14 June 2017
Easy to claim, harder to prove – The challenges of refugee status based on sexual orientation and gender identity
According to the Home Office, the number of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual, Transgender, and Intersex (LGBTI*) individuals claiming asylum has risen by 400% in the last 5 years. Although the number of individuals who have specifically claimed sexual orientation and gender identity as their reason for refuge is unclear, these figures are expected to rise. As such, it is important that the UK appropriately deals with these individuals in a sensitive manner in order to first establish that the individual does in fact fall under the LGBTI* bracket.
13 June 2017
Refugee Week: The real refugee crisis and what we can do about it
There isn’t a refugee crisis in the UK. Asylum applications have gone down over the last 15 years. Last year around 600,000 people moved to the UK. Only 5% of them - about 30,000 people - claimed asylum.
12 June 2017
Refugee Week: Status for the stateless - a brief history of the refugee
Today we face “the greatest movement of the uprooted that the world has ever known”, according to Tracy McVeigh and Mark Townsend in the Guardian. The UN High Commission on Refugees (‘UNHCR’) records that 65.3 million people are forcibly displaced worldwide and that every minute 24 people leave everything behind to escape war, persecution or terror. Next week is Refugee Week - a nationwide programme celebrating the contributions made by refugees in the UK, and helping to promote their integration and acceptance in communities across the country. For many, the treatment of refugees as a class of individuals requiring state protection is a central feature of any civilised society. But this view is relatively new.
8 March 2017
IWD: Just asking for a conversation - why International Women’s Day is still relevant
One wet weekend in January, when a group of colleagues and I were half way through planning an internal event for International Women’s Day and grappling with how to present it to the firm, the importance of celebrating the day became crystal clear to me.
8 March 2017
IWD: Don't forget the chaps today…
The theme for today's International Women's Day – "accelerating gender parity" – will resonate with a legal profession striving to improve its record on gender balance in the workplace.
