I've spent the past week volunteering with Care4Calais, a charity which provides humanitarian aid to refugees in Calais, where there is a large number of unaccompanied minors living in appalling conditions, hoping to make their way to safety in the UK.
At the same time I am reading the news that the Home Office is preparing to end the existing system of family reunification in the case of a no-deal Brexit. Leaving the EU without a deal would mean that the UK would no longer have to respect the Dublin Regulation, which allows the reunion of family members seeking asylum.
Without a safe way to cross the channel, vulnerable young people may turn to desperate measures to reach the UK - as we have seen in the numerous reports of Channel crossings by boat or lorry. Children living on the streets in Greece, Italy and France are also at high risk of abuse, and are missing years of their childhood, when they should be growing up with their family and going to school.
The charity Safe Passage has started a petition calling on the government to provide a legal route to refugee family reunion after Brexit. You can sign it here:
Comments