We offer help to refugees and asylum seekers in four key ways
The All Saints Drop-in
We run a “Drop-In” for asylum seekers in Portsmouth. This operates once a week between 10am and 1pm on a Thursday, where people can have access to various professional services without charge or appointment.
Tea, coffee, fruit and sandwiches are available free of charge while people socialise with their friends.
The Drop In is supported by partner services, like Citizens Advice Portsmouth, who can offer free legal advice and Portsmouth Central Library who attend once a month
Tea, coffee, fruit and sandwiches are available free of charge while people socialise with their friends.
The Drop In is supported by partner services, like Citizens Advice Portsmouth, who can offer free legal advice and Portsmouth Central Library who attend once a month
All Saints Drop In supported by Citizens Advice Portsmouth.
Access to Justice
Through our Access to Justice project we provide free advice on immigration law, one of only two organisations in the city that does so. Our Access to Justice office is now at the University of Portsmouth with whom the project is a collaboration. You can read more about it at the link below.
Click here to read more about the Access to Justice Project.
Click here to read more about the Access to Justice Project.
Destitution fund
We run a destitution fund to help destitute asylum-seekers that we meet in the community. Asylum seekers receive at best 70% of the official British benefits and some don’t receive anything at all. They are rarely allowed to work. In some cases asylum seekers are homeless and without any financial means to support themselves. The destitution fund ensures that those most vulnerable asylum seekers can access support and meet their basic needs.
Awareness raising
Consciousness-raising in the wider community is part of our remit:
- Meetings are held in a large number of local churches.
- Lectures are given at local colleges.
- Articles are published in the local press and a number of MPs are lobbied about specific cases.
Our history
The Visitors Group was founded in 1994 and became a registered a charity in January 2000. Although many members were originally from churches, the organisation itself is secular and there are now visitors from all backgrounds.
We changed our name to Friends Without Borders in 2014 to reflect the variety of the work we do and opened a new project Access to Justice to offer high quality legal advice to our clients. In April 2015, Haslar Immigration and Removal Centre closed and we re-focused our efforts on our two remaining projects.
We changed our name to Friends Without Borders in 2014 to reflect the variety of the work we do and opened a new project Access to Justice to offer high quality legal advice to our clients. In April 2015, Haslar Immigration and Removal Centre closed and we re-focused our efforts on our two remaining projects.
Friends Without Borders, All Saints Centre, Commercial Road, Portsmouth, PO1 4BT, Phone: 07546502143
Our registered charity number is: 1194005
Our registered charity number is: 1194005
