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How to Find help during the crisis of the COVID-19
This is a toolkit with information about how to find support during the crisis of the COVID-19.
The document provides helpful resources. Keep in mind that most of the information is focused in Toronto. We are trying to keep the resources up-to-date as possible
Ontario Coalition of Service Providers contact list
The Coalition includes refugee houses and agencies who work with vulnerable populations across Southern Ontario and 2 in the United States
To read the contact list click here 
The coalition meets every 2 months to share information and resources; identify and communicate operational needs; and to raise public awareness of refugee issues.
When calling legal aid, please make sure that you have the following details available.
To read the Questionaire please click here
BREAKING BARRIERS: Services and Resources for undocumented Torontonians and precarious migrants
The intention of this tool kit is to share information with people with precarious status about access to services, what are the possibilities to regularize their immigration status, and what are their rights.
R.P.D. PREPARATION & REPRESENTATION GUIDELINES
The following guidelines provide steps that can be taken by refugee houses/NGO staff to assist refugee claimants in preparing for and representing themselves at the Refugee Protection Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board when legal representation cannot be secured due to recent legal aid funding cuts.
To read the guidelines click here
The following guidelines provide steps that can be taken by refugee houses/NGO staff to assist refugee claimants in submitting an appeal to the Refugee Appeal Division at the Immigration and Refugee Board when legal representation cannot be secured due to recent legal aid funding cuts.
To read the guidelines click here
FCJ Refugee Centre reports on the experience of Refugee Claimants and other precarious migrants navigating the housing system.
Displaced persons and precarious migrants are particularly vulnerable to a range of other human rights violations that can then impact their right to housing. They are particularly vulnerable to discrimination, racism and xenophobia, which can further interfere with their ability to secure sustainable and adequate living conditions. People who have been forcibly displaced will often have suffered trauma during their journey, and will have lost familiar coping strategies and support mechanisms. Often unable in practice or because of their legal status to rent adequate accommodation, many are forced to live in overcrowded and insecure conditions. These challenges are compounded by Toronto’s ongoing housing crisis, which is a long-standing problem.
Many of our clients facing this situation came to FCJ Refugee Centre looking for support. This report shares our findings on the challenges that refugee claimants and precarious migrants face in finding a place to stay in the city, whether that is a temporary shelter or more permanent housing through the rental market. We are grateful to those who shared their stories with us. We wanted to bring attention to these issues as these vulnerabilities are not given the due attention they deserve, either in the media or in government policies. To read the report click here
Humanitarian and Compassionate Application Document Gathering :
From Youth To You
This is a toolkit for a growing need for youth, and particularly newcomer and precarious migrant youth, to feel more valued and included in various services that they access in the City of Toronto.
This is a resource that prioritize newcomer youth voices in fostering promising practices and addressing the less visible challenges faced by diverse newcomer youth populations.
The toolkit also outlines the FCJ Youth Network’s current model of youth-engagement and youth leadership. Through this tool we want to encourage other newcomer youth serving organizations to duplicate this model to have more community-centered youth-engagement policies and practices.We are incredibly grateful for all of the support we received over the course of this project and know that we couldn’t have done it without the generous support of the Laidlaw Foundation, our allies and community partners.
Uprooted Education: 2016 Ontario Report
The Uprooted Education 2016 Ontario Report t is the result of a project undertaken by members of the FCJ Youth Network to explore how the unique trajectories and social locations of migrant youth with precarious immigration status intersect with access to, and involvement in, Ontario high schools. The report attempts to detail these experiences through five salient themes, and offer insight into promising practices and possibilities to ignite change.
We would like to especially thank the Laidlaw Foundation for their support, as well as the many organizations and individuals that lent their voices to this project.
We consider this report to be an organic document, and hope that it is valuable in not only raising awareness of this issue in Ontario, but laying further groundwork for its continued exploration across Canada. As such, this project has been inspired and influenced by many others, and hope that it will continue to be improved upon and made relevant to other institutions, organizations and areas of work.
Integrated Model of Refugee Protection and Integration
Exclusionary Changes in the Conservative Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Policies: The Beginning of the End
Workshop / Presentations
Tool Kit: Undeserved Communities Research
(This tool-kit was made possible by the generosity of UNIFOR The Union)
- VICTIMS AND SURVIVORS OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING
- NON-STATUS POPULATIONS
- LGBTQ+ MIGRATION POPULATION
- UNACCOMPANIED MINORS
- WOMEN AND PEOPLE FLEEING GENDER RELATED PERSECUTION
Presentations: Undeserved Communities Research
(These presentations were made possible by the generosity of UNIFOR The Union)
- VICTIMS AND SURVIVORS OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING
- NON-STATUS POPULATIONS
- LGBTQ+ MIGRATION POPULATION
- UNACCOMPANIED MINORS
- WOMEN AND PEOPLE FLEEING GENDER RELATED PERSECUTION
Refugee Changes and Refugee Claim Applications
Roundtable series: Building Collaboration to Combat Human Trafficking in the City of Toronto.
