UK policy allows refugees who have been separated from their loved ones to sponsor their immediate family to join them in safety without the need to take perilous journeys to be reunited, but this system is failing the families who rely on it. There is a huge backlog of undecided cases and several large gaps in family reunion policy that mean some separated families are left without any feasible option to safely reunite.

In this joint report with Safe Passage International, we highlight the key gaps in family reunion policy that are keeping refugee families apart. These include:

• Children outside the UK being unable to join their non-parent adult relatives in the UK
• Separated refugee children in the UK not having the right to bring their parents or siblings
• Resettled Afghans who were evacuated to the UK not having access to family reunion
• Ukrainians who came to the UK on bespoke refugee schemes being excluded from family reunion

Our report also makes five recommendations that the Government could implement unilaterally to avoid further instances of adults or children with family in the UK risking their lives to reunite.

Download the report: Families belong together: Fixing the UK’s broken family reunion system [PDF]

Read the related news story: Refugee family reunion policy is “broken” and leading to dangerous Channel crossings, warn leading charities