Children on the Move: creating a holistic approach to support integration

This is the first of three podcasts focusing on approaches to support the integration of Children on the Move from the Middle East and other countries to Europe. Since 2020 Family for Every Child member organizations in Italy, Greece, Germany, UK and Lebanon have been working together to develop, share and implement practices. This process of collaboration led to the creation of the Supporting Integration toolkit, designed for practitioners working with children and young people on the move. 

In this episode Amanda Griffith, CEO of Family for Every Child is joined by Chloe Hubert, Post-Placement Support Worker at Children and Families Across Borders (CFAB) to discuss the integration of unaccompanied minors from the Middle East to Europe. 

Over 4,000 unaccompanied minors applied for asylum in the UK in 2024, of which 74% granted refugee status. But a lack of support for these children, including minimal engagement from social services and long waits for legal representation, mean many children are still failing to get the support they need. 

Chloe explains how CFAB focuses on promoting culturally inclusive practices. And uses a holistic approach to support integration; focusing on education, housing, and mental health. With the ambition to ensure 95% of families remain together post-intervention. 

Signposting

10 min 30 sec: “Many of the young people we work with are 16 or 17, so they fall out of … the local authority being obliged to provide them with a place of education”

14 min 38: Children and young people “talk about struggling for months before being assigned any kind of legal representation, and then having to often navigate a complex and unjust asylum system.”

24 min 37 sec: “We don’t have a magic wand, but the development of trusting relationships with families and the provision of practical and emotional support has alleviated some of the isolation and the stress and the anxiety which these families have faced.”

27 min 27 sec: “We would really like to see safe and legal routes, which means real safe and legal routes. We would like immigration systems to place the children and the young people at the heart of their decision making, and not for it just to be a slogan or lip service, for it really to think that if these were their children making these dangerous journeys, how would they feel? How would they act? How would they legislate if these children were their own children or their own family members?” 

Link to the Supporting Integration toolkit: https://www.changemakersforchildren.community/childrenonthemovetoolkit