June 2000
Announcements
Ealing Refugee Forum (ERF) is holding its AGM on July 19th at Ealing
Town Hall in Committee Room 3, New Broadway, London W5 2BY. This is
an open meeting and all are welcome. The agenda will be circulated
to organisations who are members of Ealing Refugee Forum in advance
(to join the forum or for more information about becoming a member
contact Misak Ohanian at CAIA on 020 8992 4621, e-mail contact@ealingrefugeeforum.org.uk).
Lasa is providing free training in partnership with ERF and Ealing
Council on the new asylum support arrangements. This will take place
on 12th July 2000 from 9.30am-4.30pm at Ealing Town Hall in Committee
Room 3, New Broadway, London W5 2BY. There are 15 places which
will be allocated on a first come first served basis. Please register
in advance (registration form enclosed). Lunch will be provided.
ERF has been successful in getting ?3000 funding from Comic Relief
for a part time
co-ordinator. ERF are currently advertising the post (see enclosed
job advertisement) and has developed a work plan for the year (enclosed).
The forum is grateful to Comic Relief and to West Acton Community
Centre for accepting the grant on our behalf.
Local Developments
ERF is a full partner of the Ealing Refugee Steering Group and we
have commissioned MORI to carry out a study of refugee and asylum
seeker communities in Ealing. For more information contact Lainya
Offside-Keivani on 020 8758 5263. Member organisations may be contacted
for information during this process.
Members of ERF were active participants in the SRB6 renewal bid which
was submitted on 2th June. ERF members were on the steering
group alongside representatives from local authorities and the health
authority. RCOs made a strong contribution to the final bid entitled
Turning adversity into opportunity for refugees and recent arrivals
in west London. For a copy of the summary bid contact Deb Appleby
at Ealing, Hammersmith and Hounslow Health Authority on 020 8893 0303
or at www.ehh-ha.nthames.nhs.uk.
The Community Legal Service (CLS) is a major government initiative
designed to provide a comprehensive network of quality legal services.
All information providers are included in the CLS so if you offer
information you will need to be aware of this. The Quality Mark is
the name given to the quality standard which will underpin all CLS
services to enable users to identify quality assured services. CLS
Quality Mark training has been organised for June 28th in the Nelson
Room, Ealing Town Hall from 9.30am-2.45pm. There are twenty five places.
To register contact Juliet at Ealing Regeneration Housing by fax on
020 8758 5384. If you are working in the Hammersmith and Fulham area,
you can also contact LBH&F Community Legal Service Partnership
for more information at Room 138 Hammersmith Town Hall, King Street,
London W6 9JU or at www.lbhf.gov.uk/cls.
As a result of work with ERF, the latest issues of each of the Ealing
PCG newsletters are carrying an article about the changing refugee
population in the area. These newsletters are targeted at GPs and
can influence and inform them. Copies of the article are available
from the editorial board on 020 8326 3585. They also want to do profiles
of the different communities in the area for future editions.
Misak Ohanian, Chair of ERF, spoke at a meeting of the Homelessness
Forum at Hammersmith and Fulham Community Law Centre, on 21st June,
about the experience of setting up the refugee forum in Ealing as
H&F would also like to set up a similar forum.
Members of ERF attended a meeting of the Hounslow Refugee and Asylum
Seekers Liaison Group on 6th June where the work of the Hounslow Employment
Service and the Community Investment Fund application was discussed
along with the impact of the new support arrangements.
On 14th April Acton and Ealing Gazette ran an article detailing how
a recruitment agency had put a sign in their window stating that they
did not accept refugees or asylum seekers. As a result of a chorus
of complaints from people, including members of ERF, to the Ealing
Racial Equality Council the matter was referred to the Police and
the CRE. Misak Ohanian, Chair of ERF was quoted in article as saying
"To put this sign up is quite disgraceful".
Hounslow PCG has a new post of Link Worker (Refugees and Asylum Seekers)
to develop links with local organisations in order to help services
to be accessible to refugees and asylum seekers and to help Primary
Care Teams to develop services which are more accessible to refugees
and asylum seekers. For more information contact Shabnam Sharma on
020 8893 0219 or at shabnam.sharma@mail.ehh-ha.nthames.nhs.uk.
The draft Hounslow Voluntary Sector Compact 2000? is a code of practice
for partnership working with local voluntary sector organisations
and the London Borough of Hounslow. Comments on the draft are invited
before June 30th. Copies are available from Mark Tuohy on 020 8572
5929. A similar document is also being developed for Ealing.
Ealing Borough SureStart is a government funded project to develop
services for families with children from 0-4 years old. It has social,
educational and community building targets to be met over the period
of the project, which can be up to 10 years. The Ealing area is the
Southern section of Northolt. The steering group has statutory and
voluntary organisations on it but lacks input from refugee organisations.
For more information about the project contact Carmel Cahill at carmine@btinternet.com.
News in Brief
Action Link London is a dynamic new website for London's voluntary
sector designed to facilitate the sharing of information and
resources. It is being launched this summer. There will be information
about training and employment, funding and partnership possibilities
and a ?contacts database?, which will include ERF. Contact Action
Link London on info@actionlink.org.uk or call them on 020 7700 8112
to ensure your organisation is included.
The Barbara Melunski Fund, in partnership with Birkbeck College and
Evelyn Oldfield Unit, is now offering free training in counselling
to refugees. This is a one year course, starting in September, on
Wednesdays from 10.00am-3.00pm at Birkbeck College. Interviews will
take place in early July. For more information contact Miranda Alcock
or Natalie Galloway on 020 7631 6626 or at Birkbeck College, University
of London, 26 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DQ.
The West London Partnership is a partnership between the public and
private sectors promoting regeneration. They offer help and advice
through the West London Expertise Bank (WeB) which is a new service
from four global brand businesses who are encouraging staff to
offer one-off help and advice, on a voluntary basis, to charitable
organisations in West London. They can give help with issues such
as finance, training, marketing and IT. They also offer help through
Professionals in the Community 40 professional firms offer their
services free to community groups. They offer a range of advice from
legal to architectural. For more information contact
PiC /WeB at West London Leadership, Park Western, 41-44 Kendal Avenue,
London W3 0RP. Tel; 020 8992 7444.
Partnership College is offering free English courses at Palingswick
House, 241 King Street, London W6 9LP. The courses are for refugees,
asylum seekers and unemployed people of all nationalities. Write to
them at the above address or call them on 020 8563 2322 for more information.
If people would like to make announcements in the ERF newsletter or
have information to share, please contact ERF c/o Hayashen, 105a Mill
Hill Road, London W3 8JF, tel; 020 8992 4621, e-mail; contact@ealingrefugeeforum.org.uk.
The ERF newsletter is funded by the Camelot Foundation.
ERF is funded by Ealing Council, Camelot Foundation,
Comic Relief and Trust for London.
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