REUK’s response to the Nationality and Borders Bill

Our response to the Nationality and Borders Bill draws on both our on the ground experience providing direct educational support to over 500 young refugees and asylum seekers, and numerous schools, colleges and universities each year, and on our extensive research into the education, integration and wellbeing of young refugees and asylum seekers, often conducted in partnership with UN agencies.

In summary, we are extremely concerned that, should this plan be implemented, the unforeseen (and potentially unintended) consequences for refugee children and young people, and for the UK as a whole, will be devastating.

We must have an asylum system that offers the chance of safety to Celestine, who fled to the UK aged 16 from the most conflict-affected region of the Democratic Republic of Congo, just as much as Abbas, the 17 year old boy from Syria who came with his family via a resettlement programme. Both of these ultimately received refugee status in the UK, and have been supported by REUK - and yet Celestine, who is now studying medicine at university, and the numerous others like her with circumstances outside of ‘safe and legal routes’, would, under the proposed system, no longer find protection in the UK.

---