W1 and W3 participants said that issues in relation to funding cycles for public services affected the ongoing ability to plan for service delivery. In the case of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive, it could continue to deliver services “at risk” (where funding had not been approved, but where it was expected it would be) while the Education Authority did not have this facility. Either way, the short term nature of funding (often only available year to year or for short term projects) meant that service delivery could often not be planned ahead. An example was given by W3 participants who referred to additional funding that had been given to Councils. This was positive, but by the time Councils received it, the funding was only available for six months, with no clarity over whether it would be renewed. PB4 noted that uncertainty over budgets made long term planning highly challenging: “… we’re still working with an indicative budget on this budget for the year, and we’re in November, and we’re all working on rolling three month contracts…” (PB4). PB4 commented further, particularly in relation to funding provided by the Home Office: “I think if we had one combined funding stream really it just makes so much more sense. I suppose multi years would be even better. But it would allow us to plan and coordinate better… [at the moment] It’s not guaranteed. It’s all very short term. You’re very late being notified of it” (PB4). PB5 described the problem around funding in similar terms: “Even the funding comes in bits and pieces, it’s short term, it’s in-year… They’re so patchy and piecemeal that you can’t plan ahead. And you’re really just putting your finger in the dyke and you’re just trying to plug gaps where you can. But you can’t invest in the future” (PB5). PB6 agreed that lack of clarity over funding was a significant barrier: “I suppose you could call it firefighting funding…. And we would really be wanting to see that funding replaced with a more permanent funding stream that we know what we’re going to get at the start of the year, you know. The Executive Office… are having discussions with Home Office… I know discussions are going on, I think they’ve been going on for some time… to be honest with you” (PB6). Lack of coordination and joined up policy and practice There was widespread consensus among participants that cooperation between public services could be improved and that currently this presented asylum seekers and refugees with additional challenges in accessing services. PB7 commented as follows: “I don’t think you would find many people who would argue… that it could [not] be better and it’s one of the failures, I would say, one of our challenges anyway, at local level… there is, I think, a lot of scope for saying, well you know what, action A has consequences for person B, you know, and that happens then, that has consequences for C. So a much more joined up approach” (PB7). PB3 agreed: “But I do feel that it’s not joined up. Like, all the councils are not joined up, so it’s not joined up with all of the trusts, so there are massive gaps, and I do think we could probably learn more off each other” (PB3). W3 participants said that for asylum seekers and refugees the lack of joined up approaches felt like “every engagement with a public body placed them back at square one” .
There had been increasing efforts by public bodies to share information – there were a lot of information sharing agreements now in place. However, PB1 noted that it was not clear how that was working out in terms of providing proper planning and support to asylum seekers and refugees. W1 participants raised several examples of good practice around coordination: fortnightly meetings chaired by The Executive Office and attended by multiple public services; the Education Authority had set up workshops in hotels, bringing together different organisations for the benefit of asylum seekers and refugees; public bodies participated in The Executive Office led Tactical Delivery Group (TDG) and Strategic Planning Group (SPG); in education, an asylum seeker and refugee forum for school principals was set up to share best practice. CSO1 expressed the view that the issue was perhaps less the absence of coordination as its ineffectiveness. They pointed out that there were many meetings to discuss the problems, but little evidence of changes on the ground: “There has been a lot of time and energy spent in meetings… I’ve lost track of what committees are sitting, and whatever else, but nothing, absolutely, is changing on the ground” (CSO1). At the same time, CSO1 noted that there could be basic failures of communication between services: “That’s a fundamental problem… one department isn’t talking to the other, or one arm’s length body isn’t talking to the other… if I’m dispersed to Antrim, although it’s 30 minutes down the road, I’ve left the trust area that I’m in for my services, and I’m rejoining waiting lists, and I’m starting to queue all over again… the communication element is a big thing” (CSO1). With regard to children, W2 participants noted that there was a statutory duty for public services to cooperate under the Children’s Services Co-operation Act (Northern Ireland) 2015 and questions were raised with regard to whether this duty was currently being fulfilled.
Final report of the of Ombudspersons and the Protection of Refugees and Asylum Seekers (OPRAS) project | 23
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