To think Ukrainian families may just have to..

[FindingMyself1999]

Go back? bbc article

such a sad situation but we barely have enough housing or school places as it is. Unless the hosts can act as guarantors? That’s a possibility ?

the government really hasn’t thought through the aftermath of the hosting scheme.

YANBU.

Being a Guarantor is a fucking massive risk that most people won’t even do for family members, especially as most EAs/LLs will now only accept a home owner Guarantor, and even in the East Midlands where I am, they also want a minimum income of 40K.

I’m trying to think of alternatives. These hosts are not getting anywhere, well because the country has enough shit going on (albeit I know not war like Ukraine). For Boris Johnson, he really prioritised the war and the UK helping the Ukrainians.

I just don’t see what is next for the families that are here. Unless they are rich enough to just buy a house cash here?

On benefits they stand no chance, particularly if a single mother. Even working single mothers stand no chance.

Temp accom in my area is full of working single mothers, doing jobs from supermarket work to nursing to other graduate jobs who, previously, would have struggled to find a new private rent, but wouldn’t have been at the mercy of the council system. Temp flats used to be empty within 6-8 weeks, now it’s more like 6 months, which leaves families hotel hopping all over the county with no regard for where their jobs or schools are.

There’s been a huge shift since Covid and it’s only getting worse; almost 30,000 homeless families and now 100,000 refugees.

@WhatsAVideo those are stark figures . I imagine the sympathy levels may drop too as cost of living increases and people are just trying to survive.

I despair of all of it. COL, NHS, unstable private rentals, hotel hopping, temp accom, refugees “going home” whilst a war is still on - WTF?!

I have no idea what to say to my teens any more when they ask me about all of this.

Christ, doesn’t bear thinking about, does it? Imagine having to go back to a war zone, with Russia continuing to randomly shell cities far from the actual front.

This wasn’t approached very sensibly in this country I agree. “Just match yourselves and do it for six months, and we won’t think about what happens afterwards. If we even get around to granting the whole family a visa.”

A family member has a Ukrainian guest and that has gone really well - she’s a single young woman and has got a good job etc. But my relative was really properly in a position to host her indefinitely, didn’t need the £350 monthly payment, which was a good job as the LA have only just been to check the place after 4+ months. People hosting a whole family in one room, where the Mum might be finding it hard or impossible to get work haven’t been helped at all, and can’t go on forever.

I have a Ukrainian family with me and I agree, they absolutely should go back, but not just yet. I'm very much in the refugees welcome camp but I do see Ukrainian refugees as different, in that, I think Ukraine will win the war and the people here just need temporary shelter not permanent resettlement. Unlike say, Afghan refugees. I think they have a moral duty to their country to go home when the war is over. People have fought and died to free their country and if the Ukrainian people who left don't go back, it's like there saying they didn't want the country anyway.

I've become very disillusioned with the whole scheme but that's a whole other thread.

I also think people felt it would go well, the hosts have been amazing. As one indicated in the article all the running around and support they needed that they had to provide. But I think people can only do it so long.

I hope that a solution can be found, it’s so very hard to think after all that has been done that the refugees would have to return. I fear people exploiting refugees here. All they will want to do is work and build a life here but it’s hard to know where the continued support will come from.

In the BBC article linked, it mentions that Cherwell Council were going to prioritise council accommodation for Ukrainians.

I imagine that will ruffle feathers-if it goes ahead-from home grown people who have also been waiting. If that hope is replicated by other councils, I think there will be a lot of angry and disappointed people, magnified when school places and nhs dentist places are also prioritised in this way.

My unpopular view-and I didn't always have it-is that we just cannot afford to carry on sending billions of pounds worth of weapons and bearing high costs and possible danger ourselves. At first, i supported Boris in his efforts to stand with Ukraine but now I think there may be trouble ahead!

I am aware of a family where the Ukrainian children were prioritised for a school place as someone else on the waiting list got told they’d gone from 2nd to 6th. So that’s already happened. If we can just support the refugees enough they really will work their socks off to pay their way. They don’t want handouts just ‘stabilising’

My council are doing the same and prioritising Ukrainian people for council housing.

I think councils doing these things are short-sighted and foolishly unaware that it will lead to discontent.

Our local pub restaurant took two on full time they were housed up the road. The manager says they're wonderful. Easy going hard working learning English so quickly. Their host is also delighted it's been agreed they can stay on as lodgers.

Just a few things here.

Asylum seekers are not “illegals” due to the UK being signatories to the 1951 Refugee Convention. Calling them “illegals” is a racist right wing trope. Actual illegal immigration exists - it’s people who don’t present to the authorities on arrival, or who overstay their visas. Labelling asylum seekers as “illegals” makes your point really muddled, incorrect and doesn’t really do much to deflect those cries of “racist” as it’s a massive right wing trope. Don’t like it? Don’t quote them then.

We do not have a good record of taking asylum seekers through legal channels. Laughable. The scheme to resettle Afghan refugees has been a shit show to say the least with many who worked for the UK army still left in Afghanistan at the hands of the Taliban. Including women who are also at direct risk from the Taliban. Apart from the two Afghan resettlement schemes, and no small family resettlement scheme* for asylum seekers, there are no other functioning “legal” channels. To claim asylum in the UK you need to arrive in UK soil.

You’re right that Albanians are not in a war zone. However, there are huge problems with people trafficking, and the majority of Albanian asylum seekers (although not all) have proof of having been trafficked.

Young men in designer clothes and trainers? Asylum seekers live on about £8 a day. Your comments aren’t based on reality, or at least not on the reality I are working with asylum seekers and refugees. Knock off designer stuff form a cheap market stall? Sure. It’s affordable on that budget at a stretch. Donated clothes? Also yes. Actual designer clothes? Blatant bollocks.

*Family reunification schemes for legal migrants currently exist. This is not the same as family reunification for asylum seekers.

“Some of them have homes in Western Ukraine”

As in the Western Ukraine that just got bombed this week? Kyiv, Lviv, Ternopil?

I suggest you do a little bit of research into the countries that actually take asylum seekers and the percentages that do stop in the nearest safe country, versus the number that come to the UK. Rather than believe the exaggerated stories you read in the papers.

Here are some to start you off:

www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/

worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/refugees-by-country

www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/asylum-applications-eu/

There’s always a poster who knows loads of Ukrainians who “weren’t even living in Ukraine” but have got on the sponsorship scheme, yet the Home Office’s own eligibility criteria states you need proof of living in Ukraine before January 2022. Unless they’re accusing our govt of being hideously incompetent?

Where i live hosts have started gently grumbling that their guests haven't got jobs etc yet. I think a lot of people signed up thinking they were just a stop off point while someone got a job etc and didnt think through the proportion of refugees that wouldn't be able to do that, one way or another

I've been impressed how many have found jobs, many doing more than one job. These are people prepared to work hard and not to 'live off' people. So many taking English lessons too.

If that's to me, then yes, I know three. Two were living in Asia, one of those had been there for nine years before the war started. Went back to Ukraine to do paperwork after her friends from Ukraine came to the UK. One had a job and place to live in Europe.

I didn't know any Ukrainian people before this but have got to know a lot through hosting one family.

@BewareTheLibrarians But aside from these statistics-if you can imagine yourself and your children on a council housing list, maybe been on it for two years or more, would you be calm and accepting if the council bumped a Ukrainian woman and her children in front of you?

If you read the BBC article at least one council says that they will be prioritising Ukrainian families for housing

YANBU and typical of the government wanting to be seen as doing the right thing