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Assessing the Circumstances and Needs of Refugee Communities

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Assessing the Circumstances and Needs of Refugee Communities HELPING STRANGERS BECOME NEIGHBOURS Assessing The Circumstances And Needs Of Refugee Communities In Derby Upbeat Communities Overdale House 96 Whitaker Road Derby, DE23 6AP [email protected] 01332 916150 www.upbeatcommunities.org CONTENTS Welcome 4 Executive Summary 5 Assessing The Circumstances And Needs Of 6 Refugee Communities In Derby Research Methodology 8 Community Snapshots 10 Eritrean Community 11 Iranian Community 11 Pakistani Community 13 Iraq – Kurdish Community 14 Albanian Community 15 Syrian Community 15 Sri Lanka – Tamil Community 16 Afghanistan – Hazara Community 16 Chinese Community 17 Themes Arising From The Cross-Section 19 Of Communities Stages Of Development Of Refugee Communities 20 Choosing To Stay In Derby Or Not? 21 English Language Provision 22 Refugee Mental Health 24 The Path To Work 25 Concern For The Next Generation 27 Patterns Of Community Engagement 28 Community Organisation And Voice 29 Conclusions And Recommendations 30 Conclusion / Recommendation 31 Appendix 1 33 Communities With Established Organisations 34 Appendix 2 35 New Communities Research 36 Questionnaire 1 – Individuals Appendix 3 39 New Communities Research 40 Questionnaire 2 – Focus Groups Acknowledgements 43 Abbreviations 43 As well as a providing a unique window into each of these communities – their WELCOME hopes, aspirations and concerns – common themes are drawn together which point to Upbeat Communities’ mission specific interventions which would greatly is ‘to help strangers become aid integration. The outcome of this will be neighbours’. We recognise that that refugees choose to stay in the city, becoming, as stated in our conclusion; engaging communities is key to that mission - both the refugee “powerful assets to the City of Derby, communities arriving in the city providing productive labour, generating and the settled community that new jobs and contributing across all areas of society”. receives them. I have a vision of Derby as a place where During our 12 years working in the city, we everyone can contribute and where we have tried to listen to the voices of those celebrate, rather than fear, the diversity communities, working with refugees and among us. It is our passion to ensure Derby local volunteers as new arrivals seek to continues to be a place of welcome for all rebuild their lives and contribute to the who arrive, especially refugees who have social, economic and cultural fabric of experienced great trauma and loss on the the city. With this in mind we decided to way. undertake this research which was carried out by our dedicated team of staff and volunteers, ably led by Jonathan Baillie. I Karina Martin am extremely grateful to him and all the Founder and CEO Upbeat Communities team as well as to Derby City Council who supported this initiative. During this process of resettling, it is clear that refugees face many challenges and barriers which can prevent integration. In this piece of research, we have tried to provide a snapshot of 9 of the largest new refugee groups in the city, looking at how they are organised, what issues they face and how they find a voice in the public sphere. 4 Upbeat Communities’ volunteers interviewed a total of 16 key informants and EXECUTIVE 5 focus groups from 9 of the largest newly arriving refugee communities, involving 37 SUMMARY interviewees in total, providing a snapshot of the experiences of new refugee communities Derby is becoming an increasingly in Derby. multicultural city, home to a As a result of these interviews, the following variety of refugee communities. recommendations have been put forward: These refugee communities provide a wide range of support, • Extend free or affordable English language provision to all asylum services and activities for new seekers asylum seekers and refugees. They • Extend permission to work or understand the needs of their study to all asylum seekers who have waited for more than one members, can provide language year and culture specific support to • Crack down on rogue employers individuals and speak up on their who are illegally exploiting asylum behalf. seekers • Extend appropriate training for asylum seekers to equip them for Most refugees just want to be able to entering the labour market more rebuild their lives, find work, integrate into quickly their new host society and make a positive • Provide employment training and contribution. Given the right support, they support specifically tailored to the can become powerful assets to the City needs of refugees of Derby, providing productive labour, • Speed up the process of assessing generating new jobs and contributing in all and recognising overseas areas of society. To achieve this requires qualifications taking steps to encourage refugees to stay • Provide facilities for refugee in Derby and enable them to quickly move children to get lessons in their into the labour force. home language and culture • Safeguard provision of resources The way the asylum system currently for anti-extremism programs and operates, most asylum seekers are mental health services for war prevented from working or receiving trauma and torture victims most kinds of education and training. The • Support initiatives designed to provision of English language classes is also make refugees and asylum seekers limited. This is leading to increased mental feel welcome in Derby health problems among asylum seekers and slowing down the entry of genuine refugees into the workforce. 