PROJECTS

Children's Fund

The Ealing Refugee Forum successfully raised £17,640 from Ealing Children's Fund for summer projects benefiting refugee children. The grant has been distributed fairly depending on the size of the project and activities involved.

The following 7 RCO's benefited from the grant. The "Znaniye" Russian School, Hillingdon Chinese Community Organisation, Somali Teachers Association, Great Lakes Development Network, Heritage Ceramics, Ladies Creative Centre & Nirari Art. The ERF plans to apply again next year with a view of supporting more RCO's working with refugee children in the summer.

BMER Community Involvement Fund

The ERF has part-managed the BMER Community Involvement Fund with Ealing Racial Equality Council to enable local RCO's and other ethnic minority community groups access £30,000 for specific projects.

Training

On July 3rd, 2003, the Ealing Refugee Forum successfully organised a special one-day
training for RCO Management Committee members at the premises of Ealing Racial Equality
Council. Dr. Kamal Rasul delivered the training from the Migrant Organisation's
Development Agency (MODA).

Newsletter/website

The ERF re-started publishing its newsletter in 2003. The re-designed Newsletter with ERF's
new logo is now circulated free to almost 1000 Refugee Community organisations, Ealing
schools, libraries, Ealing councillors, local MP's, MEP's, Primary Care Trusts, Housing
Associations, voluntary and statutory bodies. The newsletter has also a new policy and
direction, which is to encourage the contribution of many more individuals and groups to
in the production of the publication.

One to One work with RCO's

The new co-ordinator, Misak Ohanian has met with the following local RCO's to advice and
support them one-to-one on a variety of issues including finding premises, funding, Ealing
Children's Fund, constitutional changes, registering as a charity and bookkeeping. The
Society of Afghan Residents, "Znaniye" the Russian School, the Ladies Creative Centre and
Somali Family Learning & Regeneration Project. We are grateful for Paul Boielle from
Ealing CVS who has co-operated with the ERF to enable us to provide support to these
organisations.

Refugee Week 2003

As in previous years, Ealing Refugee Forum organised a very successful Refugee Week Multi-cultural event on 28th June 2003 at Ealing Town Hall. Fourteen refugee community organisations and a number of outside agencies working with refugees contributed to the event by providing stalls, diverse food and cultural presentations promoting their communities and work. The wide-ranging cultural programme featured Armenian, Persian and Egyptian dancing, Russian and Kurdish singing, an African drum performance, a Tae Kwon Do display by Afghan children. To a packed hall, Edmond Michaels, chair of ERF welcomed and praised the contribution of refugee communities to society. Guest of honour was the Worshipful Mayor of Ealing Cllr. Gurcharan Singh who expressed his and the Council's warmest greetings for the event. Other speakers included, Stephen James, programme Manager of Renewal SRB 6 Partnership who funded the event and Cllr. Harvey Rose, leader of the Liberal Democrats within Ealing Council. It was gratifying to see so many refugees, particularly children and young people participating and supporting this annual event.

Organisations which took part included, Znaniye" Russian School, Tamil Refugee Action Group, Great Lakes Development Network, Akhtamar Armenian Dance Group, Refugee Aid & Development, Heritage Ceramics, Middle Eastern Christian Minorities Advisory Centre, Kurdish Association West London, Hillingdon Chinese Community Organisation, Ladies Creative Centre, Society of Afghan Residents, Somali Teachers Association, Dekh Bhal Women & Girls Support Group and African Aid for Orphans.

Other statutory and non-statutory agencies taking part were Ealing Advice Co-ordination & Development Project, Ealing Primary Care Trust and Ealing Children's Fund.