ASIRT is a not-for-profit OISC regulated advocacy organisation. We provide legal support and representation to asylum seekers and other undocumented migrants in the West Midlands.
We can help with:
- Human rights applications (including help with fee waivers)
- Applications for recourse to public funds
- ‘Zambrano’ applications
- Fresh asylum claims
- Applications for local authority Children Act/Care Act assessments
- Training around migrants’ health and social care rights for local professionals.
We help those that are not eligible for publicly funded legal representation, and lack the financial resources to be able to pay for private representation to help regularise their immigration status.
ASIRT seeks its first Director
ASIRT are seeking to appoint a dynamic part-time Director. This is a new, exciting, creative and challenging role for someone with a strong commitment to excellence, justice, and a firm belief in the rights of migrants and refugees. Closing date 18 June 2020, 5pm.
Full details here click
Please contribute to our emergency ‘No Recourse’ Hardship Fund!
Contribute to the fund by clicking here
All contributions we receive through the fund will be donated directly to people in the most dire of circumstances.
Government policy denies already struggling individuals, parents and children access to essential welfare benefits (a status known as ‘No Recourse to Public Funds’ or NRPF). For many that ASIRT has been and is supporting it has directly caused destitution, hunger and homelessness. Desperation can potentially people in conditions of exploitation and violence as they struggle to feed and house themselves. No one wins through this policy. It’s cruel and spiteful.
The impact of NRPF policy is now being made worse by the COVID-19 crisis, which we know is disproportionately affecting Black and Minority Ethnic people, who also make up the majority of those affected by NRPF. With many losing work and still unable to claim benefits you can understand how quickly people can fall into crisis.
We have launched our NRPF Hardship Fund to help mitigate at least some of the very worst affects of the NRPF policy. If you would like to contribute then do please click here – every little will help. Ask a friend too! Help us promote the fund through social media.
We know that local communities and grassroots organisations such as ASIRT should not have to step in to deal with destitution and the disproportionate health risks created by inhumane Government policy, but the reality is that we urgently need to do something to protect already vulnerable individuals and families.
We know it’s an emergency because we connect with clients in desperate situations every day. Through the NRPF Hardship Fund a one-time financial contribution will be made available to individuals with little or no money to sustain and protect themselves, either as a condition of their Leave to Remain immigration status or because they are undocumented.
So the fund is a short term initiative to prevent the most dire human suffering occurring now. Alongside, we continue to call for the NRPF condition to be scrapped in its entirety and for the government to set up an emergency COVID-19 fund that supports EVERYONE in the UK with adequate shelter, food, and other costs of living, regardless of their immigration status.
Our existing funding means we are continuing to work with people throughout this period to help safeguard and advocate for their legal rights, to help secure access to public funds, and to highlight the injustices of the existing NRPF system.
If you would like to contribute to the fund then do please click here
