
Following a successful legal challenge, the government amended the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO), bringing all non-asylum immigration and citizenship matters for separated children back into the scope of legal aid in October 2019. This followed years of campaigning by charities and others, but the impact of the change relies on those working with these children understanding the implications and taking action.
Immigration legal aid is now available to all children under 18, including those whose age has been disputed by children’s services, who are not being cared for by a parent or by a person with parental responsibility for them or who are looked after as defined by section 22 of the Children Act 1989. This includes, for example, unaccompanied children who are in care or receiving section 20 support from a local authority. It also covers children who are in kinship care, those in private fostering arrangements, children who have been reunited with family members under Dublin III transfers, and other informal arrangements, including “where a child is caring for themselves”.
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