Sadly, the policy of making “failed” asylum seekers homeless and destitute, or sign up to “voluntary” returns programmes to access basic support, is not a loophole, but a deliberate strategy to try to force people to return to unsafe countries.

And the situation may soon become much worse.

A clause of the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants) Act 2004 allows for an extra condition to be attached to the already harsh hard case” or “section 4” support: the requirement to carry out unpaid community work. In other words, forced labour in return for board and lodgings.

Also, at present, housing and support for families with children continues until they can be deported, but the 2004 act will make destitute and homeless any family not making efforts to return to the country from which they fled. Under the act, destitute families who approach social services for help face having their children taken into care.

In Glasgow alone there are over 500 families in this position right now, waiting to find out if their support will be stopped. Social workers and other council and voluntary sector staff are extremely concerned for the safety of these families.

It appears to be Home Secretary David Blunkett’s mission to tear up the treaties and laws that we underpin democracy and freedom, including the 1951 United Nations convention on refugees and the Human Rights Act. More people are being forced into unregulated, low-paid illegal work, such as picking cockles at Morecambe Bay, or adopting other desperate measures to survive, like begging or prostitution.

We cannot continue to look away. It is commendable that Housing Today has taken up this issue. I just hope that it will help convince Britain’s major charities to act.

Blunkett has made it illegal to use public funds to help these people. Until the law is changed, destitute refugees need housing, and they need money to survive. The people supporting them are generally other asylum seekers and refugees – people living below the poverty line themselves (an asylum seeker receives only about 70% of income support).

In Glasgow, the only organisation doing this work is Positive Action in Housing, an anti-racist charity. PAiH uses money donated by the public to arrange short stays in hostels for particularly vulnerable people, and they co-ordinate a pool of volunteers who will provide spare rooms for refugees for short periods. Positive Action needs help in this crisis humaitarian work, as do similar small projects across the country. To find out about how PAiH is trying to assist desitute refugees, or to make a donation, go to www.paih.org

Michael Collins, Glasgow Campaign to Welcome Refugees

Source

Housing Today