Trust for London, Unbound Philanthropy, the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, Pears Foundation and the City Bridge Trust created a pooled fund to work closely with the Mayor of London to advance shared goals on social integration during this Mayoral term (2016-2020). The initiative was based around three key areas: participation, encouraging active citizenship and increasing voter registration; equalities, supporting young Londoners and Europeans to secure their legal rights; and relationships, creating a hospitable environment for Londoners.
From April 2017, the CII has supported seven secondments into the GLA’s Social Integration Team from Just for Kids Law (Let Us Learn, now We Belong), Coram Children’s Legal Centre, Migrants Organise, Citizens UK, New Europeans, Hope Not Hate and Project 17.
In addition, the CII has supported two projects external to the GLA’s activities, the first enabling Volunteer Centres and Centres for Voluntary Service to take part in a pilot project on citizenship ceremonies, and the second to pilot early action legal advice for families with insecure status in primary schools, run by Citizens UK, Coram Children’s Legal Centre and Kings College London Widening Participation Department.
As well as contributing to the development of the Mayor’s strategy for social integration, the CII secondees and projects have made significant progress towards the shared goals:
- Young Londoners Forum established to inform the GLA
- Guidance for young people and professionals published
- Research on public attitudes towards young Londoners with insecure status
- Social media campaign highlighting the issue of insecure status
- Research on numbers of young people with insecure status
- Pilot to test ‘early action’ legal advice to insecure families in primary schools
- Advice on how capacity could be increased across the legal sector Contributions to Mayoral policy responses on migrant issues
- EU Londoners Hub – an online portal in multiple languages to offer information to EU Londoners on applying for settled status
- EU Londoners ‘takeover day’ -where by EU migrants’ groups were invited into City Hall to take part in an information day
- #London is Open Bus - offering outreach advice with pro bono legal advisors Microgrants to enable information sessions in communities
- Contributed to Mayoral advocacy success in getting fees for settled status waived
- ‘We are all Londoners’ day at City Hall, with a celebration of European Londoners, free legal advice and the first EU Settlement Ceremony
- Research into rates of voter registration to identify communities with lower than average rates
- Political literacy materials for the London Curriculum and resources for teachers
- Building a coalition of influencers and civil society organisations to deliver the first London Voter Registration Week campaign
- Pilot project to test effectiveness of interventions in citizenship ceremonies to increase active citizenship
- Research into the effect of attending ceremonies on attitudes to migration
- Guidance on design/content of citizenship ceremonies for local authorities Mayoral Citizenship Ceremony - on a larger scale than previous ones
- Developing an approach to support London’s ‘Welcome Groups’
- Research on the impact of the hostile environment on staff and professionals in key service sectors
- Informing other GLA teams’ approaches and understanding of hostile environment
- Supporting GLA policy responses to the Home Office
Read more by downloading the full report or the summary report.
15 October 2019