‘It is an opportunity to learn. You learn that there are different truths. If you grow up and are confined in one community, your worldviews are framed by that community only. However, if you meet people from other backgrounds, you can learn about different perspectives. You learn a lot about yourself…'
This is what Berhane* told us during a focus group held at a community centre in the Harehills area of Leeds.
Berhane, originally from Eritrea, now considers the city of Leeds his home. He, among 70 other participants across Yorkshire and Humber, took part in IPPR's research that aims to understand how people who choose the Yorkshire and Humber region as their home can be supported to connect with others. Our findings highlight that people across the region – regardless of their immigration status – strongly desired getting to know their neighbours and communities better.
Understanding the causes of social isolation and loneliness is an important and timely topic. According to the Office of National Statistics, the number of people who say they ‘feel lonely often or always' has increased from five per cent to over seven per cent since the pandemic. This translates to over a million more people experiencing loneliness since the pandemic.
But migrant communities distinctively experience multiple and interlocking barriers to fostering meaningful connections. Some might be separated from family members and lack the time, energy, confidence, and resources to get involved in events and activities. Others we spoke to also expressed feeling overwhelmed with their concerns about housing, welfare, and the immigration system.
Place-based barriers can also play a role. For example, unaffordable, infrequent, and inaccessible public transport means some struggle to get to essential appointments, let alone community events or community spaces. These issues – compounded with experiencing or having a fear of experiencing racism, adjusting to an unfamiliar space, and managing the stresses of navigating the UK's complex immigration system – can all overshadow a person's opportunity, or desire, to connect with others within their community.
We identified several actions that could be taken locally by policymakers and practitioners to foster connections. For example, participants spoke about the need for more opportunities to meet, for accessible public spaces and for affordable public transport. They also spoke of having better access to jobs to build confidence, self-esteem, and economic stability.
There are many great examples of how people are trying to tackle these issues from the bottom up. In Hull, people break bread at the Hull Food Partnership, where the city has hosted free community feasts and attendees are encouraged to enjoy a meal with a stranger. In Bradford, the Millside centre's refugee café provides catering skills training to refugees and asylum seekers, while allowing them to connect with community members and share a part of their culture through the food they serve. And in South Yorkshire, community projects like ‘Who is Your Neighbour' facilitate conversations where community members can honestly express their experiences and worries of change within their neighbourhoods and find ways for meaningful dialogue to alleviate their anxieties.
These initiatives merely scratch the surface of the important work councils and community organisations are doing across Yorkshire to bring people together. These efforts to reduce social isolation and loneliness are not just ‘nice to have' – they are foundational to building stronger communities that may face adversities during a time of hardship. The UK is currently in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis. Councils face even more cuts to public services, straining their ability to offer support to migrant communities. Meanwhile, shortfalls in our under-resourced and inefficient asylum processes leaves many people stuck within the UK immigration system for long periods of time. These wider problems exacerbate the loneliness and isolation that refugees and asylum seekers face.
But connected communities, where everyone feels welcome, can do better. Much is possible: they can respond to adversities better, can defuse conflict and tension, and can be the best place to support and sustain well-being. Tackling social isolation and loneliness by building resilient communities has always been important, but as the cost-of-living crisis bites it is a necessity now more than ever.
Berhane is a pseudonym*
Amreen Qureshi is a Research Fellow at IPPR North
@AmreenQureshi_
