Legal Fund
Please Donate Generously
Find more information about this campaign below.
Fight Injustice by Supporting the Legal Fund
Imagine waking up each morning knowing basic necessities like food, shelter, and healthcare are unreachable, not because of personal failures, but because the law itself pushes you further into despair. This harsh reality confronts countless migrants in the UK, ensnared in a system designed to create a hostile environment.
Picture families huddled in cramped, shared accommodations, unable to afford proper heating or nutritious meals. Children, denied access to free school meals due to their immigration status, face the shame of empty lunchboxes and social exclusion. Imagine the constant fear of illness with restricted healthcare access, and the crushing weight of debt incurred for basic necessities like medication.
This isn’t fiction; it’s the lived experience for many under the UK’s “hostile environment” policy. This policy acts like a vice, tightening around families, denying essential support while pushing them towards exploitative lenders and predatory debt collection practices. The threat of eviction, denied school supplies, and the constant fear of destitution become daily anxieties, breeding silence and shame.
This system isn’t just economically oppressive; it’s psychologically punitive. Imagine the despair of having dreams of a better life crushed by a system seemingly designed to keep you down. This is the reality for countless migrants, their voices silenced, their aspirations extinguished by a system that feeds on their vulnerability.
But amidst this darkness, there’s a flicker of hope. IHRC Trust set up the Legal Fund to fight and challenge this oppressive system, by offering free legal support. We believe everyone deserves justice, regardless of immigration status.
In the 12 months ending 29 February 2024 our Legal Fund has:
- Assisted 11 individuals with their leave to remain applications
- Saved destitute individuals and families a total of £29,967 in Home Office fees
- Saved destitute individuals and families a total of £13,250 in professional fees
For every pound donated towards our Legal Fund last year, beneficiaries on average saved £3.26 in Home Office and legal fees, as well as helping them gain access to the job market, housing support, and public funds should they need it.
Our fight for justice needs your support. With your generous donation to the IHRC Legal Fund, you can:
- Empower migrants: Your contribution will provide legal support to those who would otherwise be voiceless and vulnerable.
- Challenge injustices: Your support will help us expose and dismantle discriminatory practices within the immigration system.
- Create a fairer society: By investing in migrant rights, you contribute to a more fair and just society for all.
How you can help
At IHRC Legal, we have helped nearly 200 people with irregular immigration status obtain residency in the UK. We have also helped over 30 individuals with leave to remain remove restrictions on their immigration status so that they can access benefits, allowing them to live in a more sustainable way.
Many of our clients have had their lives and families torn apart by persecution, conflict, abuse, and extreme poverty. We support some of the most vulnerable migrants in the country, helping them to regularise their immigration status allowing them to access vital support. These individuals, families and children would otherwise be forced to live in the “hostile environment” created by the UK Government, vulnerable to sexual exploitation, abuse, modern day slavery, homelessness and neglect. Many fear accessing essential services such as the NHS, even when heavily pregnant, as they fear being charged tens of thousands of pounds by the NHS and reported to the authorities.
Our expert advice, guidance, and experience in immigration law allows migrants to live dignified lives, giving them an opportunity to rebuild their lives in the UK.
The Legal Fund supports individuals who:
- do not have leave to remain in the UK, but have reasonable prospects of succeeding with an application to the Home Office, and their immigration case is not covered by legal aid; or
- have leave to remain but are subject to a condition preventing them from accessing public funds/benefits.
Your donation helps vulnerable migrants to regularise their immigration status: settling into safe new homes, getting access to benefits, healthcare, schooling, finding rewarding jobs and contributing to society.
This is a Zakat eligible fund, out of the eight possible recipients of Zakat, our beneficiaries fall into these possible categories as mentioned in the Quran:
- Poor
- The needy
- Wayfarer
- Those in debt
- Those in bondage
Please give generously
“I gave the pledge of allegiance to the Prophet (ﷺ) for offering prayer perfectly, giving Zakat and giving good advice to every Muslim” – Hadith
“I heard the Prophet (ﷺ) saying, “There is no envy except in two: a person whom Allah has given wealth and he spends it in the right way, and a person whom Allah has given wisdom and he gives his decisions accordingly and teaches it to the others” – Hadith
Every donation, big or small, makes a difference. Together, we can ensure migrants have access to justice, dignity, and the opportunity to thrive in the UK.
Donate today and stand with IHRC Trust in the fight for immigration justice!
[The Legal Fund, established by the registered charity IHRC Trust (no.1106120), supports low-income individuals facing immigration challenges through our delivery partner IHRC Legal.]
