MD2973 Migration Programme

1.1. This decision form seeks approval for expenditure of £835,000 of GLA budget for 2022-23 to build capacity of the immigration advice sector to: support Londoners with insecure immigration status; maintain a hub of information to help migrant Londoners to understand their rights and entitlements; and deliver a new project to improve support to migrant workers in London. Further, this decision form seeks approval of £360,000 of GLA budget for 2023-24 to continue these programmes, subject to the annual budget-setting process. Further approvals will be sought for the programme for 2023-24 and future years as appropriate.

1.2. This decision also seeks approval for the receipt of £154,000 income and expenditure of the same amount from the Home Office in support of the London Strategic Migration Partnership (LSMP). This is a longstanding piece of work, and the partnership has existed for more than a decade. The purpose of the LSMP is to provide strategic policy coordination on migration; and, through working with partners, reduce the barriers that London’s migrant and refugee communities face in accessing services (such as ESOL), advice and information.

1.3. The Mayor has been investing strategically in immigration advice and support services to meet the needs of Londoners with insecure status, through a number of initiatives. These include the Justice Together Initiative (JTI) (refs DD2418 and MD2831); the Migrant Londoners Hub (ref MD2831); the Children in Care with Immigration Needs Programme (ref DD2492); and the European Londoners micro and small grants programmes (refs DD2239 and DD2277). It is also done via funding to ensure immigration advice needs are fully integrated into the Advice in Community Settings programme (ref MD2831).

1.4. The programmes detailed in this decision form continue that strategic investment, building on existing programmes; and seek to improve and expand access to quality immigration advice for Londoners. This includes further investment in the JTI; and the Refugee Action’s Frontline Immigration Advice Project, which provides training and support to organisations to expand immigration advice provision. It also includes funding for grants to deliver and improve access to advice and support to meet the specific needs of European Londoners, those affected by the Windrush scandal, and refugees and people seeking asylum in the capital.

1.5. Approval is sought for expenditure on the Migrant Londoners Hub to ensure it continues to provide updated information about rights and entitlements; and to link migrant Londoners with advice and support services. Approval is also sought for a new project to prevent and address migrant exploitation in the workplace; this will be delivered by two new secondees as part of the Social Integration team’s longstanding collaboration with the Citizenship and Integration Initiative. The initiative directly funds seconding organisations to release staff with particular expertise and the GLA provides funding for the related programme that meets our shared priorities.

1.6. The grant from the Home Office for 2022-23 will cover the staff costs needed to support the LSMP and the delivery of its business plan; develop London’s approach to supporting resettled refugees; and coordinate ESOL for resettled refugees. The LSMP has also received funding to deliver work to support the resettlement of new arrivals from Afghanistan (ref DD2576) and will play a key role in work to support Ukrainians seeking sanctuary in the UK.

Insecure immigration status

Context and purpose

2.1. Research supported by the Mayor of London found that demand for immigration advice far outstrips supply in the capital. For legal aid work, the research concluded there was capacity for just over 10,000 immigration and asylum cases per year. For cases not eligible for legal aid, capacity is limited to 4,000-4,500 cases each year. Comparatively, annual demand is estimated in the hundreds of thousands. Brexit has made this more complex, with almost half of EU Londoners required to reapply to the EU Settlement Scheme within the next few years to secure settled status.

2.2. Over the past decade, the government has significantly increased the fees required to access settlement and citizenship and has thus created additional barriers to securing and maintaining status. At the same time, changes to immigration law and policy have made proof of immigration status mandatory before an expanding range of rights and services can be accessed. Therefore, access to quality immigration advice and representation remains key to ensuring Londoners can participate and thrive in our city.

2.3. Responding to this need, the GLA has worked with funders and civil society stakeholders to ensure immigration advice is prioritised alongside other forms of social welfare advice. Immigration advice-related work funded by the Mayor of London over the past three years has focused on developing capacity to identify and support people with immigration needs. This includes scaling up the capacity of local authorities, migrant rights organisations, legal advice and representation providers, and communities to meet Londoners’ immigration needs.

