require the UK to take an additional 3,000 children without parents or ... asylum-seeking children arriving in England f
Media briefing: Refugee crisis and Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children Statement A London Councils spokesperson said: “London boroughs have a long and proud history of helping refugees and asylum seekers, and have already resettled nearly half of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children arriving in England from the Middle East and North Africa. “Boroughs now stand ready to help further as part of the other resettlement schemes. However, they must be provided with adequate resources to be able to do this given the higher costs of living in the capital and existing pressures on housing”.
Introduction As a result of the refugee crisis, people are arriving – or will arrive – in the UK under different schemes:
Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme – resettlement of up to 20,000 Syrians in need of protection. Children at Risk scheme – resettlement of up to 3,000 vulnerable and refugee children at risk and their families from the Middle East and North Africa region. Dubs amendment – resettlement of unaccompanied asylum seeking children (UASC) already in European refugee camps. Refugees arriving by their own means and applying for asylum upon arrival in the UK.
Q&A 1. What is the Dubs amendment? The government had previously agreed to take in children from the Middle East and North Africa region via the Children at Risk scheme, which would target 3,000 individuals over the course of this parliament and be specifically tailored to support vulnerable and refugee children at risk and their families. In April 2016 Lord Dubs tabled an amendment to the Immigration Bill which would require the UK to take an additional 3,000 children without parents or guardians who had already arrived in Europe and were therefore not eligible under the Children at Risk scheme, but were currently living in dangerous conditions in camps such as the ‘Calais Jungle’.
The amendment was voted down, with many MPs arguing that there was a risk it would encourage more children to make the dangerous journey to Europe. Lord Dubs then tabled an additional amendment to request the government reconsider taking unaccompanied children, with the exact number to be determined with local authorities. This was accepted in May 2016.
2. Why haven’t any local authorities taken any children from Europe following the Dubs amendment? This is because local authorities are still waiting on confirmation from the government as to the arrangements for UASC eligible to come to the UK under the amendment. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t any UASC in London. Many have already arrived by their own means.
3. So how many UASC are currently being cared for by London boroughs? London boroughs are making a huge contribution in taking care of UASC. At 31 March 2015 they had supported a rounded total of 1,190 UASC out of 2,630 in England, amounting to 45% of the total. A breakdown of this data by local authority is available here. Data for 2016 has not yet been published, so in reality the figure will be much larger.
Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children by Region (2015) North East North West Yorkshire and The Humber
25%
East Midlands West Midlands East of England 45%
London South East
Source: Data extrapolated from www.gov.uk/government/statistics/children-looked-after-in-england-including-adoption2014-to-2015
4. What happens when an unaccompanied asylum seeking child arrives in the UK by their own means? UASC will present either at their port of entry or at the Asylum Intake Unit in Croydon. Alternatively, an unaccompanied child might be encountered by the police. Normally, the local authority where the child first presents is responsible for their care. This has put
disproportionate pressure on some local authorities such as Kent and Hillingdon who have significant ports of entry, and Croydon where the Asylum Intake Unit is based. In such areas local arrangements are put in place to, as far as possible, ensure that local authorities do not face an unmanageable responsibility in accommodating and looking after unaccompanied children, simply by virtue of being the point of arrival of a disproportionate number of unaccompanied children. In doing so this also ensures that appropriate services are available to all unaccompanied children. However, those arrangements are inevitably reliant on the cooperation of local, regional and national partners. Under the Home Office's new national scheme, where an unaccompanied child first presents at a local authority which already has over 0.07% UASC to child population, the local authority is expected to arrange for the transfer of the child through the national transfer scheme and not rely on locally agreed arrangements, unless there are clear reasons why it would not be appropriate to transfer the child. If the region in which the child first presents is under the 0.07% threshold, then the child would be expected to be transferred to a different local authority within that region. Details of the transfer flow chart are available here. Local authorities that are above the 0.07% threshold are the London boroughs of Brent, Croydon, Enfield, Hillingdon, Islington, and Kensington and Chelsea.
5. Aside from UASC, how many Syrian refugees have been resettled by London boroughs as part of the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme? Up to the end of quarter two 2016, ten London boroughs had taken a total of 64 Syrian refugees as part of this scheme, and stand ready to help even more. More information on this data is available here. This may seem like a small number, but to respond sustainably at scale funding needs to recognise the particular pressures on housing in the capital which makes it hard to source appropriate accommodation for refugee families.
6. What are the costs of resettling refugees? Boroughs are actively involved in discussions with the GLA and the Home Office about how best to support efforts to resettle Syrian refugees. However, they must be provided with adequate resources to be able to do this given the higher costs of living in the capital and existing pressures on housing. Boroughs are currently waiting for a response from the Home Office on whether the necessary funding will be made available. The current funding available is detailed here. In addition to this the Community Sponsorship Scheme will enable community groups including charities, faith groups, churches and business to take on the role of supporting resettled refugees in the UK.
For UASC settled via the new national transfer scheme, enhanced daily rates are provided from 1 July 2016 until 31 March 2017. For children transferred under the new national scheme the enhanced daily rate is £114 for under 16-year-olds and £91 for 1617-year-olds. Existing UASC that remain within their current area will not receive the enhanced rate. Full details of funding arrangements for local authorities are available here. Local authorities are still waiting on confirmation from the government as to the arrangements for UASC eligible to come to the UK under the Dubs amendment.
Further Information
Home Office asylum statistics Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children transfer flowchart Background on the council role in resettling unaccompanied children
