Public letter: Children seeking asylum are at risk

The Baobab Centre and 24 child and migrants rights organisations signed and released a letter today to urgently demand that key UK safeguarding institutions dramatically improve on their safeguarding duties with regards to children claiming asylum in the UK.

As the public letter points out, children are made to wait for Home Office decisions for far too long, with dramatically detrimental effects on their mental wellbeing. A write-up of the letter was published in The Guardian, highlighting that child refugees who arrived on their own are waiting longer than adults for Home Office decision.

“We are writing to you as 25 child and migrant rights organisations who come together within the Refugee and Migrant Children’s Consortium (RMCC). Between us we support many children living across the UK who are here on their own claiming asylum. Our letter is an alarm bell to institutions concerned with safeguarding this group of vulnerable children. Without urgent action, it is our collective opinion that some of the children we support are at risk of self-harm and dying by suicide – a risk that is being exacerbated by Home Office failures to decide the children’s asylum claims.”