Refused Asylum Seekers Fed by Charities

posted: 16/06/2010

Up to 20,000 refused asylum seekers are living destitute in the UK, relying on charities for food, reports the Red Cross today. George House Trust supports around 40 people living with HIV who are destitute.The Red Cross report criticises the government's asylum system as "shameful" and "inhumane".
 

A network of Red Cross "destitution clinics" across the country, including Manchester, give out food vouchers and food parcels to thousands of refused asylum seekers every week. The Red Cross say that this is like their work distributing emergency humanitarian aid in countries such as Sudan.
 

Sharing the burden

The Red Cross, George House Trust and other charities provide a mix of small payments, food parcels and other help to people living with HIV who are destitute. But the numbers of people requiring help and the cost of meeting everyone's needs are beyond any charity's means. Many other migrants share what little they have themselves to help those with nothing.

Destitution strategy
"This is a serious humanitarian situation for these very vulnerable people," Nicholas Young, chief executive of the Red Cross, said. "We do feel that this needs to be tackled by the government because there appears to be a deliberate strategy to make people destitute … for centuries refugees have been coming to this country and receiving kind treatment. It is a shame that is not the case now."
 

Because many refused asylum seekers no longer register with the Home Office, it is hard to get precise figures about the scale of the problem. Asylum organisations estimate that around 200,000 people have been refused asylum but remain in the country. Most are being sheltered by friends, but the Red Cross estimates that up to 20,000 are wholly dependent on charities for food, with some sleeping on the streets, in garages and in hedges.
"In many cases they experience exploitation, overcrowded living conditions, street homelessness, physical and mental illnesses and malnourishment," the report states.
 

Can’t work, no money, no food, no home
Once an asylum request is refused, the asylum seeker is no longer eligible to receive any state support and remains prohibited from working. "You can remove people back to their home country, or you can keep them here. But you have to give people food. You cannot starve people out of the country," said Joseph Nibizi, who runs the Red Cross food distribution centre for asylum seekers in Birmingham. The Red Cross report reflects its conviction that the situation is worsening.

Call for humane treatment - the right to work and healthcare

Red Cross are calling for a support system that will ensure that individuals have the right to work, and access to healthcare, throughout their application until they are either granted leave to stay or are able to leave the country.
 

HIV and destitution
People with HIV who are destitute cannot leave for various reasons, including the lack of life-saving HIV treatment, they would have no income or support in their home country, or the danger they face that caused them to flee still remains.
 

Section 4
The current system does have a safety net of hardship support, known as "section 4", which is available for those who have been refused asylum but are taking steps to return to their own country, or who are appealing against the decision. But it is a safety net with big holes and many fall through the gaps. People are left destitute until they have put together a new application which has to be accepted by the Home Office as based on new evidence. Applications are not accepted automatically, and some, including people with HIV, are unwilling to apply for section 4 because they do not want to be forced to return home.
 

One meal a day – for a year or more
A survey by Red Cross reveals that 87% of people in this situation often survive on only one meal a day, with six out of 10 remaining destitute for more than a year.
 

More than 1 in 4 appeals won
Asylum support organisations argue that refusing asylum does not automatically mean the application was unjustified. Last year 28% of people who appealed against asylum refusal were granted leave to remain, a figure that activists say reflects serious flaws in the process. About half of those whose claim is rejected come from countries such as Congo, Iraq, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Somalia and Eritrea where there is conflict and in some of these countries HIV rates are high.
 

Minister responds
Damian Green, minister for immigration, said: "The government is committed to exploring new ways of improving the current asylum system. The UK Border Agency provides support to asylum seekers who would otherwise be destitute until a decision on their application is made. However, when the independent courts have decided that an asylum seeker does not need international protection, support is discontinued and we expect them to return home voluntarily. Where a refused asylum seeker does not return voluntarily we will take removal action. Where a person faces a temporary barrier to their return which is not their fault, we will provide support until that barrier is removed if they would otherwise be destitute."
 

However the facts speak for themselves.
 

