Children in Need: Unaccompanied Refugees

Abstract

‘Some social workers come into contact with refugee children in the course of their work in the UK, but it has not always been clear what is best practice when considering how to make sensitive assessments, arrange appropriate placements and provide adequate support.’

The following article is based on an interview with Louise Williamson, author of the above quote and Director of the Children's Division of the Refugee Council, which was created in 1995 specifically in order to address the needs of refugee children. In collaboration with the writer Hedi Argent, herself a former refugee, Louise Williamson prepared cases to illustrate all the points she wanted to make, but on the understanding that every unaccompanied child has his or her own story and that the circumstances of each are unique.