SAFE Project Closing Conference
by Vera NYGARD
SAFE Project
Closing Conference
Brussels 29 October 2019
Conference Report
Background
The SAFE project, which stands for “Supporting Un-Accompanied children with Family based care and Enhanced protection”, works to enhance the quality of family-based care and to promote the welfare and protection of unaccompanied children. This multinational project, involving the British Red Cross, the Danish Red Cross, KMOP (Greece) and CARDET (Cyprus) compiled a policy paper with the title “Ensuring the best interest of the child and family unity in the Dublin process”. The paper stems from the SAFE project’s findings in these countries, which has indicated the wide variation in approaches to the Dublin system and the impact on unaccompanied and separate children.
Closing Conference
The closing conference for the SAFE project was opened by Alex Fraser, UK Director for Refugee Support and Restoring Family Links, British Red Cross. Fraser emphasised that the voice of the young people and children that are stuck in limbo situations need to be highlighted. This project is looking to do just that. “It’s a tragic thing for children to have to leave their home and everything they love because of violence and persecution. Children should not be in that situation.” Fraser stressed. We can do a lot to continue to improve their conditions. We need to help them understand what is truly happening. Ensure their protection. Listen to them. That’s the only way we will know what needs to change.
Fraser asked how seeking protection can be so difficult. We cannot underestimate the impact of a safe welcome. Helping the young people reconnect to education and the talents they have. As long as there is war, persecution, violence, people WILL move. We need to find safe routes for migration, especially for children. We all need to share the responsibility.
Representatives from the four partner countries presented results from the project in their own countries. Ghadah Al-Nasseri from the British Red Cross mentioned that out of 90.000 minors that came to the EU between 2018-19, 30% were younger than 14. There is a severe lack of protection for these children. They should all receive protection despite religion or background. There is currently many differences in systems regarding unaccompanied children in the member states. The overarching goal of the STEP project is to make all children feel at home. For this purpose the STEP project has implemented an e-learning platform that can be utilised by family workers, social workers and others, to gain knowledge and support in meeting the needs of the unaccompanied minors. All involved countries have provided trainings and consultations for the key people involved in this process.
Jon Featonby, Refugee and Asylum Policy Manager, British Red Cross, presented the policy recommendation paper on the Dublin regulation. The paper explores the Dublin Regulation as applied and implemented in Greece, the UK and Denmark by examining how each country considers a child’s best interests, and family unity, in the context of the Dublin application. With a focus on kinship families the paper aims to help policy makers and public authorities understand the challenges and needs of the families supporting unaccompanied children in transit and destination countries. Some of the key findings of the paper as presented by Featonby are:
- Timescales not being adhered to for primarily bureaucratic reasons
- Lack of available and consistent data collection.
- Restrictive and inflexible administrative practices.
- Lack of support to the child and involved families.
- Lack of relationships with the child to ensure that their best interests are truly considered.
- Absence of guidance on how to complete a Best Interests Assessment.
- Not enough resources invested in process.
Featonby expanded on the key recommendations of the paper, stating that there are some specific changes that need to be implemented across the EU. There needs to be agreements on Dublin Standard Operating procedures that are efficient and effective, regardless which countries are involved. Kinship care needs to be encouraged and data collection needs to be more consistent. The UK needs to continue some version of Dublin procedures post-Brexit.
After a short break, the conference participants had the opportunity to watch the SAFE film: Understanding the overall situation of unaccompanied and separated children. (The film can be streamed on safeproject.eu)
An expert panel of four shared their input on different topics from their own countries.
Helen Johnson, Refugee Council (UK) spoke on the topic of Challenges of the age assessment process in the UK. Through an Age Dispute Project, the Refugee Council has managed to get 201 children accepted as such (2018-2019), whilst 48 children are still awaiting assessment. In the UK, medical assessments are not used. Currently, the assessment methods used in the UK are undertaken by local authority social work, through Home Office decisions, or through Court. If a young person wants to challenge a decision that has been made regarding their age, they might be able to get legal help. A judge will then decide their age as a matter of fact, with the help oftwo trained social workers.
Some challenges in these methods do exist. No-one has a magic wand to solve this issue. In some cases no-one will ever know the right age. The Home Office does not keep a record on how many applicants are treated as “over 25” and what happens to them next. There are delays and uncertainties in the assessment process, and the relationship between the young person and the ones that should be protecting them suffers. However, Johnson remained hopeful that medical advances and robust collection on relevant data will improve the situation in the future.
Eleni Chronopoulou, KMOP, Greece, shared her experience on the family reunification process in Greece, the challenges, best practices and the impact of policies on the wellbeing of children. There are currently 4616 unaccompanied minors registered in Greece. Most of them are either in long term or temporary accommodation or in RICs. But a large amount of children also live in insecure housing conditions. There is a lack of foster carers, and the Greek law on foster care does not include unaccompanied children. There is an absence of common tools and methodologies among professionals and the administrative procedures are very slow. On a policy level, there is a clear lack of focus on humanitarian aspects. Chronopoulou shared a moving story about a migrant girl who left her home country at 14 together with her parents and brother. All of them drowned except for Sara. She is now considered an unaccompanied minor even though she did not leave her country alone. There are many others in the same situation, and finding solutions is difficult.
Solveig Gunnarsdottir, psychologist specialising in clinical psychology, Denmark, spoke on the Psychological impact of the asylum process on the child. Assessing the psychological needs of these children is crucial, as they have lived through devastating things, cruelty, violence and danger during the journey to the EU. Every child has a unique story, often of losing family members, and experiencing such devastating things they can’t talk about it. But the children also have many common experiences and feelings: that the world is not a safe place and that people can exploit them. They will never be safe. PTSD. Sleeping problems. Some feel ashamed that they survived, when others died. But they can also talk about their hopes and dreams. They want to learn the language and feel safe. Gunnarsdottir expressed that she is still amazed how resilient children are.
Gunnardottir explained that children in the asylum system face many questions: Will I be granted stay, will I be reunited with my family? What will the future look like? In the asylum centres people constantly come and go. The longer time passes the children become passive and lose hope. How can we help them? asked Gunnarsdottir. They need to feel belonging, love, and acceptance. They need stability and structure, to know what tomorrow brings. We need to support the individual child, she concluded
Alex Fraser gave the concluding remarks of the conference. There are limits to how much we can do, but we cannot give up on fighting for these children, he said. Fraser listed some practical things we can do already to make sure we are moving forward. We need to share our good practice examples with our colleagues, spread the word. We should strengthen the partnerships that have been developed through this program. On a policy level, we need to focus on using evidence from the program to advocate for unaccompanied children. But we also need to make sure that we find ways to ensure that there is a political will to create change. Otherwise, nothing will happen. In everything, we need to include the young people, listen to their experience and knowledge. We won’t give up, concluded Fraser.
Considerations for The Salvation Army:
- TSA can utilise the tools provided in SAFE project to strengthen its capacity to respond to situations with unaccompanied minors: http://safeproject.eu/about-the-project/
- TSA can advocate for the rights of unaccompanied minors in the individual countries, by approaching policy makers and decision makers, and building partnerships with other organisations with the same goals.