UK Poverty Post

Just one simple act to support Refugee Week

Refugee Week is about promoting and celebrating the contribution of refugees to the UK. It was set up by a small group of charities in 1998 and, in the attempt to address the often vicious stories about refugees that dominated the media at the time, set about organising events and initiatives to celebrate and promote the positive contribution refugees make to the UK. Since then the Week has grown considerably, now consisting of around 450 arts, cultural and educational events that are organised by a whole range of agencies and communities from across the country. The fact that the Week continues to grow and that it is now supported by some of the most prominent charities in the UK, including Oxfam, shows that it remains relevant, important and necessary.

Apart from addressing negative stories in the media, Refugee Week has also tried to promote more diverse representations of refugees, so that we don’t think of them only as victims of circumstances, or as people who have come here to take. Last year, for example, our media approach was based around various quirky stories about an Afghan model, Iranian boxing champion, Bosnian IT businessman and many others. In doing this we tried to highlight that refugees come from very different backgrounds but also that they are mostly well educated, talented and inventive people who continue to contribute to society in a myriad of small and ordinary ways.

Indeed it is this emphasis on small and ordinary things that is the main focus of our work this year. The Simple Acts campaign, which we launched earlier this year, consists of 20 everyday acts that can be done by anyone and that encourage us to learn and do more with refugees. It is based on our belief that if everyone does at least one of these simple actions, such as read a book about exile, watch a movie about refugees, or cook a dish from another country, we can start making a gradual but huge change to the way we see and interact with refugees.

People like Michael Palin, Juliet Stevenson, the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and the writer Chris Cleave have already taken part and joined thousands of other ordinary people from across the UK who are registering their Simple Acts on the website. So far more than 2000 acts have been completed with thousands more due to take place over the next 7 days.

I very much hope that you will find some time to support Refugee Week this year. Just by doing one simple act, like sharing a song or a book, meeting a refugee over a cup of tea, joining in a game of football or even just thinking about what it means to offer refuge to people, we can get much closer to making sure that refugees are an accepted part of our communities, and that they are given a chance to contribute and give something back.

The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Oxfam GB.