City of Sanctuary is a movement to build a culture of hospitality for people seeking sanctuary in the UK. Our goal is to create a network of towns and cities throughout the country which are proud to be places of safety for people seeking sanctuary and helping them integrate into their local communities. The City of Sanctuary movement began in October 2005 in Sheffield. In September 2007, with the
support of the City Council and over 70 local community organisations, Sheffield became the UK’s first ‘City of Sanctuary’ – a city that takes pride in the welcome it offers to people in need of safety. Since then, we have supported the development of over 60 City of Sanctuary initiatives in towns and cities across UK and Ireland. We believe the ‘sanctuary message’ of welcome and inclusion is needed in all spheres of society and as such we are committed to helping schools, universities, health and maternity services, theatres and arts centres, churches and other faith centres, sports, communities, businesses and homes become ‘places of sanctuary’. A key element of these ‘streams of sanctuary’ relationships is awareness raising, telling the true stories of refugees to those who never hear them. We enjoy close partnerships with all the major refugee organisations and we are committed to working with them to build a Sanctuary Alliance, a united voice to advocate for refugees in our nations and worldwide who have no voice of their own. Through creating a national network of Cities of Sanctuary, we aim to demonstrate the desire of people of goodwill throughout the country for a more just and humane approach to people seeking sanctuary in this country. City of Sanctuary Sheffield is funded by charitable trusts, donations and a grant from Sheffield Council for managing the multi-agency drop-in. We have two part time staff and a large team of volunteers, many of whom are asylum seekers and refugees.
£5 could pay a volunteer’s expenses
£12 could buy a weekly bus pass for an asylum seeker volunteer
£20 could go into our destitution fund to enable an asylum seeker to go to Liverpool to submit a fresh claim
£35 could pay for the design of new information leaflets
£100 could contribute to the printing of information leaflets
We would be very grateful for anything you are able to contribute - https://www.givey.com/cityofsanctuarysheffield
