Welcome Here needs your help with our work supporting refugees settling into our community.

When families with children and people with serious health conditions living in the asylum seeker hotel have their claims upheld by the government they have to move out into their own homes. This often happens quite quickly, with little notice, and these homes are not furnished.

Keys to a new home! Hooray! When do you move?

Tomorrow…. Oh….

They have no money for Ikea, no family to help out, perhaps no friends in the area, no transport and no help from the council or government. Who you gonna call? Welcome Here’s team of volunteers.

How can we help? Rugs on the concrete floor for tonight, we’ll try to sort out carpet and fitting as soon as we can, beds and cots – it might be an inflatable matress, but through our network of friends, businesses and charities like Roundabout we’ll try to help you sleep well. Bed clothes, thankfully we have good donations. Curtains, we’ll find some.

Fridge, borrow this till we can buy, possibly second hand, but if nothing is available, we’ll shop around. Cooking, we can get a microwave and camping hob for tonight and later we’ll order a cooker. Cooking implements – we’ve got some donations and can shop for more. Cleaning – oh yes, the new flat isn’t that clean on arrival. Vacuum cleaner, bucket, broom, dustpan and brush, washing up bowl and drainer, clothes horse and crockery… that list might cover the first night…

It all adds up and we’ve been spending.

We’re lucky to have been awarded grants that cover homes in the town of Stratford, but we’re also helping people offered housing in the wider area: in Harbury, Southam, Henley-in-Arden, Lower Quinton, Alcester, Lighthorne Heath … and the list keeps growing. Last year’s fund raising has almost been spent so we’re calling out for donations large and small. £3.50 buys a mop, £8.87 buys a topper to cover a second-hand mattress, £80 might get curtain poles for the exposed windows, £800 could buy carpet. As Tesco tells us ‘Every little Helps.’