2.4. This work contributes towards a strategic vision where all Londoners can thrive, irrespective of their immigration status, by making access to settlement and citizenship easier for all Londoners in need. It aligns with the ambitions set out in the Mayor’s Social Integration Strategy “All of Us”; in the Recovery Mission to provide a robust safety net to Londoners; and in Mayoral manifesto commitments related to citizenships and the regularisation of immigration status for young Londoners.

Delivery method and impact

2.5. This decision seeks approval for a contribution of £50,000 to the JTI, a funder collaboration intended to increase advice organisations’ capacity to support people to access their rights and entitlements. In 2021-22, the GLA contributed £200,000 (ref MD2831) to the JTI’s pooled funding for London. This has been used to increase capacity for complex immigration advice and casework provision across the city; better coordinate across immigration providers to ensure capacity is used more effectively; and influence at local and regional levels to ensure long-term change. Prior to that, the GLA contributed £310,000 (ref DD2418) to the establishment of the JTI in London, including mapping research (published in June 2021) to identify needs and scale of immigration advice in London. Initial funding also contributed to the establishment of two coordinator projects focused on raising awareness, capacity and referrals to specialist immigration advice services across London.

2.6. We are proposing to continue our investment by supporting the JTI, to ensure all areas of London have access to quality immigration advice and casework. The contribution of £50,000 will be grouped with other funder contributions to make grants to organisations in areas of London currently underserved by immigration advice provision.

2.7. Approval to provide funding of £380,000 over two years for the Frontline Immigration Advice Programme (FIAP), led by Refugee Action, is sought to expand access to free high-quality immigration advice in London. Since 2016, FIAP has helped organisations working with migrants to provide high-quality immigration advice by training advisers, to develop their advice models, and to register with the Office for the Immigration Services Commissioner (OISC). FIAP also provides ongoing support and continuous professional development to advisers and organisations enrolled in the programme. Refugee Action is the only organisation in the UK delivering this model and its successful outcomes have led the London Funders strategy for immigration advice in London, which the GLA has contributed to, to highlight FIAP as an easily scalable model if additional funding is invested.

2.8. In six years FIAP has supported more than 200 organisations across the UK (40 per cent of which are in London); and trained 1,300 students, with a 70 per cent pass rate in OISC assessments. A total of 52 organisations have been supported, 22 of which became accredited to provide more complex immigration advice and casework.

2.9. The contribution of £380,000 will support FIAP to expand its support to six organisations in London to develop, increase and strengthen their immigration advice services. It will target organisations providing advice and casework in languages other than English, to prevent language acting as a barrier to accessing free and quality immigration advice and to strengthen capacity among migrant and community organisations.

2.10. We do not believe this grant confers economic advantage on Refugee Action. As described above, they are the only organisation in the UK delivering this model of both training and holistic support to advisers and organisations. In addition, a large proportion of the sum will be used to cover the costs of participating organisations to ensure that staff are supported to engage in the training, and that organisations are able to maintain their services. The amount directly used by Refugee Action for administration and recruitment to support the programme will be less than £50,000 per annum. This is a local programme and accordingly, the funding will neither affect trade and investment between the regions of the UK nor between the EU and the UK.

2.11. Approval for expenditure of £335,000 towards grants to maintain and increase access to advice and support is sought to meet the specific needs of migrants, refugees and people seeking asylum in London. This will include work to support European Londoners and the Windrush Generation; and to support grants that enable the GLA to respond in a coordinated way to humanitarian crises, such as those impacted by the invasion of Ukraine and wider pressures within the asylum system

2.12. The decision seeks approval for expenditure of £70,000 across two years to extend the commissioned pan-London resource for local authorities to access training and learning tools, in order to build their capacity to identify and support children and young people in care with immigration and citizenship needs. This is a continuation of the work delivered by Coram Children’s Legal Centre over the past year (ref DD2492) and will allow Coram to update the training and resources developed to reflect the impending changes expected through the Nationality and Borders Bill. This bill will significantly affect the UK’s legislations related to asylum, statelessness and modern slavery.

