“Providers of immigration advice and services in the UK are subject to a regulatory scheme, established by Part V of the Immigration & Asylum Act 1999. The scheme is administered by the Office of the Immigration Services Commissioner.”⁵⁴

Devon & Cornwall Refugee Support Council are registered⁵⁵ with the OISC as a not-for-profit organisation offering services at Level 1 “General Help” to immigrants who access by person or telephone for advice and advocacy necessary to their well being.

The OISC, in turn, offer resources, training courses and personnel available to advise and assist registered advisors continue to develop competency and quality in the ever-changing immigration rules and laws set down by government. Any person offering legal advice without registration at the level required will be committing a criminal offence and be prosecuted accordingly.

An advisor has to train, be examined, and qualify to be accepted as an Advisor at Level 1, so it is that Colin Stares and Trish Baxter are both currently registered in this capacity and look to add another advisor to our registration following further training and successful online examination.

OISC require high standards of services in this field and, as such, expect DCRSC to offer general assistance to asylum seekers and refugees, who require help with their benefits or practical support. Any legal advice is provided by signposting to existing qualified legal representatives in the local area or further away. Most service users have a representative when they come to Plymouth, and the OISC standards of rules and codes of practise apply to the quality of their work and advice to their service users, and also to us, when necessary.

Regular audit of our files, policies, standard of practise and inspection of premises are all available to OISC to help ensure that those who access our services can be assured of the quality mark.

Newsletters and information are available from the OISC website on:   www.oisc.gov.uk

An Asylum Seeker is someone who is fleeing persecution in their homeland, has arrived in another country, made themselves known to the authorities and exercised their legal right to apply for asylum.

A Refugee is someone whose asylum application has been successful and who is allowed to stay in another country having proved they would face persecution back home.

A Failed Asylum Seeker.   When an application has failed to be successful then this is when the problem becomes bigger... if they reach this stage then they have no legal right to remain in this country and would normally be put on an aeroplane immediately and flown back to where they came from.   However, life is not that simple and they do have the right to appeal against their deportation.   More on that subject later.

An Economic Migrant.   These are people who come from all over the world to this country to seek employment here.   Many of you will have heard of the European Union or the Common Market as it is known.   People from a Common Market country are entitled to come here to study and to work provided they obtain the correct visas, passports, work permits and other documentation.   Some of course do come here illegally.

Migrant Workers should not be confused with Asylum Seekers and Refugees who are here seeking safety!   Asylum Seekers exist on meagre benefits from the Home Office and are not allowed to work here.   Refugees are allowed to work!

Illegal Immigrants.   These are people whose entry into, or presence in a country, contravenes immigration laws.

As previously reported in the 2007 Annual Report, the University of Lancaster⁵⁶ (UCLAN) engaged four previous parent participators of the SFSC programme as researchers into the Mental Health needs of asylum seeking and refugee women, children and young people in Plymouth.   Due to their own understanding of the programme it was decided that the next intake of individuals on the Parenting Programme be surveyed with questions regarding this subject.   It proved to be the contributory factor that resulted in a very beneficial report, which hopes to aid the Primary Care Trust in improving their services to Black & Ethnic Minority (BME) residents.

In January 2008, the SFSC Certificate Ceremony for the eight participating parents was attended by partner agencies from Plymouth & District Racial Equality Council⁵⁷ , Open Doors International Language School⁵⁸, Kew-5, Refugee Action⁵⁹ , Mutley Greenbank Trust and other friends and family members.

The eight parents came from Democratic Republic of Congo, Nigeria, Somalia, Sudan, Uganda and Zimbabwe.   It was apparent that their ethnic background can offer good examples of high moral standards within the family and that one main strength is their emphasis on respect for elders.   Sharing illustrations from their own upbringing was most enlightening and once more the key element to understanding across culture and diverse heritage.   Each one gave testimony to the positive effects of the programme on their own relationships and parenting within the family unit.

