We are Young Leaders. We come from three groups led by young refugees and asylum seekers: Safe Passage Young Leaders, The KRAN Youth Forum and Hummingbird Young Leaders.

Together, we are a group of 26 young people from different backgrounds working together for a better future for young refugees and asylum seekers.

We are a community of people with experience of migration and the asylum system, brought together by humanity, and we are working to protect and defend human rights.

We are a voice for the voiceless. We have high hopes that together we can make a change. 

We believe that the Government needs to make fundamental changes in policy to ensure that people fleeing war and persecution can access safe routes to sanctuary. Through a series of group workshops and discussions, we have worked together to agree on the following list of eight recommendations.

• Act fast to save lives, by providing more safe routes to sanctuary for refugees.

• Offer the same protection to people fleeing war and persecution regardless of how they travelled to the UK.

• Agree a deal with the EU to strengthen family reunion. The UK should work closely with countries in the EU to ensure the process is faster and smoother.

• Make urgent changes to refugee family reunion under the UK’s Immigration Rules*. Ensure that all refugees have the right to be reunited with their family members, no matter how they entered the UK.

• Expand the proposed resettlement scheme to other countries beyond the Middle East, including Africa and Europe.

• Introduce a new route to the UK specifically for unaccompanied children from Europe.

• Listen to those directly affected before taking decisions that have an impact on so many lives.

• We invite the Government to meet with us and others with lived experience of these issues to discuss our recommendations in more detail.