Surviving on £10 a week
If you can't work, can't claim benefits, and have nowhere to live, how do you survive with one £10 food voucher a week? Four refused asylum seekers tell their survival tales. Helpful tips come from four refused asylum seekers in Birmingham, who remain in this country, preparing to appeal the Home Office decision, sleeping meanwhile in hedges, doorways, old garages and staircases.

Read four people’s accounts of survival on £10 a week in vouchers

Red Cross news
Red Cross Destitution report – Not Gone But Forgotten 
Source

Dying with Food Problems

posted: 14/10/2009

Researchers in Canada have found that people taking HIV treatment who experience 'food insecurity' have an increased risk of death. The many destitute people refused asylum or leave to remain in the UK, as well as people on limited benefits and low incomes here, could face the same risk.

Food insecurity means not having enough nutritious food, or having uncertainty about obtaining food. Earlier research amongst injecting drug users taking HIV treatment in San Francisco showed that food-insecure patients were less likely to have an undetectable viral load.

Skinny and Hungry

Now researchers have found that current or former drug users in Vancouver, Canada, who are taking HIV treatment have a 50% increase in the risk of death if they experience food insecurity. The risk was especially high for people who were food insecure and underweight.
They recommend that poor patients in richer countries should receive food supplementation, and that there should be wider efforts to alleviate poverty.
 

More money or a Dietician?

Many HIV clinics in the UK have a specialist dietician who can provide information about diet. Specialist HIV social workers can also help you make sure that you have enough to eat. However the problem is largely one of poverty.
 

The government has just cut the weekly rate for a single asylum seeker over 25 who is destitute and from £42.16 to £35.13 a week from early October. At the same time, benefits for asylum seekers who are lone parents with one child are frozen at £42.16 instead of rising in line with consumer price inflation, leaving them £2 a week worse off.

Diary of an Asylum Seeker with her child scraping by on weekly asylum support from NASS.

There is more information on nutrition in NAM’s information booklet Nutrition. You can download it here.

Asylum UK - Life on £5 a week

posted: 16/03/2009

Hundreds of thousands of refused asylum seekers are living in extreme poverty in the UK, including some with HIV, because of fears of torture or death if they return to their home countries, according to a report released today.

Video

Trapped in a twilight zone - no home, can't work, can't claim

The report warns many refused asylum seekers are living in a "twilight zone", with no housing or financial support, and no right to work. Many refused asylum seekers are living on less than "a dollar a day", the global yardstick for extreme poverty, it claims. Recent research by the London School of Economics estimated there are 500,000 refused asylum seekers in the UK.

Christine Majid, from the refugee charity Pafras, who commissioned the report Underground Lives , says the number of destitute asylum seekers the charity dealt with tripled in the past two years and called destitution a "deliberate" policy to force asylum seekers out of the country.

Starving people out

She said: "In the 21st century the fact that the government is trying to starve people out of the country, it is absolutely inhumane and it just isn't working. These people would rather starve on the street here than return to their own countries."

A series of governmental policy decisions including preventing asylum seekers from working in 2002, cutting legal aid in 2004 and an overhaul of the system in 2007 has lead to an "untenable strain" on local charities, she added.

Most live on £5 a week or less

The report found that, on average, failed asylum seekers were surviving on £7.65 per week, but the majority lived on less than £5. Two thirds had experienced torture in their countries.

Homeless and vulnerable

Following the refusal of their asylum claims, 72% have spent time sleeping outside; of these, 38% have experienced physical attacks. More than a third of the women sleeping rough had experienced sexual assault, including rape.

The Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg called the report "a timely reminder of how the government has combined incompetence and inhumanity to create one of Europe's most inefficient and cruel asylum systems". "Responsibility for asylum should be taken away from the cack-handed blunderings of the Home Office and given to an independent agency."

Asylum claims fallen sharply but human rights record shames us

Asylum claims have fallen sharply in recent years and are at a 14-year low, with 23,430 applications for asylum in 2007 - 4% of all immigration applications - compared with 103,080 in 2002. A lack of access to proper legal advice is having a significant impact on the number of valid asylum seekers being refused sanctuary, and returned to countries where they could be tortured, said human rights lawyer Louise Christian. "The government's asylum policies are entirely at odds with its human rights obligation - particularly with regards to children in detention. It is a huge source of scandal and shame to this country."

