Last month the Scottish Government committed to funding the Scottish Guardianship Service for the next three years. This was fantastic news as it secured the position of a service which, we firmly believe has benefited unaccompanied children across Scotland, so it is worth looking again at what has made this service a success.
In 2009, when Scottish Refugee Council and the Aberlour Child Care Trust first set out the case for a Scottish Guardianship Service, our guiding ethos was that we wanted to ‘make the unaccompanied, accompanied’. We wanted to give those children who arrive in Scotland alone, often still reeling from the effects of their trauma, someone to fight their corner and to guide them along the complex and arduous asylum process. When Aileen Campbell MSP said she wanted Scotland to be the best place in the world for a child to grow up, we wanted them to know that they were included.
Priorities
We wanted guardianship to focus on the three priorities that would allow this to happen: independence, continuity and focusing on the needs of the child.
The independence of guardians has been crucial in allowing them to be a meaningful point of contact for unaccompanied children. Since the guardians are not social workers or teachers, since they are not balancing the interests of the child against targets or quotas; they are able to fully and uncompromisingly fight the child’s corner. Standing outside of other institutions means that they are free to be a thorn in those institutions’ sides when it suits the interests of their particular child.
Point of contact
Furthermore, the continuity that guardians are able to provide is something whose value is hard to overstate. Many unaccompanied children arrive in Scotland without knowing whether this is their final destination, often without even knowing where they are. In this context building up any kind of normality is crucial. Guardians stay with their child throughout the process of seeking asylum, providing a constant point of contact where almost everything else from accommodation to healthcare can be in flux. Lastly, it is in that constant flux that guardians can arguably be most valuable; seeking to understand and argue for what each individual child really wants.
Reclaim childhood
In the end what this means is that for many, the Scottish Guardianship Service is a way to reclaim childhood. The guardians are developing a community around retreats and fortnightly clubs. Among the 102 children who have had guardians so far, we have 17 nationalities and 26 languages but their shared experience of being an unaccompanied asylum seeker binds them together. It is a safe space where unaccompanied children can meet each other and realise that they are not alone in what they are going through.
