Age Disputed Young Asylum Seekers

A recent report by the Welsh Refugee Council describes the experience of children and young people whose lives are left in limbo, outside of society’s protective mechanisms because their age is disputed by the UK Border Agency or local authorities. Young Lives in Limbo: the protection of age disputed young people in Wales, examines the difficulties faced by children and young people who arrive in Wales without any documents that would prove their age, and makes recommendations to all stakeholders to ensure that the age assessment process in Wales moves away from a culture that is unfair, inequitable and placing vulnerable children at risk; to one which places the ‘child’s best interests’, needs, and vulnerability at the heart of the assessment.

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Public spending cuts savage dispersal system

Article first published 27 January 2011 (Institute of Race Relations)

By Jon Burnett

Dispersal policies are polarising city councils, with some having their contracts terminated and others abdicating their responsibilities to house asylum seekers.

In January 2011 the North East Contracting Consortium for Asylum Support issued a press statement, through Newcastle City Council, announcing that it was considering mounting a legal challenge against the UK Border Agency (UKBA). UKBA had informed the Consortium that its contract for housing asylum seekers was being terminated and, instead, being awarded to a property development organisation, Jomast. The Consortium, made up of seven local authorities in the north-east, housed 1,100 people and had been providing accommodation for asylum seekers dispersed to the region for ten years. In its press statement, it maintained that, ‘Putting all delivery into the hands of the private sector could deprive asylum seekers and communities of the extensive expertise and resources which councils can provide … We have consistently been judged by the UKBA to provide a quality service and to base such a major decision apparently in terms of immediate price, rather than overall cost benefit, is disappointing’.[1]

If the legal challenge goes ahead, it appears that it will be the first of its kind to confront a decision to withdraw funding for housing provision. Yet the decision itself is the latest in a series of steps which have marked a gradual shift in dispersal policies: one which has seen local authorities abdicating, or being absolved of, their responsibilities to house and provide shelter for asylum seekers.

Asylum dispersal: a history of exploitation, vulnerability and racial violence

The dispersal of asylum seekers around the UK has been subjected to considerable criticism. Instigated by the Labour government in 1999, in an attempt to reduce the concentration of asylum seekers in London and the south east, it meant people being housed on a ‘no-choice’ basis in towns and cities throughout the UK. The National Asylum Support Service (NASS) was established to administer dispersal, and effectively, removed asylum seekers from mainstream welfare services.

Financial support (initially in the form of vouchers) was set at thirty per cent less than the value of income support and a complex market of housing provision was created. Lucrative contracts to house asylum seekers were frequently taken up by local authorities, sub-contracted to accommodation providers and then sub-contracted further to private landlords. The result was a housing system which in many instances was poorly regulated, substandard and unsafe.

Complaints by asylum seekers were routine and when investigations were carried out they uncovered evidence of uninhabitable conditions. In 2004, for example, the Home Office announced that it was terminating its contract with Landmark Liverpool Ltd, stating that the majority of their properties ‘were below an acceptable standard. Many had insect infestations, damp and poor electrical installations’.[2]

Houses were often provided in hard-to-let and dilapidated areas. Racist attacks against asylum seekers dramatically increased as dispersal policies were introduced. In 2002 the Home Office disclosed that approximately 2,000 racially motivated attacks had been carried out on asylum seekers in the two years since the policy had been introduced. Some, such as those on Firsat Dag in the Sighthill area of Glasgow in 2001 and Peiman Bahmani in Sunderland in 2002, were fatal. Other people, isolated and frightened, took their own lives.[3]

Reduced local authority care

In 2004 six police forces were reported to have requested suspensions of dispersals within their localities, in part because of the frequency and severity of racist violence.[4] Yet, despite clear evidence that dispersal policies had created fertile ground for violence and exploitation, decisions on ongoing contract procurement appeared to be underpinned more by financial considerations than the protection of those seeking safety in the UK.

