Ms Fiona Finn:

On the alternatives, the Department of Justice and Equality having sole care and responsibility for protection applicants has not worked for the past 20 years, which is a lesson we have learned. We need to do something more radical. I agree with our colleagues in the Refugee Council that while it is not a housing issue per se, housing is one of the main components of how we care for international protection applicants. In our engagement with approved housing bodies, AHBs, which have significant expertise in housing and social care, they have indicated that the structure of the current tendering process does not suit them because it is very much focused on institutional, large, congregated settings. AHBs have a clear ethos and mission but the process does not match with that. We need to start doing work and to engage directly with AHBs. We must move the model away from large, institutional settings, the smallest of which, based on the tenders, houses approximately 50 people. For AHBs, however, 50 is far too many and does not fit with their ethos. We are considering small, pepper-potted forms of accommodations and settings, moving away from the larger settings.

The Department of Justice and Equality should look to build for-purpose reception centres and units. The bottom line for any new reception centre is that it would have to be own-door accommodation in self-contained units, where families can live together. Many have argued asylum seekers should be allowed to live in the community and have access to full housing and social welfare, which is another option. That has been tried in other jurisdictions but the Scottish model has presented several issues and challenges because many vulnerable protection applicants have been left isolated in communities. We are examining the system that best suits protection applicants rather than one that creates an institutional setting, places protection applicants into that and expects them somehow to fit in to the system. We need to change our thinking about the matter and to start considering different models. It is clear our current model of institutional housing of protection applicants is not working. Tinkering with it will not change the fundamental, underlying faults of the system.