Day 10

Simon’s story…

Simon works as the Service Coordinator for the Adult and Family Service at Asylum Welcome.

His job entails providing practical support to asylum seekers and refugees, helping people understand their rights and entitlements, providing them with access to legal representation and generally supporting clients when they cannot support themselves. Within this role, Simon navigates a range of responsibilities, including managing the foodbank, and helping our clients to access housing. Despite the many responsibilities that he is currently balancing, Simon is also proactively working towards expanding the service. He hopes that the physical presence of Asylum Welcome will grow significantly within the coming year, in the form of more satellite clinics spread across Oxfordshire, closer to the hotels and other places of accommodation of current clients. Another hope of Simon’s for the coming year is for the team to grow and strengthen, to become more established and to attract new energies.

During our conversation, Simon brings up the ‘success’ story of one of his clients that he is eager to narrate. The woman, a single mum claiming asylum in the UK, had her claim refused after a long period of waiting in limbo for the decision. With the negative decision came the end of the governmental support that she had until then been receiving. In order to better support herself, she moved to a friend’s house in Oxfordshire and tried to get legal representation, at which point she contacted Asylum Welcome. She quickly displayed an interest in giving back and was driven by a passion to develop skills for the day when she would have status in the country. Strong, smart and capable, this client started interpreting for and volunteering within the Adult and Family Service team. This past year, she was eligible to enter another application, which was ultimately granted. For Simon, the woman is a superhero, fantastic to work with, independent and strong-willed. She is currently thriving in her new life and whenever she has a chance to stop by the offices of Asylum Welcome for a quick visit, her progress is a beautiful thing to see… 

To be continued…

In 2021/22, Asylum Welcome supported 60% more clients than the year before with a wider range of services and a bigger budget than at any time in our history. We couldn’t do it without you. 🧡

As the national environment gets ever tougher for many of our clients and others like them, fleeing violence and persecution in so many countries, it is ever more important that we continue and extend our work.

If you can, please support our appeal today. Thank you for being part of the story.