Contracts for housing asylum seekers were initially offered for a fixed number of years. In 2006, as the second round of housing agreements were being negotiated, the then immigration minister Tony McNulty announced his intention to further increase private sector provision, stating ‘We want that degree of flexibility and contingency built into the contracts to reflect numbers as they go up and down. I think the private sector is better placed to respond to that type of contract’.[5] NASS had already terminated its agreement with Southampton City Council, ostensibly in response to decreasing numbers of people claiming asylum in the UK. And the renewal of housing arrangements saw numerous public bodies losing their contracts as well. As a representative of the Yorkshire and Humberside Consortium for Asylum Seekers and Refugees warned, after several housing associations in the district lost their contract, such decisions could potentially cause disruption to families and to children’s education as new accommodation providers re-housed them.[6]

But whilst certain public authorities and bodies had their contracts terminated, other city councils voluntarily withdrew from their arrangements with the UKBA. In February 2006 Wigan Council announced that it was opting out of its housing pact, enabling private accommodation providers to fill the gap and to release council properties ‘to address local housing needs and create an opportunity to provide humanitarian assistance to refugees on the Gateway Protection Programme’.[7] And in 2010, as the second round of housing arrangements began to draw to a close, Birmingham City Council declared that it had turned down a renewal of its contract; maintaining that, ‘we must help the citizens of this city first and foremost … With a long waiting list for homes, we really need all our properties for our people in these difficult economic times. In the interest of local people, this decision has been made’.[8] Days later Wolverhampton Council took the same decision, stating that, ‘This has been a difficult decision to make, but one that is in the interests of local people on our housing waiting list’.[9]

A third round of housing contracts

Now, a third round of housing contracts is being negotiated, channelled through the Commercial and Operational Managers Procuring Asylum Support Services (COMPASS) project set up in 2009.

This venture, launched by UKBA, scheduled bidding events for March 2011. As such the contracts procured through the project will be overshadowed by the coalition government’s commitment to reduce expenditure on provisions for asylum seekers amidst a wider programme of savage public spending cuts. The outcome of the government’s spending review, on 20 October 2010, prompted UKBA publicly to state its intention to ‘drive down the cost of asylum support’; continuing to assert that ‘The agency will save around £500m in efficiencies by reducing support costs, improving productivity and value for money for commercial suppliers’.[10] About two weeks later one implication of this decision was made clear.

In November 2010 all of the (approximately) 600 asylum seeking families in Glasgow, housed by the city council, received letters from UKBA saying that the council would no longer be supporting them. They were told that they were to be moved to other locations in Scotland and that non-cooperation could lead to the withdrawal of all support. Families were informed that they would be given between three and five days’ notice of any decision and, the same day, the city council was informed that their housing contract was being terminated.[11]

After significant public campaigning these eviction letters were withdrawn and in January 2011 immigration minister Damien Green apologised for their ‘inappropriateness’. But the fear that families have, that they and their children will be uprooted once more, remains.

Lessons learned?

In over ten years of asylum dispersal the patterns of exploitation, racist violence and social isolation which initially emerged have persisted. In 2009 for example Jasraj Kataria, a 23-month-old child, died after falling from the window of a third floor flat in Glasgow provided by NASS. The company whose property it was, the Angel Group, insisted that the windows were fitted with locks, but refused to make public the findings of its investigation into his death.[12] A year later a NASS accommodation provider, which had provided properties in Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Coventry, was reported to be in a legal dispute with the Home Office with both parties alleging the other owed it money. According to one analysis, the Home Office claimed that the accommodation provider ’sometimes provided “sub-standard, uninhabitable, or unsafe” housing, with some properties suffering blocked drains, broken doors and windows, and vermin infestations’.[13]

The coalition government is casting aside a whole swathe of services of which housing support is one, including funding for English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) courses and legal aid for migrants and asylum seekers.[14]

Read in this context; with some local authorities admitting publicly that they no longer wish to house asylum seekers in their locality and others losing contracts to more ‘flexible’ private accommodation providers, those seeking safety in the UK face being dispersed into areas which are potentially both increasingly hostile and under-equipped to provide for their needs. At the same time, the shift in the award of contracts may portend less regulation and less accountability.

