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This public health emergency brings great challenges for everyone, especially children in need of care and protection, their families and carers, and those supporting them.
While the impact of this will be felt by all, we know that it will further exacerbate the challenging circumstances of children, young people, parents, and carers who were already dealing with existing stresses and strains in their lives.
There is emergency legislation and new guidance in development that will also have an impact on the delivery of support services, the duties of public authorities and lives of…
Abstract
Social workers are confronted with a contradictory task: that of acting as state parents for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, in an era of hostile migration policies and austerity. Mobilizing Young’s (2006) concept of ‘responsibility’, we ask: how is state parental responsibility towards unaccompanied minors given meaning, and with what consequences, for both frontline workers and unaccompanied minors alike? Drawing on interviews with frontline workers and unaccompanied minors in the United Kingdom (n = 107), we delineate three modes through which…
ABSTRACT
Refugees often find themselves in a protracted situation of temporariness, as applications for asylum are processed, deportations negotiated and possible extensions of temporary protection status considered within the context of increasingly restrictive governmental policies across Europe. Through the case of a young Sri Lankan woman who arrived in Denmark as an ‘unaccompanied asylum-seeking minor’ and spent five years within the Danish asylum system, this article explores how she experienced moving through different legal categories and the institutional settings associated with…
Abstract
Policy in England and Ireland emphasizes the use of foster care for unaccompanied refugee minors (URM). Research has highlighted the predominantly positive experiences of young people in this form of care. Drawing on “recognition theory” (Honneth, 2012), this article examines the role of foster care in supporting URM transitions to adulthood. Young people are likely to have had traumatic and challenging experiences prior to their arrival in England and Ireland. They also face the challenge of settling into life in a new country, while often experiencing difficulties and stigma…
Abstract
This paper presents a community based participatory research project, which adopted a photovoice approach with seven unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC) living in foster care in the United Kingdom. The project also included a focus group with six foster carers to explore their perceptions of caring for UASCs. At the end of the focus group we then shared the young people's images from the photovoice project. The purpose of this was to better inform the carers understanding of this group's needs and the reality of their lived experiences, to see if this would have any…
Abstract
Radicalisation is fast becoming one of the most acute and pressing safeguarding and child protection issues of the whole century (NSPCC, 2016). However, the issue of looked-after children as potential recruits for extremist groups has been largely overlooked, despite the universal acknowledgement that looked-after children represent the most vulnerable of all demographics within society. This research collected rare and vital primary data by interviewing practitioners within looked-after children’s, residential, and respite services. The study established that practitioners lacked…
Abstract
Unaccompanied refugee minors are, like other youngsters, making their moves towards adulthood, but under most challenging conditions. Informed by a cultural psychological approach to development, we analysed interviews with 18 unaccompanied Afghan boys and their professional caregivers. ‘Establishing a liveable life in Norway’ and ‘helping the family in the country of origin’ were analysed as central developmental projects for the boys, the former actively supported by the caregivers, the latter typically not. Considering what each individual is trying to achieve and how their…
Abstract
Objectives To examine the mental health of unaccompanied refugee minors prospectively during the asylum-seeking process, with a focus on specific stages in the asylum process, such as age assessment, placement in a supportive or non-supportive facility and final decision on the asylum applications.
Design This was a 2½ year follow-up study of unaccompanied minors (UM) seeking asylum in Norway. Data were collected within three weeks (n=138) and at 4 months (n=101), 15 months (n=84) and 26 months (n=69) after arrival.
Setting…
Six weeks after the Calais migrant camp was demolished, unaccompanied minors scattered around France are still waiting to hear of their fate from the Home Office. The video features one young refugee who fled death in Darfur desperate to be reunited with his brother living in the United Kingdom.
The filmmaker Daniel Mulloy has directed a new 20-minute film, entitled ‘Home,’ which is inspired by the current refugee crisis. “As thousands of men, women and children attempt to get into Europe,” says the film’s website, “this twenty minute film follows a comfortable English family who experience a life-changing journey of their own.” The film’s website includes information on how to support refugees and offer help in the context of today’s crisis and also includes a trailer of the film and a list of screenings in the UK.