“I don’t know what could have happened to me, if Salusbury World did not exist.”
Refugees and asylum-seekers in Brent need help NOW because they are facing a crisis: overwhelmed by poverty, hunger, homelessness, fear and discrimination.
We help in times of crisis but our support also continues for as long it’s needed.
We don't let go. We’re there for the long term.
We get to know everyone and support them to get back on their feet, to recover control of their lives and thrive.
Right now, all our services are overloaded, and we are having to turn away vulnerable people. Help us change this immediately.
“Salusbury World literally saves lives.” - Freedom From Torture
Who are we?
We are Salusbury World, a registered charity supporting refugee and migrant children, young people and families rebuild hopeful, fulfilling lives in London. Our work in Brent began in 1999.
We provide immediate crisis support - through basics like food parcels and phone cards, and help with welfare benefits, immigration issues and homelessness – and long-term support so refugees and asylum-seekers develop the skills and confidence to thrive in London. Our support is personalised and integrated. We also offer an advice service, after-school and homework clubs, educational mentoring for teenagers, holiday programmes and a women’s project.
Salusbury World is in danger of closure in 2024 without your generous support.
Everyone we deal with is different; Jess's story explains how we help
When we first met Jess, she was desperate: homeless, fleeing domestic violence with a 6-month-old baby. She was distressed, vulnerable, and spoke very limited English.
Our work with Jess included:
- Advocating for Jess in safeguarding meetings with social services, where the social worker repeatedly failed to appreciate the extent of Jess’s language difficulties or her immigration rights and jumped to false assumptions.
- Securing a housing solicitor for Jess, and together persuading the local council that she was entitled to housing assistance.
- Advocating on Jess's behalf to halt the local authority’s proposal to move Jess to Birmingham despite her close network of friends, family and church in London.
- Connecting Jess to a domestic abuse charity and baby groups at local Family Wellbeing Centres.
Jess is now doing really well. Whenever we see her and her child, they are both smiling from ear to ear. They have a new home, and we were able to provide them with furniture. Jess is also attending our women's English classes now, thanks to the free creche we offer. She can see a hopeful future now.
We need to do more. We want to do more. We can’t do it without YOU.
- Understanding rights and entitlements is critical: we want to support more families to secure their immigration and welfare rights. We helped 223 people last year and recovered £72,000 through challenging decisions. But our free advice service is inundated and every few weeks we have to close our doors to new clients. Expanding our team of expert advisors would mean we could double our capacity.
- Learning English and building community networks is vital: we want to deliver more English classes for refugee women. Within 2 weeks of the start of this autumn term, every space in our 4 existing weekly classes was filled. We want to give more women the chance to improve their English, make friends and find work.
- Adjusting to loss whilst adapting to life in a new community is essential for children to thrive: we want to offer more refugee children the chance to join our holiday clubs – to make friends, try new activities and start to feel they belong in their new communities. Demand for spaces far exceeds our capacity at present.
Your donation will make a huge difference!
Here’s how you can help:
- £10 funds a phone voucher for an isolated refugee.
- £60 funds a first appointment with a specialist advice worker for a family in crisis.
- £80 funds art materials for our after-school club for younger children for 6 months
- £852 funds essential DBS checks for 60 new volunteers.
- £2752 funds 640 lunches and snacks for hungry children and teenagers at our summer holiday clubs.
- £6000 funds interpreters (with both language skills and trauma-informed training) for vulnerable advice clients for 1 year.