Homes for Ukrainians - Issues

[PercyGoat]

DF & her DH foster "children refugees".

They currently have a male who is "just 17". He arrived on an inflatable boat. He has no passport or any verifiable background. He speaks little English.

DF went through extensive training to deal with trauma etc. Their house was assessed and they had to make some changes to their house to make it "child friendly".

Loads of my friends are announcing on Facebook that they are providing a room for refugees.

I worry about the lack of vetting on both sides!

DF has some boundaries in place into what placement she is willing and not willing to have. I don't think that people are aware of boundaries!!!

I've seen someone saying that they can convert their living room into a bedroom if needed. Others have one spare room and considering hosting a family. Why is no one concerned about overcrowding?

£350 does not cover the costs of housing someone.

What happens after 6 months???

Any updates from anyone hosting or who knows someone hosting?

How long does the visa application take?

I do worry a bit about the ‘what ifs’. It is not easy sometimes. I now have my own Ukrainian family here. We are currently 5 adults and 3 children in a a 3 bed house. We are related and it’s still not easy, using the bathroom/ kitchen and generally getting on. I’ve even lived like this many times before too. I think some British will see the reality of a busy house, funny food smells absolutely general culture differences and struggle a lot. It’s not all rosy. It’s all so unstable for the people coming here.

My aunt is already returning to Ukraine (to the west though, with other relatives with a bigger house) after struggling with overcrowded hosts.

@DFOD my family application was a few days less than a whole month as a guide

What is DF thought it was Dear Father.

You mean the form filling? It’s not crazily long, just an hour or so if you have all the info. The complication is that both parties need to fill it together with more on the guest side than the host (but in English) so there’s a certain amount of information sharing needed. There are also some pieces of documentation demanded which can be hard for a person fleeing war to provide.

However they are taking bloody ages to be approved. There are people who applied on the first day with no obvious complications who have not yet been approved. I hardly know anyone whose guests have arrived. Meanwhile, for people whose would be guests are in dangerous situations , it is extremely difficult to have to tell them day after day that the visa is not yet approved and you don’t know how long it will be.

There are also some other problems such as the Home Office helpline giving out contradictory advice and documents disappearing from the system after being uploaded.

The system is a mess, unfortunately. If you are thinking of applying now it may be sorted out by the time you have matched with sponsees or the backlog may have grown to months rather than weeks.

@TheCountessofFitzdotterel actually I’d say the form filling is awful if you aren’t an English speaker.

Obviously anything in a language you don’t speak is hard to impossible

That’s why the sponsor generally does it.

I think it’s hugely open to abuse in its current incarnation. Too slow to centralise everything and not enough safeguards. Completely unsurprising that large numbers of single middle aged men are looking to host 20-30 year old women. Poor great granny Ludmilla with her bunions and 3 chins doesn’t seem to get a look in.

Having said all that, huge kudos to the legitimate hosts who are going out of their way to support the refugees.

He is 17
He’ll be scared in a place he knows nothing about with people who are strangers

Those who are pointing out the obvious dangers in hosting and the myriad things that can go wrong are quite right. But as I see it, for the Ukrainian women and children, remaining in Ukraine is hugely dangerous and problematic. Surely the best way to make sure that they don't fall into abusive hands is to open up our safe homes if at all possible? We're waiting to be allocated a family - and I'd be lieing if I said I'm not apprehensive. We've had people stay with us before for a few months (in one instance with toddler, dog and boxes of their possessions). They were absolutely lovely (and I'd have them again in a heartbeat if necessary) but I really wanted my home back at the end and I'm quite certain they wanted to have their own place, too. It must be so difficult to live in someone else's home. But if it was my child and grandchildren needing refuge I really hope that someone would give up a short period of their comfortable lives to help them. Lots of people can't do it (no judgement here) and some people shouldn't do it, but we all need to examine our hearts here. If we would be willing to accept refuge in someone's home if war came to Britain shouldn't we also be willing to give a safe place to stay for these refugees?

@MangosteenSoda

I think it’s hugely open to abuse in its current incarnation. Too slow to centralise everything and not enough safeguards. Completely unsurprising that large numbers of single middle aged men are looking to host 20-30 year old women. Poor great granny Ludmilla with her bunions and 3 chins doesn’t seem to get a look in.

Having said all that, huge kudos to the legitimate hosts who are going out of their way to support the refugees.

A lot of the people in the group I am and on Twitter in are hosting older people. I hate the Facebook adverts and if I was running the scheme everyone would have to go through an existing charity. The charities have proved themselves agile and efficient so I don’t think it would cause hold ups. Even people like me who are doing it through Ukrainian friends would have to explain our connection (which would be easy enough-in our case DH and his Ukrainian colleague could show they work together and his Ukrainian colleague used to be at the institution our prospective guest works at). It wouldn’t be failsafe, nothing is, but it would help deter the more obvious predators. And you would set the DBS in motion at the very start of the process. But the refugee charities have rightly complained about not being brought on board from the start. They have so much experience settling refugees, it is such a pity.