Asylum support for children and young people living in Kirklees: Stories of mothers

The report is based on a one-year pilot study by academic practitioners at WomenCentre, Kirklees, funded by the Nationwide Children’s Research Centre. This study has taken a localised approach to the Parliamentary Inquiry (2013) into asylum support for children and young people. We have placed the views of mothers of children who live or have lived in receipt of asylum support in Kirklees at the heart of the study. All of the mothers interviewed said that asylum support (accommodation and/or financial subsistence) was or had been their only means of survival and many of them have spent several years in receipt of asylum support with their children.
Using the themes that arose in the Parliamentary Inquiry into asylum support for children and young people (2013)’, we have examined the mothers’ accounts of asylum support in relation to children and young people living in Kirklees. Consistent with the Parliamentary Inquiry and central to the analysis, a number of areas of concern were raised by the mothers: ‘essential living needs’, ‘home-life’, ‘education’ and ‘societal attitudes’. A further theme emerged around ‘children’s resilience’.
As part of this report we have presented the recommendations put forward by the mothers:
• Families seeking asylum should be given the right to work.
• Section 4 support should be abolished and a cash-based support system introduced for all children, young people and their families.
• Families should have a choice about where they live.
• The best interests of the child should be central to decisions affecting children.