We have recently formed a working group of City of Sanctuary volunteers to develop some community projects to build bridges between local people and asylum-seekers in Sheffield neighbourhoods.

As a first stage we are working with groups and individuals in the Manor area. Our first local meeting will be on Thursday 22nd May at 7pm, at St. Aidan's Community Centre on Manor Lane. 

If you would like to be involved in this work, and especially if you live or work in the Manor area, please let us know.

A public meeting in Sheffield last night heard how local asylum seekers were suffering because of rules barring some of them from free hospital treatment. One man from Afghanistan who damaged his spine while mending a roof was eventually let off paying his bill but said he was told he couldn’t have a wheelchair. Another said he was refused medical care for his diabetes and when his sight deteriorated the local Eritrean community raised £3,000 for his treatment.

All four major candidates for London Mayor have recently backed the proposals of the Strangers into Citizens campaign for an 'earned pathway into citizenship' for undocumented migrants, including refused asylum-seekers.

Under the proposals, an estimated 500,000 people who are currently prevented from working legally and paying taxes, would have an opportunity of working towards legal status.

The New Statesman has published an article by Donna Covey, Chief Executive of the Refugee Council, outlining the support they would like to see from London Mayoral candidates, which includes:

"we would also like to see all candidates for London Mayor express their commitment to welcoming refugees to London. A nationwide initiative has begun, to mark Britain's cities as ‘Cities of Sanctuary'. The next Mayor has a unique opportunity to back London as the first Olympic City of Sanctuary. Above all, London should be celebrated as providing a place of safety for those fleeing persecution across the world."

Read the full article here.

There is a new working group being formed to make London a City of Sanctuary, if you are a Londoner and would like to be involved please contact us.

In 2007 Norwich became the first UK city to join the International Cities of Refuge Network (ICORN). Through this scheme, Norwich offers residency to politically exiled writers who have been denied freedom of speech in their home countries.

Norwich City of Refuge has now joined the national City of Sanctuary movement, in order to share their experience of building community programmes on issues of human rights and asylum more widely throughout the UK.

You can read the recent Leicester Mercury article on City of Sanctuary and leave your comments here.

There's an interview with Craig and Babak from City of Sanctuary on Sheffield's community radio station Sheffield Live! website. To listen just follow the link here (our interview is about a third of the way into the programme.

On 7th February we held a meeting at Sheffield University to choose our priorities for Sheffield as a City of Sanctuary over the next year. Fifty supporters and representatives of supporting organisations held lively discussions and shared their ideas.

There was a broad commitment to our Manifesto of long term goals for Sheffield, (see 'Our Manifesto' link on the left).

The core priority that was identified by the meeting was on building community between local people and new arrivals, particularly in key local neighbourhoods where asylum-seekers and refugees are concentrated.

Tuesday 4th March 2008, from 9.30am - 1pm
including lunch and time to chat
at Active Community Centre, 9 Newarke Street, Leicester LE1 5SN