‘Refugees should be treated with care’: readers say why they donated £1.3m to charity appeal | Refugees

The Guardian and Observer 2023 charity appeal has so far raised more than £1.3m for refugee and asylum seeker charities, with more than 11,500 readers donating. The appeal is supporting three charities: Refugee Councils of Britain, Refugees at Home and the No Accommodation Network (Naccom). Here, with just hours to go before the appeal closessix readers tell us why they were inspired to give.

‘We came as refugees and now have rich connections to the UK’

Hamza, 27, London

“My family came to the UK as refugees from Afghanistan in 1991 with my three older siblings and I was born in London in 1996. We heavily relied on charity and government support, from our social housing, medical care, charity advice on settling into this country to English language lessons. My only opportunity to visit a theatre up to the age of 18 came from a free school trip.

“My siblings and I have grown up to build successful careers and rich, fulfilling connections to this country. We would never have had this chance if it wasn’t for all the help we received along the way. My sympathy for refugees doesn’t just come from our experience, but it’s my hope that we can help people find their footing and maybe one day when they’re in a better place, they can have the chance to pay it forward.”

‘Helping refugees helps our country – it’s a win-win’

Helene Grygar, 80, Oxfordshire

“If we help refugees, they will help the country as in the case of the Syrian doctor reported in the Guardian [who was training in Glasgow when he realised he could not return to Syria and was supported by the Refugee Council]. I was very touched by the story of how he went on to do wonderful things. It’s a win-win situation, and why we need to give more international aid too. “Helping refugees helps our country, the economy and health system. We need all the help we can get – there’s not much from our government. Supporting refugees to contribute might help to stop the feeling against refugees, which is quite prevalent.”

‘My mother came to the UK on the Kindertransport’

Petra Regent, 66, Bristol

“My mother, Karola Hanna Regent (née Zurndorfer), came to the UK as a child refugee from Germany in 1939 on the Kindertransport. She died in December aged 97, but all her life she gave to refugee charities and I continue this tradition in her memory. She felt very strongly that as a refugee, she had benefited from generosity, kindness and compassion.

“She and my father both supported Palestinian refugees, because her father always told her to remember fairness to those who are in minorities, and that there was a lesson to be learned from her experience as a Jew leaving Nazi Germany.”

‘People have moved around for ever’

Jeremy Burke, 72, London

“People have moved around for ever. Britain had waves of immigrants for thousands of years, including the royal family. Refugees escaping terrible conditions ought to be supported and treated with care, and not blamed for the housing shortage, crime and social and economic problems.

“This year the Guardian and Observer appeal seemed to address an immediate issue. As I think [refugees and asylum seekers] need some basic help and support, and I am completely against the approach of the current government, this seemed like a good cause.”

‘We need to share prosperity as a nation’

Sally Campbell, 82, Isle of Arran

“As a nation, we need to share prosperity with all those who need help, be it in housing, emotional care and friendship. I have been saddened by our government’s cruelty in recent years to the poor and refugees. I am old enough to remember, postwar, when the nation promised decent homes, decent education, decent healthcare, and decent social services. When did we become so self-satisfied and entitled to be selfish and unwelcoming?”

‘Most of us have humanity in buckets’

Colin Hoskins, 66, central Derbyshire

“I’m not sure I’ve ever seen basic humanity as universally lacking as it is now. We need to demonstrate to those in power that actually most of us have it in buckets. The people I meet as I go about my everyday life seem to me, in the main, to be kind, generous, empathetic. Somehow though, the people who represent us in government, and the people who mouth off on social media, seem to have lost that.

“When people are put into boxes – as ‘illegal migrants’, ‘refugees’, ‘asylum-seekers’ – our leaders see only the boxes, not the people in them. There’s a huge disconnect between how people in power want to treat people suffering adversity and how most of us would treat them if we encountered them in everyday life.”