ANNUAL REPORT 2022
This was a year when we finally emerged from the restrictions of Covid and could fully focus on face-to face activities again. We also began to understand our new status as a charity and to look at our structures and organisation. And the support we get from individuals and organisations continued to grow and diversify.
Our current work has four main strands:
Resettled Refugee Families
People Seeking Asylum
Awareness Raising
Working with Others
Resettled Refugee Families
These are families who have arrived through one of the “safe” routes that are only available to individuals from very few countries. The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) defines resettlement as the transfer of refugees from an asylum country to another State, that has agreed to admit them and ultimately grant them permanent residence.
Whilst three new families (from Syrian and Sudan) arrived, some of the original arrivals are looking towards gaining citizenship. The monthly Welcome Café has been re-established and the Welcome Picnic in the summer returned for the fifth year. For a second year in a row, we worked with the Ernest Cook Trust for summer activities for teenagers.
The resettlement of Afghan families evacuated from Kabul has been slow and we have had very few requests for support, although all our activities are open to them.
Cheltenham is hosting very significant numbers of Ukrainian adults and children with very significant demonstrations of support and generosity. These people are hosted by local residents who take on many of the Welcoming roles that CWR offers others. In the background, we have helped them organise a fortnightly get-together and passed on offers of support. We are very aware that, although also fleeing war, the experience of these families differs in many ways from the others and there is a significant support network in place. We will continue to monitor how we can help.
People seeking asylum:
An asylum seeker is an informal term used to describe someone who has entered a legal process to seek asylum (an application to gain protection as a refugee) but has not yet formally been recognised as a refugee by their host country. Asylum seekers are in the UK legally while their claim is being decided and some of them are housed in Cheltenham.
We had been able to re-start our weekly drop-in sooner than the Welcome Café and it has gone from strength to strength. The Hub with its mixture of refreshments, chat, games, the chance to practice English and lots of laughter has many regular attenders.
Two new houses where people share accommodation and self-cater – albeit on a very limited allowance – have opened, one of them for single women.
More significantly, in December 2021, the Home Office took over three hotels in the county to accommodate newly arrived asylum seekers. One of these is a few miles outside of Cheltenham – accommodating single men and women and families. Our initial response was to host a couple of informal picnics in Pittville Park and slowly the families have been brought to the Welcome Café. Single people have found their way to the Hub.
This has meant an increased need for bikes and we have a small group of volunteers sourcing and renovating bikes and regular maintenance sessions as part of the Hub.
Activities now include regular football training (and the occasional match), linked to visits to watch Cheltenham Town (courtesy of free tickets supplied by the club) and a photography project.
We continue to monitor Government plans regarding accommodation for asylum seeker and expect that more will be arriving in the area in the coming year.
Awareness-raising:
Sign-ups for our monthly newsletter continue to rise and many subscribers open and read it. Our social media pages also get significant views and followers. They enable us to share information about our local activities. We also challenge misinformation and seek to myth-bust. We continue to provide speakers on request.
Over the years, we have successfully reached out to all primary and secondary schools in Cheltenham and have shifted our focus to ensuring we provide the right material on our website. This allows schools to tailor material to their specific needs.
A highlight of the year, in terms of public awareness, was the visit of Little Amal in Refugee Week. Little Amal is the 12 foot puppet of a 10 year old Syrian refugee child who has become a global symbol of human rights, especially those of refugees. We helped organised her visit with the Everyman, Cheltenham Festivals and Cheltenham Borough Council.
We have taken other opportunities to get our name known – through quiz nights, taking-over the stewarding of the Pittville ParkRun and a mindfulness event during Refugee Week. The success of this can, perhaps, be demonstrated in the number of times this year we have been picked as the chosen charity for an event – the Cotswold Beer Festival in Winchcombe, Leckhampton Open Gardens, Cheltenham Cricket Club’s Jubilee Party among others, for whose support we have been very grateful.
Working with others:
A key partner is Cheltenham Volunteer Teachers (CVT). We have worked with CVT to develop English conversation classes initially for adults from the resettled families, but increasingly for Ukrainian guests and for people seeking asylum.
For a second time, this year CWR has used its contacts to facilitate a conference of local English language providers.
The Everyman Theatre contribute so much to our activities: from tickets to the Pantomime to regular activities at the Welcome Café and the Hub.
Much of our activity depends active support of local churches. Much of this involves generous offers of space: from C3 church for the Welcome Café; the Quakers for the Hub and many other meetings; St Thomas More Church for the conversation classes; Church of the Latter Days Saints for bike storage space. Whilst the formal Faith sub-group has ceased for organisational reasons, ongoing interest and support is strong.
We continue to work closely with Gloucestershire Action for Refugees and Asylum Seekers (GARAS) and have growing links with the Borough Council. Our links with the University of Gloucestershire (both staff and students) remain strong.
A new and significant contact is with the partnership #FeedCheltenham and the various Food Pantries across the town. In particular, Feed Cheltenham subsidise the Pantry membership of asylum seekers.
Finally, a new step for us this year, is support from the Barnwood Trust with a grant in excess of £15,000 to enable us to continue to provide bikes, gym memberships, swim passes, and football kit for asylum seekers as well as provide wi-fi and phone top-ups to enable people to keep in touch with friends, family and lawyers as well as study.
Is Cheltenham welcoming?
In 2020 and 2021, we became aware of housing problems and of some incidents of anti-social behaviour affecting three refugee families. These took a long time to resolve but they have been this year, with support from volunteers known to them and the intervention of their local councillors.
More generally and more positively, as decisions slowly (very slowly) begin to be made on asylum claims, we note that people are choosing to stay in Cheltenham, saying how much they like the town and the friends they have made here. Although, sadly, affordable accommodation is proving hard to find.
As well as those already mentioned, local organisations show their support for what we are trying to do – whether the Boston Tea Party hosting Quiz nights, the Women’s Institute knitting for us or Men in Sheds donating Christmas Boxes.
And very many individuals have been supportive – with financial donations, Christmas boxes, responding to requests for particular household items and, once again, donating dozens of books through our annual Book-Giving Day.
This, and the steady flow of energetic and talented volunteers, demonstrates that there is much evidence that Cheltenham welcomes refugees.
