The Power of Community Sponsorship
As Brits were busy reclining rusty garden chairs to soak up a rare day of sunshine in late March, Home Secretary Priti Patel unveiled the biggest overhaul of the UK asylum system in decades. The policies, she said, would fix a system bursting at the seams from operating at the mercy of “criminal smugglers” and ensure fair punishment for those arriving on UK shores through illegal routes.
The announcement was followed by pushback from those who naturally worried about the birth of a two-tier system and its contravention of the United Nations’ 1951 Refugee Convention. Others spotlighted the laudable contributions of refugee doctors, nurses and other key workers during the global COVID-19 pandemic. But mostly, citizens were looking for ways to resurrect Britain as the welcoming and compassionate nation they once knew.
The announcement of the UKRS scheme — with community sponsorship in addition
A few months prior to Priti Patel’s asylum pledge, the UK Home Office quietly announced the UK Government’s refugee resettlement programme (UKRS), offering a seamless transition from the existing Syrian Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme (VPRS), the UK Government’s pledge to resettle 20,000 Syrians by 2020. This should not be overlooked — the government has subtly unlocked a door, giving power to every person in the UK to welcome a refugee family into their community.
While community sponsorship on no account assuages the asylum proposal, the scheme offers a safe route for refugees to reach the UK — and until we’ve renounced the rhetoric of “legal” and “illegal” — a legal one too.
Community sponsorship — an integral part of the UKRS — enables ordinary citizens to welcome and resettle a refugee family in their local neighbourhood. Usually, a handful of neighbours, who choose love over borders and feel indignant at the public debate around refugees, decide to take matters into their own hands. They recruit more members, work in partnership with their Local Authority to build a resettlement plan, apply with the Home Office, raise money, find a property and — finally — they welcome a refugee family at the airport and bring them to their new home.
From the day groups greet the family at the airport, they walk beside them as they rebuild their lives — supporting them to navigate their local community, register with services, find work, and feel at home. Officially, the support the community sponsor provides is for one year, but communities rarely relinquish relationships after 12 months. Throughout the year, group members usually transition from volunteer supporters to friends, and the refugee families can breathe a long held sigh of relief as home and heart are finally in the same place. The transition from volunteer supports to friends usually happens between the six-month mark and the 24-month mark and solidifies over time.
The community sponsorship scheme is transformative. Families who’ve spent years, or decades even, in a refugee camp can board a plane usually, in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, where they’ve registered as refugees with the UNHCR and have applied for resettlement. As they touch down in the UK, a group of more than 20 volunteers stand ready and armed to the teeth with knowledge on how to rebuild the family’s life.
Rallying the local community around refugee sponsorship has been proven to address the often lamented decline of community and social capital, and to improve attitudes towards migration. While 20 people may seem an insignificant size, their unwavering commitment is not. Their positivity and dedication to welcome repeatedly transcend even the most stubborn scepticism. So through sponsorship, we irrigate the prospect of changing attitudes locally and through ongoing engagement, we galvanise them into long-term action.
Consequently, community sponsorship sits as one of the few options for civil society to formulate a new narrative regarding refugee resettlement in their country. While sponsorship cannot change the Home Secretary’s asylum proposals, it does signify that we are ready to build a bigger table instead of a higher fence to show the world that refugees are welcome here.
Refugee Pathways advocates for the expansion of community sponsorship programs, such as the UK’s community sponsorship program, which enables refugees to relocate to their new host country due to sponsorship from residents within the host community. This remains to be a valuable pathway to serve as a safe and legal resettlement for refugees, while also encouraging inclusion of refugees within their host community through the building of a substantial support network of sponsors. Refugee Pathways supports the phenomenal contributions of Sponsor Refugees and joins their advocacy for continued and sustained community sponsorship programs.
A collaboration between Refugee Pathways and Sponsor Refugees, written by Emily Ervin and Kimie Frengler.
For more information about community Sponsorship, you can reach out to Citizens UK here: communitysponsorship@citizensuk.org
