Right now, refugee children are alone and exposed to danger, whilst family members wait desperately for them in the UK. The Government can and must change this, by urgently reuniting children with their families.
No child should be alone, vulnerable and scared, stuck in squalid campswhere sanitation is poor. Some children have spoken out about the regular sexual abuse inflicted on them by traffickers.
The Government has said that unaccompanied children should be brought to the UK if they have family here. Yet these children’s cases are moving much too slowly. It’s time for the Government to fulfil its commitments now, and get these children to their families. We must protect them from the horrors they’ve already endured.
Sign today and demand the government take action by:
Firstly, speeding up existing family reunion procedures and process cases swiftly, so that these children can be reunited with their families in the UK. It is unacceptable that refugee children have been stuck for months in wretched camps from Greece to France, despite having a legal right to be with their families waiting for them in the UK.
Secondly, it is wrong that children are only able to reunite with parents, not extended family members, under current UK immigration laws. These laws fail to recognise that after years of conflict, many of these children have been orphaned – but they may have grandparents, aunts and uncles, or adult brothers and sisters in the UK who can care for them. The UK Government must widen its family reunion rules to allow children to be reunited with extended family in the UK.
Take action today. Tell Theresa May: Let child refugees be with their families in the UK.
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