come here have made a massive effort to reach a safe country and people need to realise what it’s like to flee your country under threat, with no legal protection.

“Those who are rescued from the Mediterranean will say that it is only when it is too dangerous on land that they will take to the sea.

“If you’re somewhere like that, are you going to sit there or are you going to try and make something of your life?”