Thirty Years of Positive Action in Housing

Thirty years ago, this charity was founded on a simple belief: that every human life has equal value.

In 1995, with just three staff members, we helped 148 people from ethnic-minority communities facing housing problems like overcrowding and extortionate rents.

Today we have a staff team of 23, and in the past year alone supported over 4,000 families and individuals from refugee and immigrant backgrounds. Ninety-eight percent of our service users live with poverty, debt, food or energy insecurity. Many face homelessness and eviction linked to their immigration status. And for thirty years, we’ve stood with people whose human rights are under attack. We could not just keep doing this work if we did not ask who or what is making people so vulnerable.

In 2001, when asylum seekers were forcibly dispersed into Glasgow’s void housing, we exposed the mistreatment at Red Road flats. In 2002, when destitute Iraqi asylum seekers arrived at our doors, we refused to send them back into the streets. We took people into our own homes, and that act of solidarity grew into a national network.

In 2003, we campaigned against long-term detention. And in 2005, when dawn raids were tearing children from their beds, we went out before sunrise with Church of Scotland ministers and even Conservative MSPs to hold candles at the gates of the Home Office. Protesters blocked the exits to stop the vans leaving. That action generated headlines, forced a public reckoning, and ended the practice of dawn raids in Scotland. I would argue it also helped set the stage for the Kenmure Street Protest in 2022, which reached the world.

By 2015, during the Syrian refugee crisis, over 9,000 people across the UK signed up to our Room for Refugees programme. The idea went viral. We wrote to Theresa May asking her to support the scheme — she never replied. But when the war in Ukraine broke out in 2022, the UK government launched the Homes for Ukraine programme, and the Scottish Government turned to us to understand how our hosting model worked.

We spoke out against mass evictions in 2018 and exposed the overcrowding of asylum seekers in hotels during lockdown in 2020. For 25 years, the UK government has forbidden asylum seekers to work. Imagine how many billions in taxes Scotland could have raised if people were allowed to stand on their own two feet, instead of being warehoused at the public’s expense while private contractors profited.

We supported Afghans in 2021. We fought for Ukrainians in 2022 and sheltered hundreds of families and individuals through Room for Refugees.

And today, in 2025, we stand with Palestinians — helping families reunite and supporting students fleeing the ongoing atrocities in Gaza, which leading human rights bodies have described as genocidal. In the words of Hajo Meyer, a Holocaust survivor: “I know what it means to be dehumanised. And I see the same process happening to Palestinians.”

We are living through a dangerous narrative: that migrants are to blame for housing shortages, NHS waiting lists, poverty. In May this year, the UK government under Prime Minister Keir Starmer launched its immigration White Paper warning of an “island of strangers.” But Britain’s economy runs on migrant labour. One in five jobs — 5.75 million roles — are held by migrants. They are the backbone of the NHS, care, hospitality, transport, farming, construction. Without them, the country would stall.

This isn’t scaremongering. It’s fact. Migrants aren’t taking jobs — they’re doing the work others refuse because the pay is low, the shifts brutal, the conditions degrading. Immigration isn’t the problem. It’s what keeps this country functioning.

We’re told to fear it — not by accident, but by design. Successive governments have chosen to under-fund key services, creating crises for which migrants are then scapegoated.

What makes this charity different is that we do not stay quiet. We speak out. Because if we don’t, we’ve normalised atrocities and the abuse of human rights. We organise. We bring civic society with us. And we will keep building support for people who deserve nothing less than dignity and safety.

Our trustees and staff reflect the diversity of those we serve. Global crises like those in Afghanistan, Ukraine, or Gaza directly affect our service users, and we refuse to remain silent in the face of humanitarian atrocities. Despite immense challenges, our commitment to equality and human dignity remains firm. I thank our trustees, staff, volunteers, and supporters for their dedication. Your unwavering support ensures we continue to be a lifeline for those in need.

Our work isn’t charity — it’s solidarity. And in the dark, divisive times ahead, we’ll need it more than ever.