—-
FOOTNOTE

References: [1] North East Contracting Consortium for Asylum Support, Press statement (January 2011). [2] Home Office, ‘Termination Of National Asylum Support Service (Nass) Contract With Landmark Liverpool Ltd’, Home Office Press Release (25 March 2004), http://press.homeoffice.gov.uk/press-releases/Termination_Of_National_Asylum_S. [3] See Harmit Athwal, Death trap: the human cost of the war on asylum (London, Institute of Race Relations, 2004). [4] Dominic Casciani, ‘Asylum city dispersals suspended’, BBC news (15 November 2004), http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_west/4013431.stm. [5] Andy Ricketts, ‘McNulty favours private sector for asylum provision’, Inside Housing (31 March 2006), http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/mcnulty-favours-private-sector-for-asylum-provision/1447452.article. [6] Ben Cook, ‘Asylum seekers face turmoil as NASS contract is ended’, Inside Housing (17 February 2006), http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/asylum-seekers-face-turmoil-as-nass-contract-is-ended/1447297.article.

[7] Wigan Council, Committee Report: Update on Asylum Seeker Contracts and Gateway Protection Programme (Wigan, Wigan Council, 2006). [8] Neil Elkes, ‘Birmingham city council ends asylum seeker housing contract’, Birmingham Mail (9 October 2010), http://www.birminghammail.net/news/top-stories/2010/10/09/birmingham-city-council-ends-asylum-seeker-housing-contract-97319-27434645/. [9] Express & Star, ‘Wolverhampton council says no to more asylum seekers’, Express & Star (11 October 2010), http://www.expressandstar.com/news/2010/10/11/wolverhampton-council-says-no-to-more-asylum-seekers/. [10] UK Border Agency, UK Border Agency News, Issue 4 November 2010 (London, UK Border Agency 2010), p. 3. [11] Frances Webber, ‘Asylum-seeking families in Glasgow face imminent move’, IRR news (18 November 2010), http://www.irr.org.uk/2010/november/ha000035.html. [12] Harmit Athwal, Driven to desperate measures: 2006-2010, (London, Institute of Race Relations, 2010), p. 18. [13] Jeanette Oldham, ‘Home Office in court battle over asylum missing millions’, Sunday Mercury (5 December 2011), http://www.sundaymercury.net/news/sundaymercuryexclusives/2010/12/05/sunday-mercury-investigation-home-office-in-court-battle-over-asylum-missing-millions-66331-27768242/. [14] Anne Singh and Frances Webber, ‘Excluding migrants from justice: the legal aid cuts’, IRR briefing paper no. 7 (London, Institute of Race Relations, 2010).

HAT News is precluded from expressing a corporate view: any opinions expressed are therefore those of the authors.

Notions of Agency and Vulnerability, Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children in London

By Elizabeth Ollson

Asylum Seeking Children in the UK

- 12% of all asylum seekers in the UK are children who seek asylum alone.
- Most asylum seeking children as seen as an undesirable burden to British social services.
- The lecturer studied unaccompanied children from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) who were seeking asylum in the UK.
- The lecturer conducted her research in the Hillington area of London.
- The lecturer found the majority of the children in her research group fled to the UK with the assistance of adults who provided false documents and passports.

Read entire blog here

High incidence of human trafficking at the SA-Zim border

(IRIN) – To the untrained eye, the human tide surging through the South African border town of Musina is just that: a mass of people leaving behind Zimbabwe’s collapsed economy to seek job opportunities and a better life, or refuge in a neighbouring country.

Sebelo Sibanda, of Lawyers for Human Rights in Musina, is a more acute observer; he sees changes taking place in a migration that is believed to number between one million and more than three million people.

Photo: Guy Oliver/IRIN

Sebelo Sibanda, of Lawyers for Human Rights in Musina, with two children suspected of being trafficked

“A trend started in the last two or three months, where you see more and more women coming in with groups of children – the children are too numerous and often too similar in age to be from one mother,” he said.

