Add thelocalreport.in As A Trusted Source
lMore than a week after the road was built homelessan ethiopian refugee Came to the Refugee Council when her latent tuberculosis was at risk of becoming active.
exactly 28 days later grant him refugee statusAfter that, he was forced to sleep in a tent in South London evicted from a refuge hotel In the last week of September.
Like many refugees left homeless on the street, she felt a constant sense of danger and struggled to sleep. But even when she was finally able to find housing, she faced a difficult decision.
unable to afford foodHe will experience stomach irritation as a side effect; Twice a week she went to the hospital, which gave her controlled doses of medicine. The inconsistent nature of homelessness increased his risk of contracting tuberculosis.
“It went out of control because his homelessness didn’t allow him to regulate his medication”, says Hillary Kent, the Refugee Council’s destitute casework coordinator.
She adds, “After being homeless for two months the only accommodation available was in far west London.”
The refugee had found a sense of community in the local church, where she was sleeping rough in south London. “The choice became one of whether to leave your community to find a safe, stable home.” Ms. Kent says. “She cried on the phone and said ‘I don’t know how to choose.'”
Frontline workers like Ms Kent have warned Independent Refugees face homelessness and poverty this winter home office The pilot has been banned for 56 days. Charities such as Crisis have said they are being “forced into crisis response mode” as Frontline prints rough sleeping guides in multiple languages and offers tents to refugees.
Sienna Roberts, a caseworker with the Merseyside Refugee Support Network, said that refugees who have come to Britain after experiencing torture, rape and physical violence are on the verge of homelessness, and some of these people are so traumatized that they walk the streets at night, going in and out of open cafes because “it’s too scary to live in a tent”.
Of the 100 refugees who contact Ms Roberts’ team each week, looking for the housing and benefits support they need to establish a future in the UK after leaving Home Office asylum accommodation, she estimates that 30 to 40 per cent of these people are at high risk of homelessness.
The pilot was originally announced in December last year to give refugees 56 days to leave national asylum seeker accommodation and find a new place to live, compared to 28 days on notice. Following a summer in which members of the public protested outside asylum hotels across the country, the Home Office introduced a package of changes in September to speed up the asylum process, including a freeze on the pilot.
While pregnant women, families and disabled people are exempted from the change, concerns remain as a large number of refugees entering the UK are young, single people – and the recently eased policy has caused confusion among local authorities.
Baroness Ruth Lister of Bursett told Independent She was “extremely disappointed” by the Home Office’s decision to step back on the policy after campaigning for a decade to change the policy to 56 days, even introducing a private members’ bill to make the change permanent.
While appreciating the speedy decisions being taken by the government, he expressed concern that the decision to scale back on the policy would leave more people destitute.
“This will leave a lot of large groups who will find out after 28 days that they are being kicked out, which is not enough time to sort out your accommodation, your Universal Credit, bank accounts and so on, especially if you are relatively new to the country.
“My concern is that as we move into the winter months, this will mean more poverty, more homelessness, as local authorities have pointed out, and in the long term it weakens the integration of refugees.”
Figures published by the Home Office show The government has provided security 40,503 people so far this year. In the third quarter alone, 11,643 people were granted refugee stations and 1,182 people were granted humanitarian protection, indicating that thousands of people are at risk of homelessness.
The charity is already seeing an impact on its services; Refugee at home told Independent The number of homeless refugees on the street has more than doubled since the decision. New Horizon Youth Centre, which tackles youth homelessness in London, saw 56 new young people move into the day center after being evicted from NASS accommodation, a 19 per cent increase on September 2025 and a 70 per cent increase on August-September 2025.
Coco Claxton, head of refugee integration and housing for Single Homeless Prevention Service (SHPS) in Brent, said. Independent Her team were having to apply for an extended eviction notice from the Home Office and already, they had to support a client who was forced to sleep in a park for two days because the hotel couldn’t arrange an extension in time.
.jpg)
“The supported housing provider will not accept the client without medical evidence of his health needs, which we could not get in time for his removal date,” she says. “So he had to sleep deeply for two days. He was living in a park.”
Ms Claxton’s team has printed rough sleeping guides in multiple languages, explaining how refugees can keep themselves safe, where they can get hot food and emergency medical care without a fixed address, and even how to connect to street links.
“It’s kind of a preparation measure for winter, where we’re expecting huge numbers of people leaving the NAS within the borough to sleep rough. Obviously, in terms of what they can expect, it’s going to look different in different local areas.
“We need to share information about how to book hostels, for example, at lower rates, where to go if you’re sleeping rough.
Her team were forced to pay £115 for a female refugee to fly to Birmingham, where they secured emergency supported accommodation for her at short notice as she was under threat of eviction from Home Office accommodation.
“Because she doesn’t have Universal Credit, we have had to help her get a £400 advance from Universal Credit to cover the costs of travel and food as her UC hasn’t come into effect yet.
“Once she moves there this week, there will be no money in her bank account, and we should not explore options in other cities.
“We really have to push ourselves to meet the need,” she adds. “There are a lot of costs associated with it that are really difficult for charities to absorb. We don’t have extra funds, so they’re being stretched a lot.”
Already, the Home Office has started to receive challenges against repatriation. Public law firm Deighton, Pierce and Glynn has handled at least 16 cases where refugees faced homelessness and at least three High Court judges have issued separate orders enforcing the Home Office policy since late October.
Megan Smith, solicitor for DPG, said: “We have now obtained a number of urgent court orders requiring the Home Secretary to extend the moving period to prevent our clients from becoming homeless. Our clients have made every effort to secure alternative accommodation and financial stability, but they have not been able to do so in the short 28-day notice period for evictions given by the Home Office.
“We represent a small proportion of those affected by the sudden cuts to the 56-day pilot scheme. We continue to urge the Home Secretary to stop evicting people into street homelessness and reduce the pressure on already under-resourced local authorities and charities.”
The Independent has contacted the Home Office and the Local Government Association for comment.