Presentations October 28-29 2013
Building Collaboration and An Overview on the Human Trafficking Iniciative
Human Trafficking Forum on Forced Labour, April 2013
Presentations:
- Forced Labour – Urban Context
- International Legal Perspectives on Human Trafficking
- IOM – labour trafficking – international perspective
- Migrant worker rights and rural labour settings
- Manufacturing Vulnerability
- Temporary Resident Permits
- The situation of forced labour trafficking internationally and the work of the ILO
Syrian Refugees in Bulgaria: A Double Edged Sword: Report
Syrian Refugees in Bulgaria: A Double Edged Sword, a report prepared by FCJ Refugee Centre after a delegation from Canadian Council for Refugees visit Bulgaria in June 2014. This visit had variety of goals including better understand the complex situation of Syrian asylum-seekers and refugees in Bulgaria. This understanding was facilitated by interviews with key stakeholders including state agencies, NGOs, Syrian refugees, as well as visits to immigration reception centers in Bulgaria. A short video was also produced to reproduce parts of the conducted interviews and comments gathered during the visit.
Summary Report from the Forum: Human Trafficking for Forced Labour: Report on HTForum
The Forum on Human Trafficking for Forced Labour: Raising Awareness and Building Response was organized by the FCJ Refugee Centre and was made possible with the financial support of the Department of Justice Canada, and took place during the National Victims of Crime Awareness Week 2013: We All Have a Role. The forum was focused on persons trafficked internationally for the purposes of forced labour, the programs that increase people’s vulnerabilities to this crime, and the barriers to services and protection for these populations. Approximately 100 participants took part in the event, mostly from Toronto and the GTA.
Request for action and recommendations. Check the document here: Request for Action
The FCJ Refugee Centre presented a request for action, suggesting policies for protection and services tailored to the needs of internationally trafficked persons. The request for action was debated among the participants who provided input and also developed their own recommendations.
Fund Legal Aid Ontario
Open Letter from the Coalition of Service Providers for Refugee Claimants in Southern Ontario calling on Federal and Provincial governments to fully fund Legal Aid Ontario’s immigration and refugee services
How to provide support clients detained under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act
This document has 2 sections: the first section is an explanation of what happens at the Toronto Immigration Holding Centre. The second section describes how a refugee house or any other agency can become a community-based alternative to detention. The FCJ Refugee Centre has been supporting detainees at the Immigration Holding Centre through the TORONTO REFUGEE AFFAIRS COUNCIL (TRAC) for more than a decade. Through this experience the Centre is trying to identify how the refugee houses at the Coalition of Service Providers, or any other agency, can provide a better support to this population.
The guide provides a quick overview of the release process for detained immigrants at the Toronto Immigration Holding Centre (TIHC). Our goal is to increase awareness among service providers and the wider population about issues of detention. We hope this guide is a helpful tool on procedures and promising practices to best support detainees in their transitioning process to independent living.
To read the document click here
Housing Needs of Precarious populations Guide
The Housing Needs of Precarious populations Guide addresses the barriers, priorities, promising practices and gaps in terms of accessing housing for precarious migrants. The document highlights existing limitations of the settlement programs that exacerbate the vulnerability of those populations to homelessness.
To read the document click here
The Precarious Migrant Protection and Support Program Resources
Human trafficking survivors led initiative
As part of the 2016 Victims and Survivors of Crime Week “The Power of Our Voices”, FCJ Refugee Centre in partnership with East Metro Youth Services embarked on a project to provide a safe space for survivors of human trafficking to voice their opinion on services and protection available and a lack thereof. The initiative was funded by the Department of Justice Canada. Such project was long overdue as survivors are left out of the conversations and decision-making pertaining to accessing services and solutions to combat trafficking in persons. The ultimate goal of the project is to lay the foundation of survivor led and designed toolkit for service providers outlining promising practices and accurate support.
To Read the Summary report click here
The Inland Regularization Class
As part of our 25th Anniversary Celebration, the FCJ Refugee Centre is proposing a program aimed at providing a new avenue for regularization for many migrant populations that find themselves in various states of immigration status limbo, including legacy claimants. We anticipate that this proposed program could impact more than 360,000 residents of Canada – a group that represents 1% of the “censused” population. This program involves the development of a new immigration class through which individuals will be assessed on various criteria surrounding their time in Canada, including their involvement in different institutions and community groups, economic integration, as well as social and familial ties. This new class will fill the gaps in existing legislation whereby refugee claimants are unable to submit an application for permanent residency on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, despite having set roots, and becoming well-established in Canada.
Take a look at the complete document: Click here
Audit Report Access T.O. Initiative
