Falmouth lights 200 candles to stand with the 200 refugee children currently missing from government-approved hotels in the UK

The 200 Candles represented the 200 missing refugees the Home Office suggested are “Missing” | Jory Mundy

Organised by Falmouth & Penryn Welcome Refugees who resettle refugee families across Cornwall, over 200 candles were lit in solidarity with refugee families and the child refugees who have been reported “missing” across the country by the Home Office. An October report shows that over 200 refugee children aged 14-17 have gone missing from hotels and other government-approved accommodation. Welcome Refugees has suggested this figure could be outdated, and that we don’t really know how many refugees are currently unaccounted for.

The 200 candles aimed to reflect the 200 children known to be missing, with decorations of children also seen across the Moor. The vigil allowed the community to come together to share their disgust and concern, showing the missing young people that they care about them while raise awareness of the issues refugees face. The event allowed others to bring their own candles to show their respect.

Placards from the Vigil | Jory Mundy

The event comes following scrutiny for the Home Office’s handling of migrants and migrant children once they arrive in the UK. Over 4,000 of these children have been placed in hotels since 2021. A whistle-blower inside the Home Office contractor Mitie, has recently reported to The Observer that they’d witnessed “children being abducted off the street outside the hotel and bundled into cars” in places such as Bridgton with many health and social workers raising concern with the use of hotels, and the treatment of migrants therein. Peter Kyle (Labour MP for Hove) has gone on the say that a hotel in his constituency was only given a “couple of hours notice” that it would be used to house unaccompanied migrant children.

When Lord Simon Murray (member of the House of Lords) was asked “what actions they are taking to safeguard unaccompanied children seeking asylum and preventing them from going missing from hotels?”, he admitted that “200 children remain missing with 88% of these (176) being of Albanian origin”. Groups such as Welcome look to break the stigma around refugees, including negative stereotypes that vilify them as people traffickers, gang members, and criminals. Welcome believes there are many reasons why people flee their countries – honour killings of girls and women, poverty, chronic corruption in government and public services, blood feuds, and increasingly powerful trafficking rings.

The founder of Falmouth and Penryn Welcome Refugee Families, Jude Munden, said “There’s a deliberate strategy to talk negatively about Albanian refugees in particular. Earlier this year, Government representatives have referred to Albanians coming over in terms of an ‘invasion’ and said that Albania is a peaceful and prosperous country, with absolutely no reason to need to leave. Munden, in stating the group’s intention says, “We really wanted to do something to just strip it back and talk about the focus of it which are these youngsters who are going missing, when hosting this vigil.” She went on to say that the government and media have “created a situation which is a really hostile environment for refugees, with a lot of misinformation and racism towards Albanians”.

One individual lighting a candle | Jory Mundy

In Westminster, Lord Simon Murray went on to say that the government hoped to phase out the use of hotels “as soon as we can” but couldn’t commit to an actual date for this to happen by.

“WILL THE HOME OFFICE AGREE TO IMMEDIATELY END THE CONTRACT WITH THIS HOTEL AND MOVE THE CHILDREN OUT TO SAFER ACCOMMODATION? WILL THEY SET UP A PROPER INQUIRY AND TEAM TO PURSUE THE LINK BETWEEN ORGANISED CRIME TRAFFICKING AND THE CHILDREN IN THESE HOTELS? “BECAUSE THIS IS A TOTAL DERELICTION OF DUTY THAT IS PUTTING CHILDREN AT RISK, WE NEED AN URGENT AND SERIOUS ACTION TO CRACK DOWN ON THESE GANGS AND TO KEEP CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE SAFE.”

Yvette Cooper, Shadow Home Secretary to Parliament – January 24th

Two Candles on the Moor | Jory Mundy

When 100 charities wrote to the Prime Minister calling for an independent inquiry into the disappearance of the children—referring to it as “a child protection scandal”—Rishi Sunak commented in Parliament that “The UK has opened up its hearts and homes to hundreds of thousands of people over the last few years: from Syria, from Afghanistan, from Ukraine, from Hong Kong and provided refuge and sanctuary to many children” but that “the reports were concerning with local authorities having a duty to protect all children”, voicing his idea to end the use of hotels to house refugees. In the same debate, Conservative MP (Stoke-on-Trent North) Jonathan Gullis came under fire, as he was overheard heckling “Well, they shouldn’t have come here illegally!” when the Shadow Economic Secretary Tulip Siddiq discussed the missing children report.

It has also emerged that the Home Office was warned repeatedly by police that the vulnerable occupants of the hotel – asylum-seeking children who had recently arrived in the UK without parents or carers would be targeted by criminal networks.

A speaker at the Vigil | Jory Mundy

Speaking to the gathered people were individuals including Rector Bill Stuart-White (from All Saints’, Falmouth), Jo Willis (Director, Shallal) as well as Rezi Whitlock, a young person who is a care leaver, and Lilyan Isaac, an asylum seeker who now has leave to remain in the UK. Jude Munden and Rufus Maurice of Welcome also spoke. All of the speakers spoke of fears for the well-being of the missing young people, and how scared they must be.

After the speeches, a minute’s silence was held on the Moor before a candlelit procession began which led the group towards the Cornish Bank. Falmouth & Penryn Welcome Refugees thanks those who attended and those who showed their support for the refugee community. Board Member of FPWRF, Glyn Winchester, commented to the Anchor saying “I feel as if I was holding a candle to all the refugees and all the asylum seekers who have taken that trip thinking they are going to have good lives. They’ve gone through hell to get here, but it’s not the end of their hell, and I really believe that more people should try to look into what their experiences are and not react to propaganda in the news.”

Falmouth & Penryn Welcome was set up in 2018 by members of the Falmouth Community in response to the global refugee crisis in places such as Syria. They have currently resettled two refugee families in the Falmouth/Penryn thanks to community support and are preparing to welcome a third soon: they are always looking for donations to support the charity (to support the family’s costs of travel, rent and English lessons if needed) as well as volunteers. Members of Welcome also recommended writing to the local MPs to support refugee policies in Parliament, to create safer passages for refugees coming into the UK, encouraging people to have difficult conversations with those who hear these negative narratives in the news to break stereotypes concerning Albanian refugees.

The Moor decorated with paper cut-outs of children | Jory Mundy

The week before the Vigil, students from the JustLoveFal society raised over £2,000 by shaving their heads, which was split between Falmouth & Penryn Welcome Refugees and Truro Community Refugee Support, and you can read our article about the head shave here.

If you’re interested in finding out more about the charity you can visit falmouthandpenrynwelcome.org.