‘I felt like my life was being taken away’: Homeless mother threatened with having children removed

“They said they had a room. But not for me, just for my children. I was crying. The children were crying. They were scared. It felt likely life was being taken away from me.”

Sarah* and her three children became homeless in May last year. The small London flat the family had been living in flooded, and the fire brigade told her it was no longer safe for them to live there.

The mother-of-three was an undocumented Nigerian woman with no recourse to public funds, but the family had an application pending with the Home Office for the family's leave to remain on human rights grounds. She didn’t foresee the threat of having her children, aged seven, 10 and 14 – all born in the UK and attending school – being taken into care.

It took three days to organise an appointment with Haringey Council, during which Sarah and the children were able to stay with a friend. They arrived at the council at 11am on a Thursday in early June 2016 hoping to get some form of interim support, and were seen to at around 3pm.

Within several hours, Sarah was reportedly told no support was available for the family. With nowhere to go, they remained in the council offices until they were forced out when they closed, at which point they went to a 24-hour police station.

She said it was there that she was informed over the phone by an out-of-hour social worker that Haringey Council could house her children but not her.

“They knew I had nowhere to go. I asked, ‘Where are we going to sleep?’ I felt like I had done something wrong. They came back and said they’d found a room, but not for me, just for the children,“ she told The Independent.

“They didn’t have any sympathy. I said, ‘You’re trying to take my life away.’ I was crying and crying. My kids were just crying. We were there until 2am. They kept coming and saying the same thing.”

In a state of desperation, Sarah phoned the mother of her 10-year-old daughter’s friend, who was woken up by the call but agreed to house the family for the remainder of the night.

The following day, she returned to the council with her documents, but was told again that the only option was for the local authority to house the children without her.

After intervention from a solicitor, the family was given a temporary room in a shared house while the council carried out an assessment of the children’s needs. The room had one double bed and one single bed for the four of them. They stayed there for four months.

“We had one room for all of us. My daughter slept on the single, and I slept in the double with the two boys,” Sarah said. “There was a disabled man there, and someone with mental health problems. We were given no money. It was very difficult.”

In October, Haringey Council closed the case following the assessment. They gave the family 10 days to leave the temporary accommodation, saying they couldn’t support them because the family had resources they could call upon.

However, Sarah and her children were left destitute. North East London Migrant Action (NELMA), an activist group campaigning on behalf of families with no recourse to public funds, helped Sarah find refuge for her and her family, staying first with a Christian charity and later with a NELMA volunteer.

A spokesperson for Haringey Council said the council could not comment on individual cases, but was "very aware" of its responsibilities in supporting those seeking refuge with no recourse to public funds and always looked to provide this support "efficiently and with compassion".

They added that the local authority was currently supporting 71 households with no recourse to public funds, including 151 children.

The Children Act 1989 states that local authorities must safeguard the welfare of children in need in their area and “so far as is consistent with that duty, promote the upbringing of such children by their families”.

But organisations working with people with no recourse to public funds have told The Independent of multiple cases in which people approaching local authorities for housing were told social services would accommodate the child but not the parent.

Benjamin Morgan, a coordinator of NELMA's accompanying scheme for destitute migrant families, told The Independent: “Many local authority social services departments have created a climate of fear, misinformation and intimidation to stop destitute migrants accessing support they’re entitled to.

"Local authorities are knowingly disregarding their duty to some of the most vulnerable families in London, and the threat of taking children into care is being used to deter families from turning to them for help."

It comes as it emerged that nearly a quarter of a million people are experiencing acute forms of homelessness across Britain, with charities warning that rough sleeping set to rise by 76 per cent in the next decade unless the Government takes long-term action to tackle the problem.

The Independent revealed earlier this year that ethnic minorities have borne the brunt of spiralling homelessness, with the number of BAME families accepted as homeless having increased by 58 per cent in six years, compared with 34 per cent of households categorised as “White”.

A spokesperson for Haringey Council said: “We are very aware of our responsibilities in supporting those seeking refuge with no recourse to public funds and always look to provide this support efficiently and with compassion..

“Cases of this nature can be very complex, which is why we have a number of measures in place to ensure we are constantly monitoring these services and making improvements where necessary.

“Measures have included commissioning two audits – one to ensure all our cases meet statutory expectations and good practice and another to look at the processes around securing support for those who need it.”

*The woman’s name has been changed to protect her identity