Support Asylum Seekers in North Somerset

Aim

The Hotel is a brand-new project created to support the wellbeing of asylum seekers housed in hotels across North Somerset.

In May 2022 a Somerset hotel closed its doors to the public and accommodated over 100 asylum seekers (exclusively single men) who have been forced to leave their homes and families and are now displaced in the UK. 

These men are cut off from shops, people, and asylum seeker services. North Somerset Council have never hosted asylum seekers or refugees and there no established support networks in the county, so the asylum seekers rely solely on agents based in Bristol for their legal, social, mental and physical needs.

As local residents to the Mendips, we’ve been supporting these men placed at the hotel for the past five months. We’ve set up a WhatsApp group with other local residents to gather donations of clothes, shows, coats, phones, personal care items. Regular football games have been set up, and 45 bikes have been donated.

As many of us are commuters, we’ve also been offering lifts in and out of town. Lifts are eagerly taken up by the hotel residents as transport is an issue - the buses are infrequent, and often don’t stop to pick them up. Many of the bus drivers claim not to pick up black and brown men at all. Over the last few months this situation has become increasingly precarious, with numerous reports from the men and local residents about the behaviour of the drivers.

We are residents local to this area, but we are also CEO’s of a charity that creates work responding to major issues of our time. We create work that is meant for everyone, and we believe that all communities should have equal access to free public art and public services such as transport. There are no other refugee rights organisations in North Somerset, so we are taking action.

Alongside the facilitation of this immediate practical support, Trigger has been working on a brand-new project called The Hotel created to support the wellbeing of asylum seekers in hotels across North Somerset. 

This creative programme is in the initial stages of development, and will be created in collaboration with those it is meant for. We look forward to sharing it, but there are currently urgent needs to be addressed:

• We are calling on Stagecoach to address the racism within their community of drivers
• We are looking to source legal support and improved transport links for the men housed at the hotel

Your donation will go directly to fund:

• Transport provision
• Legal advice
• Access to services

We need your help to support this vital cause. 

Thank you. 

Update: this story has now been featured across local and national media including Guardian, BBC and Bristol Post

This project successfully funded on 31st October 2022