2.13. This decision seeks an exemption from the Contracts and Funding Code to allow for the variation of the Coram Children’s Legal Centre’s (Coram) contract without need for a competitive procurement. The exemption is required to allow for the continuation of existing work that cannot be separated from the current project.

2.14. Coram was selected following a competitive exercise in which it scored significantly higher than the other bidder. If the GLA were to recommission this work, there would likely be significant additional costs associated with having to replicate materials already developed by Coram. It would also affect delivery timing, as the training will not be in place immediately once the legislation and relevant policies come into effect.

2.15. Extending this contract will ensure Coram quickly responds to this changing scenario; builds on the relationships it has already established with councils; and keeps materials and training updated to cover changes in legislation and policy during the next 18 months.

2.16. To that end, we are seeking approval to extend the contract with Coram for a further 18 months. This will increase the overall length of the contract from 12 months to 30 months; and the overall expenditure from £70,000 to £140,000.

2.17. Below is a breakdown of the funds for the spending proposals. All funding is subject to the annual budget-setting process.

Table 1

Migrant exploitation in the workplace

Context and purpose

2.18. Migrant workers are disproportionately represented in low-paid, precarious and informal work. Many face additional vulnerabilities including exclusion from statutory services; language barriers; limited support networks; and a lack of knowledge about labour rights or where to access support. Migrants also face challenges accessing advice and support that adequately covers the intersection between their immigration status and other rights and entitlements, including their employment rights. For some, reporting poor working conditions and challenging an employer could put them at risk of losing their visas and becoming undocumented. Undocumented migrant workers face additional challenges, as seeking support may put them at risk of detention and deportation under measures that have been described as part of “the hostile environment”.

2.19. The pandemic brought longstanding exploitative working practices into the spotlight. The related economic turbulence has had, and will continue to have, a severe impact on the availability of sustainable and good employment in London. This and the rise in the cost of living, combined with already restrictive immigration conditions facing many Londoners and ongoing changes to the UK’s immigration system, are likely to see a sharp rise in the numbers of Londoners pushed into precarious and exploitative working conditions. This is especially concerning for those who have no recourse to public funds, as they are more likely to be pushed into accepting any form of work to continue to support their families and prevent destitution.

2.20. In his manifesto, the Mayor acknowledged these concerns and committed to challenge unscrupulous employment practices; demand high employment standards; and support Londoners to access support on employment rights and other social advice via the London Recovery Board.

2.21. Building on these commitments and the GLA’s longstanding collaboration with the Citizenship and Integration Initiative, in April 2022 the Social Integration team will welcome two part-time civil society secondees to coordinate and strengthen the Mayor’s work to protect the rights of migrant workers in London. The secondees will work closely with other teams at the GLA and MOPAC to ensure coordination across intersecting briefs.

Delivery method and impact

2.22. Approval of expenditure of £70,000 is sought to commission an organisation to conduct an analysis of the current advice provision and infrastructure in place in London to support migrant workers to address cases of labour abuse, exploitation, and modern slavery. It will help identify the structural and practical barriers that prevent migrant workers from enforcing their employment rights; and propose relevant interventions to better identify and support them to address employment-related issues. Findings will be used to develop a coordinated funder strategy to ensure long-term sustainable support to relevant sectors, joining up with other relevant programmes including the JTI and the Mayor’s Advice in Community Settings.

2.23. Approval of expenditure of £80,000 is sought to build capacity and strengthen referral pathways and collaboration between the migrant and employment rights sectors, to better identify and support migrants facing labour abuse and exploitation. This work will be shaped by the civil society secondees in collaboration with migrant and community organisations, employment advisers, caseworkers and solicitors; and will be developed in close collaboration with researchers to ensure interim and final findings are reflected in the project. It will also build on the GLA’s and MOPAC’s ongoing activity, including Advice in Community Settings, the Employment Rights Hub, and work to prevent and tackle modern slavery.

