'Inhumane' Asylum Payment Card

posted: 08/11/2010

Four leading refugee organisations criticise the Azure payment card used to pay asylum seekers because it leaves so many living in hunger and deprivation.  The Azure card problems affect people with HIV. The new report, Your inflexible friend: the cost of living without cash, shows the many problems people face when you have no cash and are given no change.
 

 

 

The Azure payment card was introduced at the end of 2009 and the card replaced the system of supermarket vouchers for asylum seekers.

The card is topped up weekly (but only with £35 income for a single person) and can be used only in certain supermarkets. You cannot get cash, be given change, and anything over £5 that you do not spend by the end of the week is taken back from you.
 

Cash-less hassle
Without cash,

• over half (56%) could not pay for travel to see their legal advisers, or attend essential health appointments (53%)
• 40% could not buy food for their dietary, religious, or cultural requirements from the allowed supermarkets, and many go hungry as a result
• 39% believed the supermarkets do not give the best value for money, and say markets or charity shops offer a better deal
• 60% had problems with the card not working, including 13 people with children
• 79% reported that the shops had refused the card
• 56% reported anxiety and shame when using the card

The findings confirm the concerns raised by the organisations when the payment card was first introduced in 2009, and that asylum seekers living on this type of support continue to live in deprivation as a result of the card.
 

Jonathan Ellis, Director of Policy and Development at the Refugee Council said: “Our evidence proves the failings of the new Azure card are forcing asylum seekers into hunger and hardship. Their survival relies on a payment system that not only hugely restricts where, when, and what they can shop for, but often does not work at all. People, often with babies and young children, are in many cases just waiting to return to their countries as soon as they can, or cannot return because it is still unsafe. They have no choice but to remain here temporarily, and are not allowed to work to support themselves. It is therefore unacceptable that they are unable to buy items that meet their basic needs, and that they have to face hostility in shops when they use these cards.
 

People need cash not plastic

The government is reviewing the asylum and immigration system and must use this opportunity to end this inhumane system now, and offer asylum seekers cash as an alternative. Though levels of support are still too low – at just £5 a day - a simple cash support system would give people the freedom to spend the money as they wished, while allowing people to live with dignity until they can return home.
 

Your inflexible friend: The cost of living without cash
 

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