Refugee Council Poliblog

Continuing the campaign to allow asylum seekers to work

By Tom, Campaigns and Public Affairs team

Last Friday the Let Them Work constituency lobby began all over the country. Small groups in every region did their bit to help the campaign by lobbying their MPs to persuade them that asylum seekers should have permission to work again – a concession that was abruptly, unjustifiably removed in July 2002. So, seven years later Refugee Council have joined up with the TUC and over 20 trade unions and other charities to push the government to change this misguided policy that wrecks lives and limits our economy.

For over six months I’ve been delivering training all over the north of England to prepare for this lobby. I’ve met so many groups of people seeking sanctuary who have suffered under an appalling system that is ‘not fit for purpose’ and has blighted their lives for years. What inspires me most in these meetings is how eager and disciplined these groups are. For me, the campaign is a matter of justice, of doing the decent thing by people who deserve dignity and respect. But for the friends I have made in this campaign, the unpaid colleagues I work with and for – for the asylum seekers who are the root and flower of Let Them Work, this issue is absolutely personal. To these campaigners, it is Let Us Work. If I ever need a reason to get out of bed in the morning, that’s it.

Already we’ve had some fantastic feedback from lobby groups. In the north east, for instance, a group of ten asylum seekers met with an MP in Sunderland. They’ve been waiting five and seven years, no decision on their claims, all suffering the effects of long-term enforced unemployment, all ready and willing to work if they get permission. To the Home Office, these are “a backlog” that will be “dealt with” by 2011, with no apology for the unacceptable delays. But for their MP now they are human beings, faces and names and families. And that personal contact makes all the difference.

Join the campaign here.

Three simple acts for Refugee Week 2009

By Kelly, Online and Information Team

Refugee Week 2009 is upon us! This year Refugee Week is all about simple acts: small actions you can do to change perception of refugees. With this in mind we thought we’d list three easy ways you can get involved this Refugee Week:

1) Visit a Refugee Week event

There are hundreds of events taking place in Refugee Week – from the Celebrating Sanctuary festival on London’s South Bank to a programme of plays at the Sherman Theatre in Cardiff.

Visit the Refugee Week events calendar to find one near you

Discover what the Refugee Council is up to this Refugee Week
 

2) Join a big action campaign in support of refugees

This is easier than it sounds. If you haven’t signed up yet, why not sign the Let Them Work pledge in support of giving asylum seekers permission to work? Or let five of your friends know about the pledge by email. To date nearly two thousand people have signed our pledge, as have many MPs.

3) Sign off your email with a note about refugees

For Refugee Week, the British Red Cross are running the Look Beyond the Label campaign – asking you to change your online status in support of refugees. Whether you’re a fan of Facebook, besotted by Bebo or Twittering away, go to www.lookbeyondthelabel.org to find out the easy way to get involved.

You can also keep up to date with everything going on this Refugee Week by following simple_acts on Twitter.

Enjoy Refugee Week!

Latest in the fight to restore free healthcare for asylum seekers

 By Hannah, Campaigns and Public Affairs team 

Once again, refugees' rights are being battled through the courts.  This time, it is about the entitlement of asylum seekers whose claims have been turned down to access free hospital care.

In 2004, the government introduced a charging regime forcing refused asylum seekers to pay up front for secondary care, that is, treatment you would receive in hospital.  This covers everything from maternity care and giving birth, to treatment for ongoing illnesses such as kidney failure, and standard operations.  Only emergency treatment is free.

Ongoing campaigning by the Refugee Council and others, including outraged doctors and nurses who are appalled that they are being prevented from treating sick people simply because they are unable to pay, has led to the rules being relaxed for pregnant women, although they are still billed for treatment afterwards.  Naturally it is a bit of a waste of time – and money – to harass a new mum for £3000 when she is living on vouchers but the government continues to insist on it.

So like so many of these things, we took the battle to the courts.  Sadly, yesterday the Court of Appeal overturned a ruling by the High Court that refused asylum seekers should in fact be classed as ‘ordinarily resident’ and therefore qualified for free treatment.  However, they did say that the definition of urgent treatment should be widened to include people whose conditions would severely worsen if left untreated, and that in these cases it may be unlawful for a hospital to withhold treatment until a patient has paid up front.

We can take some small solace in the fact that the Appeal Court recognised the inhumanity of the extent of the regulations.  But it is not enough.  And it shouldn’t be a question for the courts at all.  This is not a legal fight, this is a battle for basic humanity.  The government has already acknowledged that there is no evidence asylum seekers come to the UK to access healthcare.  They have produced no evidence that this initiative has saved any money for the NHS at all.  Refused asylum seekers have nothing, so all this rule does essentially is deny sick people help to get better.  Surely that can't be right?

Another year, another immigration Bill

Yet another immigration Bill, the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill, is making its way through Parliament at the moment bringing us up to a whopping total of 8 immigration bills since 1997!  The Government has been working on a simplification project over the past couple of years, trying to codify and simplify all immigration law, but they are running behind schedule and have put forward a Bill containing issues that they consider to be ‘urgent’ before this larger Bill is introduced in October.

However, very few of the issues in this current Bill are urgent.  There are many more pressing issues that the government should be addressing – the plight of destitute asylum seekers, the restrictions on permission to work, the lack of protection safeguards in our borders, the discriminatory voucher system… the list goes on.

The one urgent thing that the Bill does do (and about time too!) is introduce a duty on UKBA staff to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, as is the case for staff working for all other government departments.  Supportive Peers are working hard to convince the government that this should also apply to UKBA staff based overseas, and are probing the Government to find how children’s lives will be improved in practice.

We have many serious concerns about the rest of the Bill.  Our main one is that the Bill is introducing a ‘probationary citizenship’ period as part of a person’s route to citizenship which will increase the time they have to wait to apply for citizenship from 5 years to 6 to 8 years depending on whether they engage in voluntary activity.  Refugees have come to the UK for protection and so should be given permanent residence as soon as they are granted status so they can rebuild their lives in peace and security.  We believe that these extra hurdles being placed in a refugees’ path to citizenship are unnecessary, unfair and unduly harsh, and many supportive Peers are making sure our views are heard in Parliament.

You can read our full Bill Briefing here.

Would you want to talk about being raped in front of your child?

By Jonathan, Policy and Development team 

Just imagine, if you can, that you are someone who has fled torture and persecution in your own country and have sought asylum in this country. Imagine also that you are a single parent and your children are with you. And then imagine that you are about to go into your vitally important asylum interview with the Home Office, and, because there is no other option, you have to take your children in with you.

You are then faced with an impossible dilemma – do you tell everything that happened to you but in front of your children – or do you hold some things back to save your children hearing you talk about it all? What a horrible dilemma for any parent.

And that is the reality for many of our clients that we see during our advice sessions held across the country. In England there is no child care provision for parents during the all important asylum interview, and parents are faced with this impossible dilemma.

Now in Wales there has been a successful pilot and a similar pilot is about to be launched in Scotland. Refugee Council staff across the country are pushing hard for similar child care provision to be provided in England.

We are also working with our partners across the refugee sector, most notably with Asylum Aid as a part of the charter of rights of women seeking asylum, to push for change on this issue.

Child care during asylum interviews is good for people seeking asylum, it is good for their children and it is good for the Home Office – so why can’t we have provision of child care across the whole of the country?