2.24. Below is a breakdown of the funds for the spending proposals. All funding is subject to the annual budget-setting process.

Table 2

Migrant Londoners Hub

Context and purpose

2.25. Following the success of the European Londoners Hub (refs DD2239 and DD2277), the Mayor has invested in the development of the soon-to-be-launched Migrant Londoners Hub: a resource to welcome newly arrived migrants, and support Londoners with immigration needs by providing them with information about their rights and entitlements. MD2831 confirmed the initial funding to develop new content and ensure the site is kept updated; this content is delivered by the specialist immigration law firm Seraphus. It also authorised funding for the commission of a translation provider to ensure resources for the Migrant Londoners Hub and the Employment Rights Hub are made available in more languages (ref DD2529). DA Language Ltd has since been appointed to deliver the translation for the two hubs. Additionally, it allocated funding to commission a map of services to provide accessible and comprehensive information on where migrant Londoners can access safe and qualified advice and support to meet their needs. This is currently being procured.

Delivery method

2.26. We are now seeking approval to maintain the Migrant Londoners Hub and its service map; and to ensure these resources are kept updated, and new content is developed and translated, as needed. Further to this, approval is sought to improve accessibility of the site, including by:

• commissioning a partner to lead user-testing of the updated hub, its translated materials and service map

• commissioning a partner to develop visual content and other materials for the hub to facilitate access to information and accessibility for migrant Londoners. Previous user-testing for a project on employment right highlighted this as a useful strategy to improve accessibility for users who experience barriers to reading or comprehending written information.

Funding will also contribute towards dissemination, including paid social media.

Impact and deliverables

2.27. The Migrant Londoners Hub aims to:

• act as a trusted resource for migrant Londoners to access quality information about their rights and entitlements in the UK, and where to access safe and qualified advice and support

• encourage migrant Londoners to identify their immigration needs, and take steps to secure and maintain status to remain

• inform local authorities, GPs, police and other professionals about their duties and responsibilities towards migrant Londoners, to improve service delivery and help increase trust and confidence in these services

• strengthen the Mayor’s messages of welcome and belonging towards migrant Londoners, mitigating narratives that aim to exclude and “other” migrant communities, such as the “hostile environment”.

Below is a breakdown of the funds for the spending proposals. All funding is subject to the annual budget-setting process.

Table 3

London Strategic Migration Partnership

2.28. The purpose of the LSMP is to provide a strategic leadership, advisory, coordination and development function for migration and integration in London. The LSMP brings together cross-sector partners to look at migration issues of strategic importance to London. Its remit includes data and demographics on migration and supporting integration. The work of the LSMP is informed by the Mayor’s Migrant and Refugee Advisory Panel, which has a membership of organisations that support migrants, refugees and asylum seekers. The LSMP will ensure its work supports the Mayor’s priorities and GLA policies and activities.

2.29. The funding covers staffing costs for longstanding posts, it is externally funded via grant income from the Home Office with some additional costs being met through the Robust Safety Net Staffing Budget, comprising:

• £64,000: ‘enabling’ – a lead officer to coordinate the LSMP and to manage the delivery of the workplan

• £60,000: ‘resettlement coordination’ – an officer to deliver a programme of work around refugee resettlement

• £30,000: ‘ESOL coordination’ (match-funded through the Robust Safety Net staffing budget) – an officer to support access to English-language learning for resettled refugees and other learners.

Impact and deliverables

2.30. The work of the LSMP includes the following objectives:

• increase the social integration of refugees, people seeking asylum, and other migrant Londoners

• enable the fulfilment of London’s commitments to refugee resettlement, so that the capital plays an ambitious role in meeting the goals of the UK’s resettlement programmes

• facilitate the development of new approaches to supporting people seeking asylum that are sustainable and resilient in the face of future pressures

3.1. Under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010, as a public authority, the GLA must have ‘due regard’ of the Public Sector Equality Duty, that is, the need to:

• eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment and victimisation

• advance equality of opportunity

• foster good relations between people who have a protected characteristic and those who do not.

