Local AM backs work of Hackney Chinese Community Services
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ASSEMBLY
LABOUR
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News release
06.07.2021
For immediate use
Local Assembly Member backs work of Hackney Chinese Community Services to improve BNO visa scheme and support victims of hate crime
A local campaign to push for more support for Hongkongers arriving in the capital as part of the British National Overseas (BNO) visa is being backed by local London Assembly Member, Sem Moema AM. Ms Moema has called for the “significant gaps” in the Government’s scheme to be filled so it is accessible to more than just the rich and highly-skilled.
Hackney Chinese Community Services (HCCS) has been working with City Hall to draw up recommendations on how the current BNO scheme could be improved.
In January, the local organisation compiled a report alongside Hongkongers in Britain and the Hong Kong Assistance and Resettlement Community which calls for better employment, housing and mental health support for those settling in the UK on a BNO Visa.
The Home Office has estimated that up to 320,000 Hong Kong residents could permanently move to the UK in the next five years. But concerns have been raised about the scheme becoming financially prohibitive to Hongkongers looking to flee the Chinese Government’s clamp-down on dissent and democracy in the region.
Under current plans, those who settle in the UK under the BNO Visa will have No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF), will be subject to the NHS surcharge and students using the scheme will have to pay international tuition fees.
Ms Moema recently attended the HCCS’s reopening after the easing of COVID-19 restrictions. During the event, she gave a speech praising the work of HCCS to support victims of hate crime targeted at the local East and South East Asian community and lauding its plans to build a new resource centre in Dalston.
Ms Moema also highlighted the borough’s history of providing a refuge for migrants and dissidents from the Windrush Generation in the wake of the Second World War to South Asians fleeing Uganda in the 1970s.
Local London Assembly Member, Sem Moema AM, said:
“Hackney has a proud history of welcoming refugees and political dissidents. I am proud that a local organisation like HCCS is playing a key role to lobby for more support to Hongkongers looking to flee the oppression of the Chinese Government.
“The BNO scheme is not fit for purpose if it is only targeted at the rich and highly-skilled, and the significant gaps in the support it offers, as highlighted in HCCS’s report, must be filled by Government.
“I was honoured to attend the organisation’s recent reopening and speak about their vital work supporting victims of rising hate crime against East and South East Asian Londoners in the midst of the pandemic.
“I look forward to engaging with them more going forward and I am delighted they are planning to set up a new hub in Dalston”.
ENDS
Notes to editors
- More information about the British National Overseas (BNO) visa scheme can be found here;
- Hackney Chinese Community Services’ (HCCS) report in to the BNO scheme, published and presented to the Greater London Authority (GLA) in January, in partnership with Hongkongers in Britain and the Hong Kong Assistance and Resettlement Community, can be found here;
- The Home Office has estimated that up to 320,000 Hong Kong residents could permanently move to the UK under the BNO scheme in the next five years;
- Sem Moema AM is the London Assembly Member for the North East (covering Hackney, Islington and Waltham Forest).