Integration of newly recognised refugees

On 18 January 2024, the House of Lords is scheduled to consider the following question for short debate:

Lord German (Liberal Democrat) to ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the current pathways for newly recognised refugees to integrate and establish themselves in the United Kingdom.

1. Recognition of refugee status

1.1 Who is a refugee?

Under the United Nations Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees (the Refugee Convention), a refugee is a person who:

[…] owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country.^[1]

1.2 Claiming asylum in the UK

People who want to stay in the UK as a refugee must apply for asylum.^[2] The possible outcomes of an asylum claim are as follows:

• Grant of refugee status. Refugee status means that someone is recognised as a refugee, as defined in the Refugee Convention.^[3] Those granted refugee status are given permission to stay in the UK for a minimum of five years.^[4] If there is a significant and non-temporary change in conditions in the refugee’s country of nationality during the period of limited leave, it may be decided to review the grant of refugee status. Refugee status may also be reviewed if the Home Office receives information relating to someone’s eligibility to be granted refugee status, for instance if they obtained refugee status through misrepresentation.
• Grant of humanitarian protection. If a person does not qualify as a refugee under the Refugee Convention but the Home Office accepts they have a need for humanitarian protection, they will be granted humanitarian protection status.^[5] People granted this status are given permission to stay in the UK for a minimum of five years. If there is a significant change of circumstances during this time in the country from which the person fled and they no longer require humanitarian protection, or if other evidence shows that humanitarian protection is no longer appropriate, the Home Office may review this status.
• Grant of other leave. If a person is not accepted as needing international protection but the Home Office considers that there are reasons for allowing them to stay on a temporary basis, they are granted limited permission to stay.^[6]
• Refusal. If someone is refused asylum, the Home Office will give them a letter explaining why and setting out whether they have a right of appeal.^[7] If a claim is refused and the applicant does not appeal or has exhausted any right of appeal, they are required to leave the UK.^[8]

When a person applies for asylum, they can include their dependants—spouse, civil partner or unmarried partner, and children under 18 years old—in the application if the dependants are also present in the UK.^[9] If the application is successful, the dependants can usually stay in the UK for the same amount of time as the main claimant, but they will not be granted refugee status unless they make their own claim for asylum.

1.3 Refugee resettlement schemes

Resettled people are granted refugee status or another form of humanitarian protection by the UK while abroad and then brought to live in the UK. The UK operates three global UNHCR (the UN Refugee Agency) resettlement schemes:^[10]

• UK resettlement scheme (UKRS). This is the UK’s main resettlement scheme. Individuals coming through this scheme are assessed and referred by the UNHCR according to its criteria, which are based on people’s needs and vulnerabilities.
• Community sponsorship. This scheme enables civil society (friends and neighbours, charities and faith groups) to directly support refugees resettled in the UK. Those identified and brought to the UK through the UKRS and the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme (ACRS), are eligible to be supported through community sponsorship.
• Mandate scheme. This scheme launched in 1995 resettles refugees who have a close family member in the UK who is willing to accommodate them.

As well as these global UNHCR resettlement schemes, one pathway within the ACRS is a refugee resettlement scheme whereby the UK government receives referrals from the UNHCR of vulnerable individuals who have fled Afghanistan.^[11]

People who come to the UK through a resettlement scheme have already been recognised as refugees by the UNHCR under the Refugee Convention. Therefore they do not go through the asylum process in the UK.^[12] They are given refugee status with indefinite leave to remain the UK.

1.4 Other ‘safe and legal routes’ to the UK for people seeking protection

Other ‘safe and legal routes’ to the UK for people seeking protection exist that do not give beneficiaries refugee status and the associated rights under the Refugee Convention. For instance, the British national (overseas) route for people from Hong Kong, the Ukraine family scheme and the homes for Ukraine scheme are all visa-based schemes, and successful applicants are not considered as refugees.^[13]

2. What happens once someone is granted refugee status?

2.1 Change of status

People with refugee status have different entitlements, for example to claim benefits or to enter employment, than those who are in the UK awaiting a decision on their asylum claim. People granted refugee status or humanitarian protection will normally receive the following:^[14]

