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On February 23, Mila Panchenko (pictured), who fled the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, which was left in ruins during fierce fighting with Russia, arrived in the UK almost two years ago, marking the end of a months-long evacuation. I was relieved that I had found a place where I could put an end to things and calm down. Photographed on the 21st in Hatfield, England (2024 Reuters/Anna Gordon)
[ハットフィールド（英イングランド） ２３日 ロイター] – Mila Panchenko, 55, who fled the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, which was left in ruins during fierce fighting with Russia, arrived in the UK almost two years ago, finally ending her months-long evacuation. I felt relieved that I had found a place where I could calm down.
However, after being forced to move four times, she is now homeless and unable to see a future. She has no place to return to. The apartment building where she lived in Mariupol was destroyed by Russian bombing.
Panchenko, who is temporarily housed in a shared house run by the YMCA in Hatfield, about 18 miles north of London, says she feels like she is at the mercy of the British government.
“The British government can always say ‘goodbye’ to me once the war is over. Where should I go then?” he asked.
This is not just Panchenko’s story. Red Cross research shows that Ukrainians living in the UK are four times more likely to become homeless than other households. Some of the more than 200,000 Ukrainians living in the UK are also worried about whether they will be allowed to settle long-term.
Two years after Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Europe, the United States, and Canada still have a combined total of more than 6 million displaced people in their countries, and the burden of supporting them remains high. How to respond in the future can be said to be a common issue.
Based on various opinion polls, there is a deep sense of sympathy among Ukrainians. However, with no end to the war in sight, countries that have taken short-term support measures have found that the costs have turned out to be much greater than expected, and spending is now being curtailed.
Britain has cut the initial period of stay for new Ukrainians entering the country by half, to 18 months, and ended a system that allowed Ukrainians to stay with relatives in the UK.
Subsidies given to local governments when supporting refugees will also be reduced. This is not only the UK but also several Eastern European countries, and Ireland is also considering it.
Poland, which hosts about 1 million refugees from Ukraine, extended welfare benefits this month, but only until June. European Union guidelines state that member states must continue to provide such benefits until March next year, but Poland has indicated it may reduce the amount from June onwards.
Last week, the Home Office said it offered 18-month visa extensions to Ukrainian refugees already in the country, but it also backed the Ukrainian government’s hopes that they would eventually return home.
But when Panchenko returns to Mariupol, he has no place to live. She hopes to continue living here in Hatfield.
Ukrainians who have lost their homes in Ukraine or whose hometowns are still under Russian occupation say, “I want to be of service to society in the UK.”
Panchenko, who fled occupied Mariupol, spent a very short time in Italy before moving to the UK, initially in a room provided to her by a family who had applied for a Ukrainian refugee program. He immediately scrambled to find an environment where he could move more freely, but was unable to find housing at an affordable price, and after moving from friend’s house to friend’s house for a while, he ended up homeless.
Official data shows that at the end of January, 19 Ukrainian families and nine single people were registered as homeless in Welwyn Hatfield.
Since January 2023, the government grant for UK local authorities to look after Ukrainian refugees for three years has been reduced from an original £10,500 to £5,900 per person. The grant to support Afghan refugees is more than £20,000 per person.
A spokesperson for a coalition of municipal governments said that the situation, including a longer period of support than previously expected, duplication of support for refugees from other countries and regions, and a lack of housing, has led to a decline in the number of homeless Ukrainian refugees. It is pointed out that this has led to an increase in He called for an urgent need to reconsider funding for local governments to support refugees.
A senior British government official said an extra £109 million had been allocated this year to prevent Ukrainians from becoming homeless. The Ministry of Housing and Communities has also announced plans to provide 1.2 billion pounds by 2026 to help local governments build or purchase housing for Ukrainian and Afghan refugees.
The ministry also said that the monthly allowance for families who applied for the Ukrainian Refugee Program had been increased from £350 to £500 in response to rising living costs.
However, one senior government official said that now that the initial enthusiasm has faded, the number of applications for the program has dropped significantly.
In a survey published by the UK’s Office for National Statistics in October last year, two-thirds of host families said their ability to support their families had decreased due to increased living costs. Just over half of respondents said they intended to stay for 18 months or longer.
Germany is also facing a growing burden of accepting refugees. Recently, the head of a coalition of local governments called for the federal government to provide more generous unemployment benefits to Ukrainian refugees, demanding that Ukrainian refugees receive the same benefits as other refugees.
On the 17th of this month, the British government announced that it would be able to extend the expiration date for Ukrainian refugees by 18 months, originally set to be three years, but which expires next year.
It’s a welcome move for Volodymyr Horovachev, 31, who fled Ukraine before martial law was imposed, but he has only applied for an extension three months before the deadline expires and has not been offered a way to settle in the UK. I’m confused.
Landlords and employers want refugees’ legal status to be guaranteed, so not knowing what will happen next is a problem, Holobachev said. “It is currently unclear how we can prove that we have the ‘right to work’ or the ‘right to rent a house’ for the necessary period of time, and without that, we are left at the mercy of our landlords and employers.” said.
For Panchenko, too, there is little he can do to overcome his fear of being kicked out of the UK.
She believes that her life would have been different if she had been provided with the means to settle down, have been able to pay into her pension savings, and have had the right to work, study and live forever. “There’s nothing left for me when I return to my hometown. Where will I go with my suitcase and leave rich England?”
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2024-02-26 09:13:00