The Zimbabwean migration, comprising asylum seekers fleeing political persecution, economic migrants from a shattered economy, traders, shoppers and unaccompanied minors, provides ample camouflage for human traffickers.

The border between South Africa and Zimbabwe is a fertile ground for criminal gangs. The “magumagumas” prey on migrants, robbing and raping them as they make their way to South Africa, while the “malaicha” arrange safe passage for migrants, but do not always keep to the contract.

Nde Ndifonka, the southern African spokesman for the International Organization for Migration, told IRIN: “The conditions are there. We believe there is a high incidence of human trafficking happening there [the South Africa-Zimbabwe border]“.

Parents living in South Africa often pay a malaicha to bring children across the border, Sibanda said, and it was a “small step” to becoming a human trafficker.

Ndifonka said the malaicha were part of trafficking rings and targeted “specifically, vulnerable young children, as there is a demand for labour and sexual exploitation in South Africa”.

In mid-April 2009, during a spot check, police found two unaccompanied minors – boys aged about four and five – in a car en route to Johannesburg. “The woman at first said they were her children, but when I interviewed the children separately they said they did not know who she was,” Sibanda said.

The unseen crime

“The woman then maintained that she was their mother’s sister, but the children did not know who she was, but were told by her to call her ‘aunty’. The woman then said she was taking them to meet their mother in Johannesburg, but the children said their mother was living in Cape Town.”

The woman is expected to be charged with kidnapping or a lesser charge of smuggling, as South Africa has yet to adopt human trafficking legislation.

An international children’s agency, which declined to be identified, fearing it might attract human traffickers to its offices, told IRIN it had begun trying to trace the children’s relatives. The aid worker said people claiming to be the relatives or friends of parents had tried to lure children away from the shelter.

“Human trafficking is difficult to detect, as people are generally not aware they are being trafficked. We know it [human trafficking] is happening but cannot detect it,” Jacob Matakanye, CEO of the Musina Legal Advice Centre, told IRIN.

“The only way to prevent trafficking is to educate people about it in the country of origin … Zimbabwe is an ideal opportunity for traffickers, as it is next to South Africa [the continent's richest country],” he said.

The UN defines human trafficking as “The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons by means of threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability, or of the giving of or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person for the purpose of exploitation.”

UK defends citizens’ repatriation from Zimbabwe

By Angus Shaw

(AP) Britain defended a plan to help its elderly citizens leave Zimbabwe, saying Friday in response to media criticism that it would not be a mass evacuation.

The British government announced last month that it would help citizens aged 70 and over resettle in the United Kingdom. Younger Britons with health or other problems may also be eligible. British officials say a few hundred elderly Britons have inquired about the repatriation plan.

The state media labeled the plan racist. Independent newspaper columnist Joram Nyathi alleged last week that Britain imposed sanctions on Zimbabwe and then “you airlift your own to safety.”

President Robert Mugabe said last week he had no objection to elderly Britons’ departure.

“I don’t see any reason why anyone would want old people,” Mugabe said in an interview on state television marking his 85th birthday.

Ambassador  Pocock

Andrew Pocock, the British ambassador to Harare, said in a letter in Nyathi’s Zimbabwe Independent newspaper that only small numbers of vulnerable, elderly Britons were eligible.

“It is an offer of assistance to British people who meet certain criteria of age and vulnerability, and who wish to leave Zimbabwe because they can no longer maintain themselves here,” Pocock said.

Zimbabwe gained independence from Britain in 1980, but many Britons remained in the country, often as landowners and major businessmen. Mugabe often fans racial resentment in a country that suffered under white minority rule to score political points by calling his black opponents tools of former colonial master Britain and railing against white control of the economy.

Mugabe blames his economic crisis on Western economic sanctions. Mugabe’s critics point instead to corruption and mismanagement under Mugabe. Foreign aid and investment has dried up since the often violent seizures of white-owned farms began at Mugabe’s orders in 2000, disrupting the agriculture based economy.

Pocock wrote that British sanctions “consist solely of an asset freeze and visa ban on 203 people responsible for the destruction of good governance, democracy and the rule of law in Zimbabwe.”