• an initial period of five years’ permission to stay
• immediate and unrestricted access to the labour market (generally people are not allowed to work while their asylum claim is being considered)^[15]
• recourse to public funds (asylum seekers usually have ‘no recourse to public funds’, which means they are not eligible for most social welfare benefits and public housing)^[16]
• the opportunity to apply for a refugee integration loan, a loan of between £100 and £500 (or up to £780 for couples) for things that are “essential to help […] settle into UK society”, including: a housing deposit, rent payment or moving costs; essential items for the home; training or education; basic living costs such as food or household bills; work clothing and equipment^[17]
• a five-year route to settlement for those who continue to need protection on the settlement protection route
• no requirement to demonstrate a knowledge of language and life in the UK when applying for settlement
• the ability to sponsor their partner and children under the age of 18 to join them in the UK under the family reunion provisions in the Immigration Rules

2.2 Biometric residence permit

Once someone is granted refugee status or permission to stay in the UK, they are issued with a biometric residence permit (BRP).^[18] A BRP can be used to confirm a person’s identity, their right to study in the UK and their right to any public services or benefits to which they are entitled.^[19] The individual should receive their BRP within five to seven working days of being granted refugee or humanitarian protection status.^[20]

2.3 Ending of asylum support and the move-on period

Asylum claimants are entitled to claim asylum support while they are waiting for their case to be decided. This takes the form of housing and/or a cash allowance (£49.18 per week for each person in the household, or £8.86 if the accommodation provides meals).^[21]

Once someone is successful in their asylum claim, their eligibility for asylum support ends. However, this does not happen immediately: there is a prescribed grace period of 28 days from the date the claimant is notified that a decision has been made on their asylum claim.^[22] The government advises people immediately to apply for benefits, to arrange housing and to open a bank account once they get refugee status.^[23]

As well as receiving a grant determination letter confirming their asylum claim has been successful and a BRP, people granted refugee status or permission to stay in the UK should also receive an asylum support cessation letter confirming their asylum support will be stopped and a notice to quit.^[24] This states the date by which the person must leave their Home Office-provided accommodation. These documents are not necessarily received at the same time. The notice to quit must give at least seven days’ notice.

The Home Office also notifies the charity Migrant Help about the outcome of the asylum claim of people who have been receiving asylum support.^[25] Migrant Help then contacts the refugee within one working day to provide advice about accessing benefits, housing and booking JobCentre appointments to get support with finding employment.^[26]

An advice guide for newly recognised refugees produced by Migrant Help explains that the local authority in the area where the refugee has been living will provide accommodation if the refugee is deemed to have priority need.^[27] The Refugee Council charity says that private rental is often the only option for refugees who are not assessed as a priority, particularly single people.^[28] It has said that “finding a deposit and rent in advance for landlords is beyond the reach of most”, and many face the prospect of homelessness and destitution.

Concerns have been raised about how the 28-day grace period, also referred to as the ‘move-on’ period, is applied and whether it is long enough. Organisations including the Refugee Council, Asylum Matters, the British Red Cross, Shelter and Crisis have argued that a 28-day period is “incompatible with other areas of government policy” in terms of accessing housing support and benefits:^[29]

The Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 placed new duties on English councils to provide support to anyone who is either homeless or at risk of becoming homeless within the next 56 days. For those at risk of homelessness, the act means local authorities have a duty to work with people to prevent them becoming homeless within those 56 days. The move-on period gives newly recognised refugees only half that time at most. Many local authorities also don’t accept either the grant determination letter or the BRP as proof that the person is at risk of homelessness, which shortens the period to find accommodation even further [ie, if the person must wait until they have received their notice to quit].

While refugees will almost always want to work and be able to support themselves, the reality is that most will probably have to rely on universal credit while they find a job. Within universal credit, there is a minimum of 35 days between someone applying for universal credit and the first payment being made. This is already seven days longer than the move-on period.

However, it’s also impossible to receive universal credit payments without providing bank account details. But refugees often face challenges opening a bank account, especially before they’ve received their BRP and without being able to prove their address.^[30]

It has at times been the practice to delay the point at which the 28-day period starts to be counted. Baroness Williams of Trafford, then a minister of state at the Home Office, said in February 2022 that rather than extending the 28-day period, the government’s focus was on “implementing practical changes with the aim of securing better outcomes for refugees”.^[31] She said this included “ensuring that the 28-day period does not start until refugees have been issued with a biometric residence permit, the document that they need to prove that they can take employment and apply for universal credit, and that the national insurance number is printed on the permit, which speeds up the process of deciding a [universal credit] application”.