5 ASSESSING THE CIRCUMSTANCES & NEEDS OF REFUGEE COMMUNITIES IN DERBY Derby is becoming an increasingly multicultural city. The 2011 census showed that the Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) Population in Derby had increased to 24.7% of the population from just 15.7% in 2001 and that 34,600 Derby residents had been born outside the UK. Amongst others, these numbers include a variety of refugee communities. Refugee communities provide a wide range of support, services and activities for asylum seekers and refugees who have newly arrived in the city of Derby. They understand the needs of their members, can provide language and culture specific support to individuals and speak up on behalf of their members. Often they are the first point of support for new arrivals . These communities sometimes operate informally, as a network of like-minded individuals, but in other cases they may be constituted as a formal organisation, providing services and projects for their community members. Of the groups we interviewed only 2 were formally constituted. This research on behalf of Upbeat Communities engages with a number of these communities in order to identify their current circumstances, how they engage with their members, what the current needs within their communities are, and how they could be better supported to take part in civic engagement. Interviews and group discussions were carried out with key contacts from a number of such refugee communities, in order to capture a snapshot of each community and explore how stronger relationships can be built between these communities, the local authorities, statutory service providers and the voluntary sector. 7 As a result of these discussions, Upbeat Communities volunteers were able to RESEARCH connect with most of the largest, newly arriving refugee communities that were METHODOLOGY identified. A total of 16 key informants and 5 focus groups from 9 of the largest A range of organisations dealing new refugee communities identified were interviewed, involving a total of 37 with asylum seekers were interviewees. These interviews form the consulted in order to identify the basis of the community snapshots given most significant, currently arriving, below and the subsequent themes emerging asylum seeker populations and from the research. to find key contacts within as Data on accommodation provided for new many of the largest of those arrivals across the East Midlands in the first communities as possible. These 9 months of 2015 revealed that the largest refugee populations coming in to the region included interviews with British were as follows: Red Cross, Derby Refugee Advice Centre (DRAC), New Communities in Social Enterprise (NCISE) and Food Education Enterprise (FEE). NATIONALITY JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP TOTAL Eritrea 18 32 24 15 8 25 40 32 19 213 Iran 37 11 18 14 30 26 15 19 39 209 Sudan 13 17 13 6 4 14 41 32 40 180 Pakistan 10 17 33 17 9 20 15 2 13 136 Iraq 6 17 10 10 5 11 12 12 32 115 Albania 5 10 15 11 16 17 12 17 4 107 Syria 13 10 12 12 12 2 8 7 19 95 Nigeria 9 24 6 14 7 12 3 11 86 Sri Lanka 6 7 8 4 11 6 5 5 9 61 Afghanistan 4 10 6 11 2 8 13 3 57 Others 43 43 59 30 46 58 68 59 54 460 Tota l 164 198 204 133 152 188 236 201 243 1719 Figure 1. Asylum Seekers – East Midlands new arrivals data - Oct 2015 8 In addition to these refugee populations, a they are just people from the same country”. significant community of Chinese asylum Hence, the term “community” has been seekers, particularly relating to Derby, was employed in this report from this initial identified in figures giving a snapshot of Feb starting point of people coming from the 2015 , in which they were the second largest same country. It was decided to begin with group overall that month. finding interviewees from countries that asylum seekers are coming from and then For each community snapshot, to start exploring their perceptions of their questionnaires were devised to enable a own community identity and the community better understanding of: identities of others from their country, thus starting to fill out the picture of other The demographics of the dimensions of the term community amongst community them. What activities the community are The information collected during the doing together interviews and focus groups was then What issues are currently affecting analysed to look for both similarities and the community differences between the communities surveyed in order to identify themes and How the community engages with learning points from the research.
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