If you’d like to give a warm welcome to the next person moving into a room in a Boaz house, £30 could provide a new set of bedding and towels 🧡 Give today at boaztrust.org.uk/give

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Another new room ready for someone to move into! 🔑 Grateful to be able to offer spaces of safety, privacy and recovery for people who have experienced the realities of homelessness, as well as the hostile environment here in the UK.

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"People who have been displaced due to conflict or persecution often have very little when they move into a property. This funding has helped people we support to feel comfortable and in control of their new space, as well as sustain successful tenancies."

"The Home Starter Kit funding from the B&Q Foundation has been brilliant. It has enabled us to buy cleaning kits and other essential items to help people with refugee status who have experienced homelessness to find a safe, clean place to live – usually a room in shared housing."

A room with furniture, a rug, lamp and a double bed.

A big thank you to Neighbourly and the B&Q Foundation for a recent grant from their new Home Starter Kit programme! 🧡 Our Head of Support Services, Katie, shared about the impact this funding is having for people we work with ⬇️

So, in May 2026, community and faith groups, plus charities big and small, are coming together to celebrate and inspire ‘A Million Acts of Hope’ across Britain. Keep an eye on our social accounts or sign up to our news email (boaztrust.org.uk/stayintouch) to see how you can get involved! 🧡

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But the reality is millions of people across the UK show up for each other, their neighbours and their communities every single day. Acts of hope and kindness happen all the time. But these everyday stories too often go untold.

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✨ 13th - 20th May: A Million Acts of Hope ✨

Watching the news or looking at your social media feed, it’s easy to believe that the UK is more divided than ever. The voices of those who seek to spread hate and division are loud.

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Earned settlement: retrospective change is wrong but prospective change is even worse Changing the rules for migrants already here is wrong and unfair but only affects a finite group of people. Extending default settlement to 10 years or more for everyone is a social policy disaster.

Grateful for this piece by Colin Yeo, which shines a light on the impact that prospective changes to the qualifying period for settlement will have on individuals, but also how it will shape integration outcomes in the UK for decades to come ⬇️

wewantedworkers.substack.com/p/earned-set...

Ministers working with Labour backbenchers to temper Mahmood immigration plans Exclusive: Starmer urged to go further with exemptions if he wants to avoid widespread anger from his own MPs

The Government's cruel changes to settlement rules
will tear families apart and push people into years of fear and uncertainty.

Opposition is growing from MPs and the public alike.

The Government must listen and stop these harmful plans now.

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

Charity Commission Closes Case Against City of Sanctuary UK: No Wrongdoing - City of Sanctuary UK City of Sanctuary UK, a national charity that has spent the last twenty years building welcome, support and opportunity for people seeking sanctuary, has been fully cleared by the Charity Commission f...

Huge congratulations to @cityofsanctuaryuk.bsky.social for withstanding a torrent of toxic misinformation about their work, and getting this positive result following unfounded complaints to the Charity Commission: cityofsanctuary.org/2026/04/07/c...

Thank you so much to the supporters who donated some essential food items for people we work with recently! 🧡

This Easter, could you help us provide and find safe places to stay for people who’ve fled war and persecution? 🧡 Give a gift today at boaztrust.org.uk/give

*Name changed

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The significance of safe housing, and its interconnectedness with other areas of life, can never be overstated. As Halima* told us: “it’s linked to everything else.”

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“For me, the biggest change was having my space, you know, a space where you can sit, relax, think. And it gave me time to focus my energy on getting employment. I moved in in August and by November, I had full time employment. That was the biggest change.” - Halima*

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It was brilliant to be at the NACCOM conference this week. As a member, we so value the work of the network & the strength of relationships forged through it. It was a reminder that we are together in this, as passionate individuals & organisations, determined to stay hopeful & create change 🧡

If you’d like to support this work financially, you can make a donation at boaztrust.org.uk/give. Your generosity could mean someone doesn’t have to spend another night on the street 🧡

These are people who didn't have anywhere to stay, some of whom would have been sleeping outside.

In the majority of cases, people moved into private rented accommodation, but a small number accessed Home Office or other charity accommodation.

We do this through our housing provision, but also through our expanding outreach support work (this includes the Restricted Eligibility Support Service & the Refugee Homelessness Prevention Project). In February we supported 33 people to find safe accommodation through our outreach support work.

Our Housing Officer has been busy getting new rooms ready for people to move into over the past couple of weeks! 🏡

Being able to offer people experiencing destitution a safe, stable place to stay is at the heart of our work at Boaz.

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⏰ There’s still time to apply to become our new Housing Access Training & Development Officer! 😊 You can find all the information about how to apply at boaztrust.org.uk/jobs ✨

The deadline is 9am on Thursday 2nd April 2026, so make sure to get your application in before then ⌛

From Manchester to Westminster: a journey of voices and hope Proposals to conditions under which immigrants can settle here mean uncertainty and hardship for many, we asked MPs to reconsider

Excellent article by one of the Greater Manchester campaigners we travelled down to London alongside for the mass lobby a couple of weeks ago ⬇️

northwestbylines.co.uk/politics/fro...

We celebrated #InternationalWomensDay at our latest wellbeing session, recognising the strength women show in their daily lives. The theme for 2026 was ‘when we give, we gain.’ 💜

Encouraged to see that the Government is considering changes to their 'earned settlement' proposals as a result of pressure from MPs who are communicating the devastating impact these plans would have on their constituents. This really highlights the value of advocacy and MP engagement work.

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Starmer mulls compromise on migration reforms after backlash from MPs Former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner branded the plans “un-British” in a speech on Tuesday night.

“We cannot have a system where the child of a banker gets settlement after three years and the child of a care worker gets it after 15.” - Tony Vaughan MP

www.politico.eu/article/keir...

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This time last week, over 500 people marched to Parliament and met with over 100 MPs about the Government's devastating proposed changes to settlement.

And we're not stopping here. It's vital we keep up the pressure. Sign the open letter to the Home Secretary.

act.praxis.org.uk/open-letter-...

That fear is a direct result of these policy signals. When people are too frightened to use the safety net, something has gone very wrong.

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The earned settlement plans are making people too scared to claim what they're entitled to. We worked with someone who had just been granted refugee status and facing homelessness because they were afraid that claiming Universal Credit would be held against them for years to come.

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Rayner: government ‘cannot just go through the motions in the face of decline’ Former deputy prime minister says Labour’s immigration changes are un-British and Starmer must respond to fall in party’s popularity

Angela Rayner is right that moving the goalposts on indefinite leave to remain is deeply unfair. Policy that creates precarity doesn't produce integration; it produces destitution.

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www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

No to ‘earned settlement’ | Mass Lobby of Parliament

📣 Read our write-up of last Wednesday's mass lobby here 🔗 www.boaztrust.org.uk/articles/no-...