Description

The Asylum Seeker Project (ASP) works with asylum seekers who are lawfully awaiting an outcome on their refugee or humanitarian protection claim, but who face destitution without community support.

ASP provides housing, professional and volunteer support, monthly cash relief, help with utilities bills, and other emergency help.

These children, women and men have been the poorest of the poor in Australia. No other group has been so barred from income. Many have been denied the right to work and have had no access to welfare payments and Medicare. Most ASP clients are in the latter stages of the application review process, so they have no access to Red Cross coordinated support schemes sometimes available in earlier stages. Most have suffered physical and/or emotional trauma in their home countries, and combinations of homelessness, ill-health, isolation and mental illness in Australia. Some have endured periods of detention.

Website

Hotham Mission Asylum Seeker Project

State

Victoria

Social Category

International/Indigenous/Refugees