3.2. Equality, integration and inclusion are the drivers behind these programmes. They support the delivery of: the Mayor’s Social Integration Strategy ‘All of Us’; and the Recovery Missions to enable access to ‘good work’ and a ‘robust safety net’. These programmes also help address challenges highlighted in other missions, including commitments to support young people and to build stronger communities. All these programmes seek to tackle the inequalities that pose barriers to Londoners with insecure immigration status. These barriers stop such Londoners from fully participating in their communities, and the related work of these programmes includes improving access to immigration advice.

3.3. The work to improve access to immigration and employment advice and support services, and to improve accessibility of information to migrant Londoners, will reduce uncertainty and discrimination facing migrant groups. This includes challenges such as feeling unwelcome; discrimination; hate crime; difficulty renting private property; problems gaining employment; discriminatory treatment stemming from confusion about entitlements to services; and resulting mental health problems.

3.4. Insecure immigration status often interacts with other forms of marginalisation, such as poverty, disability and racism. Many of London’s migrant communities are also ethnic minorities, and are impacted by barriers in accessing housing, secure healthcare and other entitlements. The impact of insecure immigration status does not solely affect the life chances of migrants themselves, but also their British family members such as children and other dependants.

3.5. Migrant groups are also significantly represented among the low-paid workers who have been at the forefront of London’s Covid-19 response, or who have been impacted by poverty exacerbated by the pandemic and consequent rise in the cost of living. For instance, those affected by the ‘no recourse to public funds’ condition are often from a Black or other minority background, and often struggle with issues such as poverty, the impact of disability or domestic violence.

3.6. Creating opportunities for migrant Londoners to access good-quality advice and support, and for this advice to be embedded in settings where they can access it more easily, will help them to enforce their rights and entitlements. This programme creates more possibilities for migrant Londoners to flourish within their communities by ensuring that their basic rights are secured. Poor access to services and social connections has a particularly deleterious impact on people seeking asylum with additional protected characteristics. For example, our partners believe that people in the asylum system who identify as LGBTQ+ experience disproportionate isolation and victimisation.

3.7. Any commissioning processes will ask potential partners to demonstrate how their projects are inclusive of a diverse group; and actively work to eliminate discrimination on the basis of the nine characteristics protected in the Equality Act 2010. In order to ensure the highest standards of equality, diversity and inclusion are upheld, the GLA will use outreach and engagement approaches to target activities at particular groups that are less able to engage, or that face greater barriers to engagement, to enable them to participate, while ensuring that activities are open and accessible to all Londoners.

3.8. The guidance and resources are produced in accordance with best practice for accessible communications. The production of materials in multiple languages will support Londoners with limited English; and improve access to users with low reading comprehension. Grant programmes will focus on improving access to vulnerable or excluded groups.

Key risks and issues

Conflicts of interest

4.1. There are no conflicts of interest to note for any of the officers involved in the drafting or clearance of this decision form. The team administering these projects includes secondees and trustees of a number of relevant organisations; appropriate mitigations will be put in place throughout all tendering and grant programmes to remove relevant officials from a decision-making role regarding funding where any conflict does arise. This applies to GLA officers and also those funded to deliver work on our behalf. All commissioned services will be procured competitively in accordance with Contracts and Funding Code.

Links to Mayoral strategies and priorities

4.2. This work links to the Mayor’s Strategy for Social Integration ‘All of Us’, including confronting barriers and discrimination faced by migrants and refugees, and supporting Londoners with insecure immigration status to access their legal rights to citizenship and residence. It also supports the delivery of the Recovery Missions to enable access to ‘good work’ and a ‘robust safety net’.

Consultation and impact assessment

4.3. The focus of this work building the capacity of the immigration advice sector has been built on extensive research and engagement with migrant rights sector organisations, people with lived experience of the immigration system, and desk-research on capacity to inform our decisions as a funder.

5.1. Approval is being sought for receipt and expenditure of £154,000 in grant funding for the activities associated with the London Strategic Migration Partnership for 2022-23. The grant funding income will be provided by the Home Office.