However, in August 2023, the Home Office informed local authorities and civil society organisations that the 28 days would now start from when someone was notified of the decision on their claim, rather than when they received the BRP.^[32] The Refugee Council argued this would mean “the move-on period has in effect been reduced by at least a week”.^[33]. It said this would increase the risk of destitution and homelessness for newly recognised refugees and place additional pressures on local authorities and the voluntary sector. The Refugee Council also noted that some refugees had ended up “stuck in asylum accommodation” beyond the end of the 28-day move-on period because they had never received a notice to quit, without which their local authority would not accept they were at risk of homelessness and provide support. The Refugee Council said the result of another change in practice introduced in August 2023 was that these people were now being issued a notice to quit that expired in seven days, “in effect […] giving refugees seven days to find alternative accommodation—not the 28 days of the move-on period”.

In September 2023, the Refugee Council and over 140 other organisations wrote to the Home Office and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities asking the government to abandon these changes.^[34] They called on the government to:

• commit to immediately reverse the changes so all refugees have a minimum of 28 days before they are required to leave their accommodation
• ensure that refugees receive all their documentation before the 28-day notice period begins, in line with recent Home Office policy
• issue clear guidance to local authorities that a newly recognised refugee is at risk of homelessness once they receive notification of the decision on their asylum claim, and are eligible for homelessness prevention support from that time without the need for evidence such as an eviction letter
• stagger the seven-day notices that people are now receiving and work with statutory services and civil society organisations to manage the increase in demand for support
• commit to working towards extending the move-on period to at least 56 days, in line with the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 and the application for universal credit

In October 2023, churches across the Diocese of London reported that they were seeing “dramatically increasing numbers of newly recognised refugees experiencing homelessness” due to people receiving seven days’ notice to quit their asylum accommodation.^[35] The Bishop of London and other leaders from faith and belief institutions across London wrote to Home Office ministers in December 2023 outlining their concerns:

Since August [2023] we know that in practice refugees are having much less notice that their asylum support will end than the stated policy of 28 days. Some are given seven days or less to leave their accommodation. Many have been in asylum accommodation for months or even years, with no opportunity to work or build networks. They are now being given only days to navigate the various systems and authorities necessary to plan their next steps.^[36]

They called on the government to ensure that all refugees had a minimum of 28 days from receiving their BRP before they are required to leave their asylum accommodation, and to move towards extending the notice period to 56 days.

In response to parliamentary questions about the impact of the August 2023 changes, the government said in October 2023:

To reduce the number of people currently accommodated in hotels and other accommodation types, and therefore reduce costs and limit the burden on the taxpayer, we are reliant upon people who are no longer eligible for asylum support leaving the asylum accommodation estate as quickly as possible. This number is increasing due to significant efforts underway to clear the asylum backlog.^[37]

The government emphasised that the prescribed notice period of 28 days from the point someone was notified of the outcome of their asylum claim had not changed.^[38] It said that “individuals should make plans to move on from asylum support as quickly as possible” and noted that it offered support on this through Migrant Help and other organisations.

By December 2023, the government said that “current practice is that individuals remain on asylum support and in asylum accommodation for 28 days from the point of the biometric residence permit being issued”.^[39] In response to an oral question from the Bishop of London, Lord Sharpe of Epsom, parliamentary under secretary of state at the Home Office, argued this meant individuals had longer than 28 days in practice to move on.^[40] Lord Sharpe also reiterated the government had no plans to extend the move-on period to 56 days. He said the prescribed 28-day period was “long-standing in our legislation” and increasing it would “exacerbate” the “huge strain” on the asylum accommodation estate.

3. Integration of refugees

3.1 Integration strategies across the UK

The UK government has responsibility for asylum and immigration policy for the whole of the UK, but the integration of refugees is a devolved matter.^[41]

The devolved administrations have or are developing their own policies on the integration of refugees:

• Scotland: The Scottish government published its ‘New Scots: Refugee integration strategy 2018 to 2022’ in January 2018. It is currently developing an updated version.^[42]
• Wales: The Welsh government published its ‘Nation of sanctuary: Refugee and asylum seeker plan’ in January 2019.
• Northern Ireland: The Northern Ireland Executive ran a consultation on a draft refugee integration strategy between November 2021 and February 2022.^[43]

The UK government said recently that “all refugees and those granted protection in the UK should be able to fully integrate into life here and become self-sufficient, providing for themselves and their families, and contributing to the economy”.^[44] The government acknowledged that it was important to support refugees in doing so, since “refugees face additional barriers to entering the labour market than the UK-born population due to, for example, a lack of awareness of how the UK job market works, language and cultural differences”.^[45]

The UK government published an ‘Integrated communities action plan’ for England in 2019. This set out the government’s plans to “create socially and economically stronger, more confident and integrated communities”, looking at community integration broadly, not just the integration of refugees.^[46] However, it set out some actions specific to integrating refugees, including seeking to increase the provision of information to refugees recognised after arrival in the UK, and working across government and with civil society and other partners to improve the coordination of existing services so that newly recognised refugees could access support more quickly.^[47]

