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adult in their life to speak on their behalf and mentor
“The Refugee Council’s Children’s Panel intends
them. 24 The Department for Education and Skills
to guide children through but struggles to so this
acknowledged the general need for a key person
in reality because of resources. Not all children
in the lives of children and young people in its
get to see an advisor and those that do might only
wider policy work. 25 However, no additional provi-
get one or two meetings.” 30
sions for unaccompanied or separated children were
included in the subsequent Children Act 2004 despite
an amendment being tabled 26 which would have
provided for a legal guardian for every such child.
Furthermore, no amendments have been
made to the Immigration Rules to ensure that
“Unless you have an active and involved social
worker, it is extremely difficult for the separated
child. The informal arrangement of the Refugee
Council’s Children’s Panel doesn’t work. It would
be nice to have a formal structure.” 31
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unaccompanied or separated children receive the
representation required by the EU Directive. 27
Instead the Government purports to comply with
Article 19 by maintaining that unaccompanied or
separated children are represented by both their
social workers and the Refugee Council’s Panel of
Advisers. In the early months of 2005, the Government
undertook a hasty review of the services
being offered by the Refugee Council’s Children’s
Panel to show that it was concerned to meet its
obligations. To date it has not offered the Panel
a statutory role. 28
Whilst it is true that the Refugee Council is
funded by the U.K. Government to provide advice
to unaccompanied or separated children through its
Children’s Panel, the Government gives an inaccurate
description of its role in the Green Paper Every
Child Matters 29 and in its response to its obligations
under the EU Directive. In the Green Paper it states
that the Panel plays “an important role in helping
children through the asylum determination process
and in accessing the services that they need for
inclusion.” This exaggerates the role of most Panel
advisers. Without adequate funding or a statutory
role, their work is of necessity far more limited. At
best the Panel has assisted some unaccompanied or
separated children to obtain a legal representative
and support from a social services department.
The Children’s Panel is based at the Refugee Council’s
premises in South London and is coordinated
by a Head of Section and a Manager. The London
Casework Team has eight advisers and one senior
adviser. In addition, it has a Regional Casework
Team of five advisers and one senior adviser, who
travel to Kent, Birmingham, Manchester, and Peterborough,
areas which have a large number of
unaccompanied or separated children. Five of the
six regional advisers are based in London and many
legal representatives outside of London report that
they have little contact with Panel Advisers. 32 Much
of the time advisers are occupied assisting unaccompanied
or separated children to resolve age
disputes and obtain appropriate support and services
from social services departments. In addition
between 20 and 50 unaccompanied or separated
children drop by every day to ask for advice about
health, benefits, education, and housing.
The Panel simply does not have the resources
to allocate an individual adviser to every unaccompanied
or separated child referred to it and,
therefore, it is not true to say that it provides all
unaccompanied or separated children with representation.
It cannot even allocate an adviser
for all unaccompanied or separated children
under 15 as it used to do.
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