Supporting Destitute Asylum Seekers through Legal Advice and Integrated Services: An evaluation of Hope Projects (West Midlands)

In 2020 the charity Hope Projects (West Midlands) commissioned an inter-disciplinary team of NTU researchers to conduct a five-year evaluation of its services for destitute asylum seekers. This is a highly innovative model, which combines high quality free legal advice, housing and financial support, and diverse other services. It aims to support the wellbeing of some of the most marginalised and precarious members of our society, helping them to escape destitution, stabilise their immigration status, and build a sustainable life in the UK.

Today the British asylum system operates on the principle of mistrust – assuming that anybody claiming asylum is lying unless they can prove otherwise. The expectations for evidence to prove one’s claim have been found by numerous studies to be wildly unrealistic, given that the desperate flight to safety often leaves no opportunity to gather extensive paperwork.

In the absence of recognition as a refugee, the British state denies those seeking protection many fundamental rights. The majority are denied the right to work. Where state benefits are offered, these are below the poverty line. Where housing is offered, this is on a no-choice basis, often of very low quality, and subject to repeated relocations around the country, disrupting formal and informal support networks. For those who have been refused asylum and have exhausted their rights to appeal, many are deprived of all access to housing and benefits, and are still not allowed to work. This is reinforced by prohibitions on private renting, bank accounts, and driving licences, exorbitant fees for many types of healthcare.

Requirements for many types of service providers to report to the Home Office creates a climate of fear that discourages people from accessing even those services to which they are entitled. The result is state-orchestrated harm and levels of destitution that are disastrous for mental and physical health, and with particularly severe consequences for some groups, such as pregnant women. These conditions, produced by the state, directly render people vulnerable to multiple forms of exploitation and represent a severe failing in safeguarding responsibilities.

The evaluation covers three elements of Hope’s provision:

• A legal advice service, evaluated between 2021 and 2025. This includes a review of the literature, survey responses from 92 clients, 90 in-depth qualitative interviews and a focus group with 58 clients, a documentary case review of 20 client care letters, 18 in-depth interviews with Hope staff, volunteers, trustees and partners, Hope’s own monitoring data on client outcomes, and a final survey round in late 2024 to assess longer-term outcomes.
• A rapid response housing service, evaluated during 2024. This includes a review of the literature, in-depth qualitative interviews with five clients, three Hope staff and six referral organisations, and a client survey to assess mid-term outcomes.
• A health and wellbeing service, evaluated between 2024 and 2025. This includes a literature review, interviews with ten clients and two Hope staff members, and a review of internal monitoring data gathered by Hope.

This evaluation has documented the severe impact that destitution has in preventing refugees from exercising their legal right to asylum effectively. Clients who are referred to hope are usually in a desperate position – most have already been refused asylum and have exhausted their appeal rights, in many cases they have no legal representation and may have received poor legal advice in the past which has undermined their credibility, they have no access to legal aid, and are often also homeless. Yet they also feel that returning to their country of origin would be even worse, because of the threats they face there. Under such circumstances, it is extraordinarily difficult to prepare a new asylum application.

Yet after receiving support from Hope, 57% of survey respondents said that the charity had helped them secure legal representation, 50% said they had made new application for asylum, and 18% said they had now secured leave to remain in the UK. The proportions of people successfully resolving their asylum claim and securing leave to remain following support from Hope demonstrates that without Hope’s charitable services the UK asylum system would be failing even more people. Correct asylum judgements should not be dependent on charities ameliorating problems created by the British state itself. Furthermore, because the capacity of Hope and other charities falls far short of demand it is reasonable to expect that there are many more people whose asylum claims would be upheld if they received the proper support – good quality legal advice combined with secure housing and financial support – that is needed to enable them to present their case effectively. On that basis we recommend urgent steps to the UK government, charitable funders, and service providers, outlined in the briefings and reports below.

Phil Davis, Director of Hope Projects, said: "NTU's evaluation has been really helpful, not just in proving the value of the work that we have done, but in providing input that enabled us to improve the quality of the service that we provide. Particularly the data from the first round of evaluation which picked up ways where we could improve the way we communicated, both verbally and on paper, with our clients. Later waves of data confirmed that the changes we made to our service led to better outcomes and a better qualitative experience for our clients. Put simply, Hope Projects is better because of the work NTU did."

• Report: Meeting Urgent Housing Needs for Destitute Asylum Seekers: Evaluation of the Hope Projects (West Midlands) Rapid Assessment Beds (RAB) Service, Final Report
• Report: Fighting Asylum Destitution Through Quality Legal Advice: Evaluation Of The Hope Projects (West Midlands) Legal Service, Final Report

Briefing documents

• Connecting Legal Advice and Material Support: Briefing for Service Providers and Civil Society
• The Impact of Policy on Asylum Destitution: A briefing for the UK Government based on evaluation data of Hope Projects legal services provision
• The role of quality legal advice to address destitution among refused asylum seekers: Lessons for charitable funders

The NTU team can be contacted at tom.vickers@ntu.ac.uk for any questions about the evaluation and its findings, or to discuss requests for further evaluation or consultancy.