The action plan also proposed testing the feasibility of an outcomes fund for refugee integration, which would offer the opportunity for different government departments to work together with local government, investors and delivery partners to develop and fund innovative interventions to achieve integration outcomes for refugees.^[48] The government announced the creation of a refugee transitions outcome fund in the 2020 spending round.^[49] This is a £14mn cross-government fund which aims to “increase the self-sufficiency and integration of newly granted refugees, helping them to move into work, learn English, access housing and build links in their local communities”.^[50] It uses a social impact bond model, where payments are made by the Home Office to social investors for specific outcomes as they are achieved. Four projects were selected in 2021 through competitive tender to deliver the programme outcomes for a fixed cohort until March 2024.^[51] The projects are being delivered in Plymouth, the North East, the West Midlands and Greater Manchester.^[52]

3.2 New plan for immigration and an enhanced integration package

The UK government is also bringing in a package of enhanced integration support for those who arrived in the UK via ‘safe and legal’ routes, as part of its policy of legislating to deter irregular entry to the UK.

In March 2021, the then home secretary, Priti Patel, published a ‘New plan for immigration: Policy statement’ which said that the government would “continue to encourage asylum via safe and legal routes, strengthening our support by offering an enhanced integration package to those arriving in this manner”.^[53]

The government said in February 2023 that the enhanced integrated package would be delivered through the refugee employability programme.^[54] The programme was announced in September 2023 and covers England only.^[55] The Home Office said it was not a replacement for the support already provided to refugees to help them rebuild their lives in the UK, but was “designed to complement what is delivered across mainstream services and the voluntary sector”.^[56] It will provide tailored employment support (such as skills courses, or help with job applications) and, for those who do not already receive it, additional English language provision and integration support (such as support accessing health services and signposting to local community groups). The Home Office said it was running a competitive procurement to secure suppliers for delivering the programme.

In a policy statement published alongside the announcement of the scheme, the Home Office said that the programme would “provide support for refugees and those granted protection who have arrived here through safe and legal routes”.^[57] The programme would be open to people who:

• had arrived in the UK under resettlement schemes (the UKRS, the mandate scheme or the community sponsorship scheme) after 25 February 2021
• had arrived in the UK under the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme (ACRS) or the Afghan relocations and assistance policy (ARAP)
• had been granted refugee permission to stay on or after 28 June 2022 when the new system as implemented by the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 came into place
• arrived under refugee family reunion, if their sponsoring refugee was eligible for the refugee employability programme

The Home Office has said that it will keep eligibility for the refugee employability programme under review as the programme is delivered.^[58]

The Nationality and Borders Act 2022 created a differentiated approach to asylum claims depending on how someone arrived in the UK. The government said that to “discourage irregular entry”, such as entry across the English Channel in small boats, the act would create a framework where asylum claimants could be granted a restricted form of temporary protection status if they did not meet certain conditions.^[59] This would include circumstances where they had not come directly from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened, or where they did not show good reason for their illegal entry or presence. The act implemented what Ms Patel had set out in the ‘New plan for immigration’, which she said would “mark a step-change in [the] government’s posture as we toughen our stance against illegal entry”, where “for the first time, whether you enter the UK legally or illegally will have an impact on how your asylum claim progresses, and on your status in the UK if that claim is successful”.^[60]

These provisions came into force on 28 June 2022, but in June 2023 the government announced it was pausing the new approach.^[61] The government said it would change the Immigration Rules so that from July 2023, asylum claimants would not be grouped into those granted refugee permission to stay (group 1) and those granted temporary refugee permission to stay (group 2). Instead, all those with successful applications would be granted the same status, and anyone already placed into group 2 would have their conditions changed to match the conditions given to those in group 1. The government said this was because it was introducing “considerably stronger” measures in the Illegal Migration Bill. The Illegal Migration Act 2023, passed in July 2023, would require the removal from the UK of anyone coming to the UK illegally who had not come directly from a country where their life and freedom were threatened, even if they were seeking to make a protection or humanitarian claim.^[62] However, these provisions are not yet in force.

4. Read more

• House of Commons Library, ‘Asylum statistics’, 12 September 2023
• House of Commons Library, ‘Safe and legal routes to the UK for people seeking protection’, 25 January 2023
• House of Lords Library, ‘Refugees and asylum-seekers: UK policy’, 1 December 2022

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Cover image by Markus Winkler on Unsplash.