“We should never use homelessness as a deliberate tool policy,” says refugee charity
As refugee charities prepare to support Afghans who have arrived and settled in the UK, Natalia Parzygnat spoke to the Director at Hope Projects, Phil Davis, about the future of in-country refused refugee seekers.
The first time I tried to talk to Phil Davis from the Hope Projects, he was out of his office housing someone left homeless and destitute “by the asylum system”. But I finally got the chance to speak to Phil. He welcomes me with a smile, and we start the interview.
As the situation in Afghanistan progresses quickly, the charity that he works with has been quite busy helping refugees, and Davis expects that numbers would go up with new Afghan arrivals.
“We should never, ever be using homelessness as a deliberate tool of policy, and that’s what we’re doing to 1000s of people. And that’s just wrong, that’s just, just morally wrong.”
With the new resettlement scheme aiming to bring 20,000 Afghans, there are fears for refugees currently living in the UK whose asylum was refused, as they may become homeless. Specifically, those who did not flee but arrived in other ways.
I asked Phil what would happen to those whose right to remain was declined. And he promptly responded.
“Their alternatives are either to return home, which in the case of the Afghan community right now would be almost certain persecution, these are people who’ve been in trouble with the Taliban.
“Or they stay here, and they stay here literally street homeless without any access to financial support without any access to hospitals or anything, it’s just either the street or sofa surfing around friends or temporarily.”
Historically Afghans who came to the UK flee from the Taliban as they were in danger, adds Davis.
The latest data shows that over 3,000 Afghans currently await approval of their asylum.
So what and where is the problem?
According to the latest data, there were 218 Afghans entering detention from the beginning of this year up to June 2021. Moreover, national statistics showed 5 enforced returns to Afghanistan this year, 11 voluntary returns and 30 refused entries, making a total of 46 returns.
Data also shows that 140 Afghans were refused asylum, and 95 were withdrawn.
And as Davis from the regional charity said, there are consequences of refusals:
“There are a lot of people in Birmingham, in the West Midlands, who have been left literally street homeless and destitute because of those refusals of asylum.”
The Hope Projects helps people whose claim was denied, provides housing for them, and provides financial and legal aid.
My interviewee told me that Afghans refused asylum, were told they could return home. Although their lives were in jeopardy of prosecution by the Taliban, they could come to a different part of Afghanistan as Kabul was “safe”.
“No, we never believed that Kabul was safe, and certainly now it’s, it seems absurd to even consider that,” said the Director of Hope Projects.
Carefully thinking of the new resettlement scheme, my interviewee, who has more than 15 years of experience working with asylum seekers, said that a “comparatively small” of people had been permitted into the UK through a resettlement scheme.
“The majority of people who arrive in the UK don’t come via resettlement schemes, they get out of the country by whatever means they can, but they don’t have the option of waiting for someone to process them and pick them and bring them to the UK.“
“Good and bad” refugees
So the Hope Projects sees now is discrepancies between refugees who come here through the resettlement scheme and those arriving in the UK “irregular ways”.
Davis has noticed, those who come here on resettlement schemes are seen as “good” refugees by the Home Office, whereas those who took a dangerous journey to the UK are considered “bad”.
But Davis points out that everyone should have equal opportunities adding that not many refugees make it that far to the UK.
“The vast majority of refugees and asylum seekers don’t come anywhere near Britain, the ones who do it’s mainly people who either speak English or who know someone who’s already here and they’re trying to connect up with people that they know.”
After a brief pause, he said like it was something obvious: “which is what anybody will do in those circumstances.”
Other refugee charities have also asked the government to treat all asylum seekers equally regardless of their journey to the UK.
Anti-Refugee Bill
Following up on the topic, I asked about a new parliamentary bill. Suddenly Phil sits straight on his chair and comes closer to the camera to talk about his concerns.
With The Nationality and Borders Bill (known as the Anti-Refugee Bill), the charity is worried it will make it harder for people to apply for their right to stay. Particularly with the bill restraining rights for refugees to have further representation.
The Hope Projects said that many people had been granted their status after their intervention, successfully proving their home country is unsafe.
“The new bill that’s going through will make it harder and harder to make those further representations. It’s designed to try and stop people from doing that, and we know that there have been about 15,000 people since 2015 who’ve been granted refugee status based on further representations. They were originally refused.”
According to Refugee Council, with the new bill introduced a month ago, those who haven’t fled “war or persecution following rigorous official checks” could not be granted safety, and some could be outlawed because of their arrival method.
Adding that people seeking asylum whose claims were “inadmissible” and had/will have to wait six months before processing their application.
However, with the new circumstances, a Home Office spokesperson said:
“The Home Office can provide reassurance that no one who is at risk of persecution or serious harm in Afghanistan will be expected to return there.
“Given the complex situation in Afghanistan, enforced returns of those who have been refused asylum and who have exhausted all rights of appeal are currently paused while we consider the situation.”
Creating homelessness
While working during the lockdown, the charity has noticed that homelessness was linked to issues with asylum in many cases.
“One of the things we discovered was just what a high percentage of homelessness in Britain is related to the asylum system. And we’re doing that deliberately, where we’re recreating homelessness.”
Phil said they had been frustrated that almost 18 months ago, they helped many people and they “have ended up” the homelessness in the region. The charity he works for found houses for those on the streets and provided support proving that they can fight with the problem.
“And now we’re choosing to go back on that to recreate homelessness, which just seems crazy to me.”
For the future
Davis believes that the resettlement programmes are great, but the government should expand “the size”.
He added that these people who came here by other means than flying should be considered as “legitimate” as they had “very good reasons for needing to be out of the country in a safe place.”
Also, being better at making decisions. My interviewee pointed out that we should stop refusing people who gave strong asylum claims but were refused.
Passionate about what he does, he will find houses for people as he expects numbers to increase. As his voice dropped and his head turned, he knew that many more homeless people needed their support.
“I think we’ll see more people trying to arrive in the UK trying to connect up with friends and family already or making the long and dangerous journey.
“ That journey by sea over the channel is extremely dangerous. Still, we’re making people do that we’ve closed down every other route, and if you’ve closed down all the legal routes to come into the UK, desperate people will take illegal ones, so we are responsible for that.”
