Background
We Are Here is a piece of research, published in 2021, that seeks to better understand the realities of life for undocumented migrants in the UK today. It explores how people become undocumented, and how precarity is produced through the structures of the system itself. It reveals the systemic weaknesses of our immigration system that lead to so many people becoming undocumented and how a small error, or a short period of illness, can change the course of a life.
Under the current system, people are kept in insecure temporary status, punctuated by expensive and stressful renewal applications, for years and decades, greatly increasing the chance that a piece of bad luck will drive them out of status. Once that happens, the system makes it almost impossible to change course and regain status. We explore how, once someone becomes undocumented, their everyday lives are criminalised, and they are driven into exploitation. Their voices are silenced, and they are unable to get help or tell anyone about their plight. Under the Hostile Environment, almost everyone who should keep them safe – like the police, the NHS, social services, and even some charities – have become part of the system of immigration enforcement and surveillance, and attempt to rip them away from their families and homes.
We look at how undocumented status impacts on people’s lives and the lives of those around them. And finally, we make recommendations as to how sensible, measured and simple reforms could help break the cycle of insecure immigration status for people living and working in the UK. We propose measures that would both prevent people from becoming undocumented in the first place, and make it practically possible for undocumented migrants who have established lives here to resolve their situation.
