Refugees do not choose to come here - by definition, they were forced to flee.
Scrapping permanent status will trap refugees in a state of insecurity and fear. This is inhumane cruelty.
Doing so says some people deserve fewer rights - and that inequality is law.
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
4.45 million children in the UK live in poverty, and nearly 4 in 10 are in families where both parents were born abroad.
My blog sets out why this must be recognised in the upcoming Child Poverty Strategy.
🔗https://tinyurl.com/yc8mp55p
And crucially, they highlight the 2026 break clause and 2029 contract end.
If the government is serious about reform, it can’t sleepwalk into another five years of the same failed contracts.
Full report here ⬇️
committees.parliament.uk/committee/83...
They also take decentralisation seriously – not a silver bullet, but a credible route to ending many of the harms of the current centralised model.
In my oral evidence, I described the system as “fragmented and incoherent”, with a “culture of quick fixes” and weak safeguarding oversight.
The Committee echoes these concerns, calling for a safeguarding KPI, better training, and *actual* penalties for poor performance.
…picking back up with some news from this week 👇
The Home Affairs Select Committee has just published its report on asylum accommodation – and I’m pleased to see many of IPPR’s recommendations reflected in it.
Apologies, I haven't been here for a while - but @jacquibroadhead.bsky.social has convinced me that it's a worthwhile place to be, so hello 👋
🎉🎉🎉 Very proud that @parth0.bsky.social and @lucyhbmort.bsky.social have been nominated for @smartthinking.bsky.social Think Tanker of the Year and Researcher of the Year!
🚨We have published a NEW REPORT sharing the experiences of children from our All4One youth group who were wrongly treated as adults by the Home Office.
These children arrived in the UK alone seeking asylum, were declared “significantly over 18” at the border and sent alone to adult asylum hotels.
When 1 in 3 of the 4.3 million children living in poverty are children in migrant households, the government just will not be able to cut poverty levels without action for this group of kids
Big news! We’ve secured a debate in Parliament on child poverty next week. We need your help to get your MP in the room to speak out about No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF), one of the most harmful policies facing migrant families.
📝 Email your MP now: act.praxis.org.uk/email-MP-NRP...
Bravo Rivka ✨👏
One provider out, another with its own chequered history in. Meanwhile, costs continue to climb. This Times article cites @ippr.bsky.social research: annual costs per person have risen from £17k to 41k since 2020.
⏳2026 is a critical opportunity to break free from a failing system.
bit.ly/4hGnWTW
This time last week I spoke at the Home Affairs Select Committee about fixing our asylum accommodation system. We urgently need to shift power regionally and locally, improve safeguarding, and move away from mass sites - towards community solutions that work for everyone.
ICYMI: See also this wonderful write up of our report in the @theguardian.com
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...
Read our report with @praxisprojects.bsky.social 🔗 www.ippr.org/articles/eve...
If the government is serious about opportunity for all children, it must ensure childcare access isn’t blocked by immigration status.
The fix is simple: Remove immigration-based restrictions on childcare support.
This would:
✅ Help parents work & support their families
✅ Reduce child poverty
✅ Improve school readiness & social cohesion
Take Efia, a single mum earning £950/month - she had to quit her job because £756 went straight to nursery fees. How is that sustainable?
New data shows:
📉 41% of parents without childcare say it stops them from working
📉 50% say household finances have worsened
📉 Kids are falling behind before they even start school
Thousands of families - many with British children - are denied 30 hours of free childcare simply because of their immigration status. That means:
🚫 Parents unable to work
💰 Families struggling to afford basics
👶 Kids missing out on early education & social interaction
Last week, @josephinewy.bsky.social and I published a report on childcare - specifically, how migrant families with No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) are locked out of childcare support, pushing them deeper into poverty and holding back their children. 🧵👇
(& shoutout to British Future for their polling that helped me to make these arguments!)
www.britishfuture.org/fewer-than-1...
www.ipsos.com/sites/defaul...
Instead of a race to the bottom, we need:
✅ A system that recognises contribution
✅ Security & stability for migrants & families
✅ Policies that build cohesion, not exclusion.
None of this actually helps. It doesn’t reduce migration. It doesn’t help communities. And it doesn’t reflect public opinion - most people support fair routes to settlement.
🔹 Meanwhile, the government has changed policy to permanently bar refugees arriving irregularly from ever becoming citizens. It’s a reaction to Tory attacks - but it won’t stop people coming. It will just entrench exclusion.
🚫 They also plan to deny settlement (ie ILR) to anyone who doesn’t meet a “net contribution” test (a nightmare to measure fairly) & ban people arriving via small boats from ever settling, no matter their circumstances. These are bad ideas.
🔹 The Conservatives essentially want to extend the 10-year route to all migrants. That means more people stuck on expensive, temporary visas for a decade or more - pushing families into poverty & insecurity.
I wrote a blog about the UK’s citizenship & settlement policies - and how both the Conservatives & Labour are making decisions that will trap people in precarity without solving anything. A quick thread on why this matters 🧵👇
Have you spotted a familiar office door while watching Black Doves yet!? 👀