5.2. Approval is also being sought for expenditure of £1,195,000 for the Migration programme over two financial years (2022-23 and 2023-24) as detailed in the below table.

5.3. The £1,195,000 expenditure (£835,000 in 2022-23 and £360,000 in 2023-24) will be funded from the Migration Support programme budget held within the Communities and Social Policy Unit.

5.4. The expenditure detailed within this decision all sits within the ‘Robust Safety Net’ mission. Funding for future years will be subject to the annual budget setting process and is subject to change. Any contracts that commit the GLA in future years will be subject to suitable break clauses.

6.1. The foregoing sections of this report indicate that the decisions requested of the Mayor fall within the statutory powers of the Authority to promote and/or to do anything which is facilitative of or conducive or incidental to social development within Greater London and in formulating the proposals in respect of which a decision is sought officers have complied with the Authority’s related statutory duties to:

• pay due regard to the principle that there should be equality of opportunity for all people

• consider how the proposals will promote the improvement of health of persons, health inequalities between persons and to contribute towards the achievement of sustainable development in the United Kingdom

• consult with appropriate bodies.

6.2. In taking the decisions requested of him, the Mayor must have due regard to the Public Sector Equality Duty; namely the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct prohibited by the Equality Act 2010, and to advance equality of opportunity between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic (race, disability, gender, age, sexual orientation, religion or belief, pregnancy and maternity and gender reassignment) and persons who do not share it and foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it (section 149 of the Equality Act 2010). To this end, the Mayor should have particular regard to section 3 (above) of this report.

Exemptions form the Contracts and Funding Code

6.3. Officers are seeking approval to vary the GLA’s existing contract with the Coram Children’s Legal Centre. The original contract was valued at £70,000, whilst the proposed variation is valued at £70,000. Section 9 of the Authority's Contracts and Funding Code (the "Code") requires that the Authority undertake a formal tender process or make a call off from an accessible framework for procurements with a value between £10,000 and £150,000. However, section 10 of the Code also provides that an exemption from this requirement may be justified on the basis that the proposed services amount to the continuation of existing work, from which they cannot be separated. Officers have set out at paragraphs 2.13 to 2.16 above the reasons why the procurement of the Coram Children’s Legal Centre falls within the said exemption. Accordingly, the Mayor may approve the exemption, if he be so minded.

Grant Funding

6.4. The GLA is seeking approval of a grant of £380,000 to Refugee Action. This grant exceeds the subsidy control threshold. To that end, the GLA, in providing the grants, must ensure that (i) it not confer an economic advantage on the recipient to the extent that the recipient is offering goods or services which are competing in a market with other organisations; and (ii) it not have an effect on trade or investment between the EU and the UK.

6.5. Officers have set out at paragraphs 2.7 to 2.10 above the reasons why the proposed grant to Refugee Action does not (i) confer an economic advantage on the recipients; and (ii) does not have an effect on trade between the regions of the UK and between the EU and the UK. Furthermore, officers are reminded to use the Authority’s long-form grant agreement in relation to the said grants, so that there be (a) an obligation on the recipient to procure competitively any goods and services, which it requires to further the funded activities; and (b) a mechanism for the recovery of the grant funding in circumstances where it may later be found to be an unlawful subsidy.

6.6. To the extent that the budget the subject of this MD be used for further grant funding, officers are reminded to comply with the requirements in section 12 of the Code and to ensure that an appropriate funding agreement be put in place between the Authority and the recipient, before any of the funding be paid.

6.7. In decision 3, officers are seeking approval for the Authority to receive £154,000 from the Home Office. Officers are reminded to ensure that the Authority comply with the conditions placed upon the use of the funding by the Home Office.

Procurement

6.8. Where officers use any of the requested budget for the procurement of goods or services, they are reminded to ensure that they comply with the requirements of the Code and seek assistance from Transport for London’s Procurement and Supply Chain department. Furthermore, officers are reminded to ensure that a contract be put in place between the Authority and the counterparty before the services commence.