Dear all, sorry for the long silence, this doesnt mean nothing happening, rather the opposite- havent rested since last post!!
Firstly the Solicitors Duncan Lewis whom i invited to come to the Jungle to see how many young people had the legal right to be in UK, have brought a class action against the Home Office, see https://www.theguardian.com/…/calais-child-asylum-seekers-l…
Second, the conditions under which children are being kept in France are highly variable. Almost all are being looked after by volunteers not the “specialist staff” that Home Secretary Amber Rudd promised on the record. Some of these are doing a good job but in other places conditions are dire and there are on-record reports of children having been physically abused by the ‘carers.” They have in these places been fed noting but bread and the daily allowance to keep them is 5 Euros. Many are still in the same clothes they were, when they left the Jungle- sandals and t shirts.This is a freezing winter- in eg Luchon where many Sudanese boys are, its up to minus 12.
With support from your generous crowd funding I have been able to go to eight centres all over France- as far as Pyrenees, Atlantic coast, all Eastern and S Eastern France, and continue to visit others. As well as filming I’m takng aid and stuff, backed by Social Workers Without Borders who accompanied DL solictors on their Calais mission.
The Home Office says it has now finished taking those who have a real case but I have on this trip (In France now, hence hasty writing as ever! ) discovered very many that still have a legal case. And that many of the ‘full and comprehensive interviews” of vulnerable and in some cases torutred chdilren, lasted 5 minutes or less and did not have any child experts, legal experts, social workers or even interpreters present. They were then told of the negative decisions 2nd hand, casually by domestic staff at the centres- Oh youre not going anywhere.
This is in breach of their EU and UN rghts .
I have met sveral who have attempted suicide. I am today at the funeral of another who has died of heart failure. Its not the physical condtions that bother them ( though they bother me) its that large numbers still have a legal case to be in UK under either Dubs or Dublin 3, and have had a travesty of a ‘hearing’ with no chance of a fair decision. UK thinks out of sight out of mind. BUT THEYRE NOT OUT OF OUR SIGHT !!!! Many others have run away in despair. Some are sleeping rough back in Calais and in Belgium.
Many French centres are due to close at the end of January and NO ONE HAS COME UP WITH A PLAN FOR THE KIDS WHO HAVE FOLLOWED EVERY INSTRUCTION AND YET WILL SOON BE HOMELES AGAIN. There will almost certainly be more tragedies- deaths from cold , suicides, if we dont keep on this and report it and use al this evdence in the upcoming legal chalenge.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE DONATE AND GET YOUR CONTACT LISTS TO DO THE SAME
Sue xxxx