During 2008 Louise Baxter (Mutley Greenbank Trust) and Trish (DCRSC) were approached by the Plymouth Parent Education department to consider the possibility of facilitating a pilot programme that could be evaluated with the view that we could deliver the 13-week programme in other areas across Plymouth.   As one of the main parent education courses in the UK there is a lot of interest to use such evaluated programmes to meet the needs of parents in these challenging times.   Although there were attempts to start a programme in the Efford area, it has been postponed to September 2009 by which time we hope to have established funds to sustain a rollout of programmes starting in the most central areas first. Plymouth Parent Partnership⁶⁰, are also networking with us to enable other agencies to propose staff who can train in the near future and create a larger pool of trained facilitators.

For those interested to get more information of the next Strengthening Families Strengthening Communities programme, referrals can be made to the office.

    ( Photograph courtesy of Trish Baxter )

The SFSC Certificate Ceremony for the Eight Participating Parents

    ( Photograph courtesy of Trish Baxter )

Sharing Cultures

Imagine the scene of youths gathering in the open air at the beginning of a summer adventure.   A noisy mass of individuals; enthusiastic, full of energy and expectations, laughing together and abounding with the hope of discovering more of life in all its fullness and experiencing the potential of reaching personal goals.

Imagine the years have passed and the reunion of those old school mates is full of stories:   retold of those past adventures. The reliving of the memories invigorates those who have been battered by the years and may be dogged by failure, instead of the attainments they had hoped to achieve.   The human spirit is generally very resilient but in certain cases, some individuals will display an attitude of resigned defeat at what may have been repeated disappointments, negative life experiences and internalised regrets.   Their history seems to be marked with the stamp of failure.

The way we perceive our lack of success or achievements affects who we are and moulds our lives into a distortion of the truth.   It is for this reason that we, as frontline individuals are passionate about restoring self-esteem and self-worth in those we meet at the Masiandae Centre.

Failed asylum seekers, by definition, are projected as being those who do not warrant protection but flood our shores by fraudulent means, motivated by the desire for economic gain.   This fact is so totally obscuring the truth that I illustrate just a few examples of those who have been dogged by failure.

• Ms. Small Island escaped 13 years of domestic abuse by accompanying a family to the UK as their domestichelper.  When the family were due to return to that oceanic island, the fear of returning to the beatings, and humiliation was too much to contemplate, so she claimed asylum.   Her fragile mental health and the physical distress were genuine evidence of domestic violence and according to the judge; there was no doubt that she would need protection to avoid the same suffering on return.   But her claim was determined as “failed” because her government has serious domestic violence issues on the island and has put in place judiciary process to assist those who are brave enough to bring charges against their offenders.   Even before she could get advice and seek the support of the island’s Domestic Violence Support Unit, she was detained when reporting to the local police station, taken to the Removal Centre and deported to that sunny spot where the sea surrounded her and cut her off from the safety and peace of mind she claimed.

• A young Bidooni found himself the constant butt of racial harassment; repeated intimidation and threats against his life.   Despite his nationality being Kuwaiti, the longstanding discrimination against those descendants of Bedouin tribesmen, who historically migrated across the Arab States affects youths like him today.   They are discriminated against for employment, land, etc., and depend on self-created communities where they try to survive the persecution aimed to cleanse the country of this ethnic group. He was given a language assessment by Home Office personnel, which picked up his accent as belonging to a neighbouring country so with disregard of original ID cards and documents to prove is nationality, he was deemed “failed” and under removal directions. Even genuine documents offered for evidence of the truth is often classed “too easily created by forgers” therefore they hold little weight when deciding their authenticity!   How can a young man in this position do anything but “fail” when a judge’s opinion makes the final decision on someone’s right to refuge in a safe country?

• Last year, we witnessed the cruel, inhumane face of our immigration system when families whose children were well established in our culture and achieving academic excellence were forcibly removed and returned to face discrimination again in their own land. Despite their positive contribution to the community, years of integration and community indignation at their removal, they will be dogged by failure for years to come!

