Asylum children dumped on Liverpool's roads

Oct 28 2007 by Larry Neild, Liverpool Daily Post

Liverpool Waterfront

AFRICAN children are being dumped at the end of the M62 in Liverpool with nothing more than notes pinned on them, it emerged last night.

They are transported to Merseyside by callous people couriers, and at the end of the journey are abandoned in the city. Immigration officials want to base more young asylum seekers to Liverpool to help Britain cope with the growing number of orphaned children arriving, some as young as six. The influx is causing a financial headache for the city council – left to care for the children while officials haggle over fees with the Home Office.

Now Liverpool’s children’s services director, Stuart Smith, is involved in discussions with the Government’s immigration directorate to increase the number of “unaccompanied children” coming to the city.

If the city agrees to up the number from the current 300 to around 400, the Home Office will cap the number allowed to be sent to Liverpool, and a set scale of fees paid to Liverpool City Council will be guaranteed.

As part of the negotiations, the Home Office will also pay the council fees going back five years, raising money that could pay for the extra specialised staff needed.

Mr Smith outlined the dilemma to the council’s powerful executive board yesterday.

Liverpool and Kent are the only two UK authorities set up to care for unaccompanied children.

He said Liverpool had been praised for the service it offered to child asylum seekers, but it had cost implications for the city council.

Mr Smith said some of the children arrived in the city having being left at the end of the motorway with a map and with little documentation.

“Some young children are brought here by people who charge a fee. It could well be that extended family members in Africa pay these fees to have children brought here.

“One of the issues we have is that there is no control on the numbers and the system of form filling is complicated for us. Through the talks we are holding, we would resolve funding issues and there would be a limit on the number of children sent to us. At the moment, we have 300 children in our care and are looking at increasing this by 50 or 100.”

The dilemma for the city council is many of the children who have been severely traumatised do not speak English and need intensive care from support workers.

Executive member Cllr Mike Storey told how his wife, schoolteacher Carole Storey, was teaching two young children from Africa who had been forced to watch as their parents were shot and killed in front of them.

He said: “Liverpool has a proud tradition of helping children caught up in such horrific situations.”

Council chief executive Colin Hilton told the executive board: “We are having to deal with unaccompanied children, many of them having faced oppression.

“A lot of them are traumatised when they reach our reception centre, some facing torture in their own countries.”

Talks are continuing with Whitehall with a deal expected shortly.

OPINION: PAGE 6

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