Marlow Refugee Action

We are a volunteer led organisation seeking to translate the global refugee crisis into meaningful local action. We fundraise to support grassroots organisations working directly with refugees both locally, nationally and globally and we work to raise awareness within our community of the complex issues facing displaced people, and what they can do to to make a difference.

Merry Christmas from Marlow Refugee Action!

As the year draw's to a close we are proud to look back on a fantastic year of fundraising in support of grassroots organisations working directly with asylum seekers and refugees both locally and overseas. It has been a year which has seen almost unprecedented challenge in the sector, with the war in Ukraine displacing around 7.6 million people, a backlog of 150,000 people in the UK asylum system and the disturbing advent of attempts to remove asylum seekers to Rwanda which has as yet not come to fruition due to the incredible work of NGOs and legal representation. 

Against these and many other challenges her and overseas we have been proud to use the people-power of Marlow to make a difference to displaced people. This has included: 

- Handling the finances for the Marlow Ukraine Collective who have been supporting 77 guest families in Marlow and the surrounds. Over £16,000 has been raised to help support guests to access education, school resources, language classes and other essential support in our community. 

- Continued support of education charity Action for Education in Greece providing vital educational and wellbeing support in the Nest in Athens. We part fund the rental of the Nest and the refugee teacher accommodation, 

- New partnerships with I Have Rights and the Human Rights Legal Project to ensure that human rights abuses in Greece, such as forced pushbacks are challenged and that those facing significant challenge to claiming asylum have the correct legal advice and support. 

- New relationships with Collective Aid Serbia and the Calais Food Collective to provide shower facilities in Belgrade and drinking water for asylum seekers in the Calais surrounds. Asylum seekers and NGOs face ongoing state-driven harassment and abuse in these localities, and so it is vital to support such determined and agile organisations working in hard environments

- Funding of kids club, school supplies, mobile phones and winter coats for Care4Calais here in the UK. With the backlog so extensive, adults and children are left for months and even years in hotel accommodation. Hotels are not homes. they lack amenities, privacy, cooking facilities and leave people in a limbo which is highly corrosive to their mental health

- Funding of digital equipment for RefuEd to enable them to support teachers in refugee camps in a range of settings around the world. Basic tech allows teachers to educate far larger classes and reach more people seeking to gain vital education when formal teaching is often unavailable to them. 

This is just a snapshot of some of the activities we have been able to support this year, and it is all down to your donations. Thank you for all that you have done this year; donations large and small make a real difference to the lives of displaced people both here and overseas. Merry Christmas! 

We're getting on the Move for Refugees! 

This Refugee week we invite you to join our On the Move for Refugees distance challenge. We want to collectively cover the distance between Marlow and Kyiv in the run up (pun intended!) and during refugee week 2022 (20-26th June). To find out more... https://www.peoplesfundraising.com/fundraising/MRAonthemove

26/03/2022

With the war in Ukraine having entered its second month, we have been assembling resources for our community to use to find reliable information on hosting, donating and supporting the community response to the crisis. We are supporting the Marlow Ukraine Collective Group with their efforts and will continue to provide useful information and updates as the situation progresses. Visit our website to access our Ukraine specific resources: 

https://marlowrefugeeaction.org.uk/information-for-potential-hosts-of-ukrainian-families/