>>  One mother and son were picked up in the early hours last November, like so many removed as failed asylum seekers, and hurriedly transported to Yarlswood Removal Centre⁶¹ where they spent a few days recovering from the shock.   To prove their right to protection, according to the Refugee Convention, their solicitor had submitted photographic proof as fresh evidence of the riots and suffering she and her children experienced in her homeland, as well as further medical evidence.   Although her story was deemed to be genuine, it was judged that she should be able to relocate without danger of future suffering and so they failed her claim.   The decision was not sent by post to her solicitor, nor did she have opportunity to make plans to prepare for any forced removal because the immigration officers denied her the right to seek advice when they served flight directions booked before her decision was given to either of them.

>>  Without prior malaria treatment and the retaining of her son’s Birth Certificate on removal, the UK Border Agency⁶² sent them back without any support network or financial means to relocate anywhere.   Abandoned to the consequences of destitution and begging for food and shelter has been a harrowing experience and such degrading and inhumane treatment that should not have been meted out on someone proven to have suffered the trauma of persecution in her home country.   Since their return, we have received regular updates of their poverty and her son’s deteriorating health.   They have slept on church floors as a temporary measure yet moved on again after some time, to look for some other compassionate source.   Affected by the mosquitoes, lack of nutrition and boils, she says he is too ill to leave, so she cannot work to gain a living and longs to find a way to return to the support of friends, here in Plymouth, the city where she found refuge.   She cannot understand how the UK government failed to allow them to remain and build their lives in safety.

For those of us who feel the system determinedly fails those who are genuinely discredited by poor decisions and target led removals, we owe it to the next generation to change the attitudes that create these failures.   We need to spread the word that not all “FAILED” asylum seekers are unwarranted claims but may be those who, due to their homeland, are returned to face the challenge of gaining access to costly legal processes, expected to find immediate safety and gainful employment to avoid poverty, or a hiding place from perpetrators of persecution who continue to create victims of suffering.

Let us not fail those service users who rely on truth to prevail by telling the real life stories of those who can’t speak for themselves.

What we believe depends upon the environment of our own experience of life.   Whether we trust the British police force will be based upon the image and reality of life.   Thankfully we trust our   “men in blue”  to be genuine protectors of the law and guardians of the peace.

Not so in other countries!   Reporting crime, violent attack or murder may be disregarded by cohorts of another realm of policing, where corruption is rife and prejudice part of the normal practise that demeans the victims and may even be the precursor to further persecution.

Our service users arrive in the UK to escape both the pain of human suffering and the mental torment of the psychological torture that presents itself when it’s not invited.

One day, whilst tending the family livestock, a young man hears the sounds of marauding pillaging thieves, hounding the local villagers into giving over their valuables and harvest stores under threats of death.   It’s not the first time, nor the second.   These well-armed horsemen were too frequent visitors to the region that the word was being spread of government complicity and a determined effort to rid the land of the settlers once and for all.

This time was different – the sounds were murderous, the houses ablaze and there was bloodshed and rape in the place he called his own neighbourhood.   Little did he know that soon after months of hiding in the hills with surviving members of the family that he would be captured by these same slaughtering thieves, forcibly enslaved and used to serve them day and night with other kidnapped youths, away from the international focus and ignored by those police who were well acquainted with the many reports of incidents like his.

Digging up small trees with his bare hands, fetching water from the wadi, cooking with the firewood collected in the wilderness and guarded by drunken, armed men was a lifestyle from which he and his fellow captives prayed to be freed.   Then, on one chance evening, a fire broke out and the attention of the guards was distracted to deal with the blazing danger in the camp.   In one fleeting moment, with agreed decision the slaves took that opportunity to chance their freedom on the risk of escaping in the smoke and panic. Running away from their captors was not an easy route, especially as those armed began to fire, and a hail of bullets met their targets and killed some fleeing for their lives.

Our young man looks back on those memories with as much sorrow for the separation it brought to him and his loved ones; and the scars its left in his mind.   It would be a joy to say he was granted asylum as one of Darfur’s many young men who escaped genocide, but he arrived in those early days when the UK were still denying the realities of events now so clearly documented in countless reports and photographic evidence.   The refusal decision was maintained because the first immigration judge deemed his graphic testimony of events “so implausible that it was preposterous!”