UKBA emergency support spurned by most

A UK Border Agency spokesperson said the government provided measures to ensure individuals are not left without basic essentials. But the report says only around 9,000 people receive UKBA support, which provides £35 in supermarket vouchers a week and no-choice accommodation. Many are reluctant to apply for it as they must sign an agreement consenting to be removed from the UK at a later date.

The report is being released in conjunction with a major exposition of photographs of failed asylum seekers, launched in association with the Still Human, Still Here campaign, led by a coalition of human rights organisations including Amnesty International and the Refugee Council.

The secret world of destitute asylum seekers is captured in pictures in the exhibition Still Human, Still Here, at the Host Gallery, London from March 18.

Underground Lives report

source

image from Refugee Council

Council HIV Homeless Threat

posted: 16/12/2008

The recent House of Lords ruling on the rights of destitute asylum seekers to minimal food and accommodation, is causing problems for Newcastle upon Tyne city council.

Instead of carefully reviewing each of the 118 people (17 with HIV) to make sure they fit the new rules from the House of Lords, Newcastle council, in Northeast England, seems to be using the court case as an excuse to save money by making people both homeless and hungry.

With expert advice and advocacy, George House Trust can see no good reason why anyone with HIV should lose all local authority housing and support. Anyone who might be made homeless can claim instead from the UK Borders Agency.

The local newspaper reports that up to 80 adults with special needs in Newcastle are in danger of losing their council-funded accommodation following a legal ruling. Attempts will be made to find alternative housing, but some could end up destitute.
 

Newcastle City Council’s adult services is supporting 118 refused asylum seekers under the National Assistance Act of 1948 with accommodation and subsistence, at a cost of £789,370 last year. The people are all single adults who have been refused asylum and whose appeal rights are exhausted. They are prohibited from working and have no entitlement to public funds, but have additional needs.

17 living with HIV threatened
The group includes 63 people with mental health problems, 17 who are HIV positive and 38 with physical ailments or disabilities.
 

The issue has resulted from a legal ruling involving an asylum seeker from Zimbabwe who is HIV positive. The man, who lives in Slough, gets NHS treatment but needed somewhere to live. Slough Council refused to provide him with accommodation and said he was able to look after himself. After years of legal wrangling, the council won only part of its case at the House of Lords.
 

The ruling means failed asylum seekers living in council-funded accommodation in Newcastle may no longer be entitled to support. Some have been housed and supported, as is their legal right, for more than four years. Cathy Bull, head of Newcastle adult social services, said: “The recent House of Lords decision has very significant implications on the support local authorities across the country are allowed to offer failed asylum seekers. We have sought legal advice and have been told that we have no choice but to comply with the decision. People who do not meet the new criteria will be given six weeks notice that their subsistence payments will cease and their accommodation withdrawn. Every possible step will be taken to minimise the impact of this decision both on affected people and on the city.”
 

George House Trust comment
Supporting vulnerable refused asylum seekers living with HIV by providing basic accommodation and food, is a legal right under the National Assistance Act 1948. The House of Lords has simply clarified the amount of care and attention someone needs to get council help. Slough Council lost its main argument that ‘care and attention’ means someone needs personal or nursing care in their own home. The House of Lords instead made things easier for people – you only need to show you need some help looking after yourself. Newcastle council seems to be scare mongering and trying to save itself more than three quarters of a million pounds.

We think people with HIV should have no fear – properly made claims should all be allowed.

Expert guidance

We’ve got the answers any council needs on how it should properly deal with these reviews, on the front page of our website in the Information Bank - Housing and support for HIV-positive asylum seekers.
 

Source

 

Section 21 Support Guidance

posted: 21/11/2008

NAT and Hackney Community Law Centre have produced a briefing for those working with HIV-positive asylum seekers to explain the impact of the House of Lords ruling in the case M v Slough Borough Council. 

It gives guidance on how best to help affected people.

Section 21 briefing after House of Lords in M v Slough, August 2008