Over the summer, the council has taken 80 Albanian young people into its care who arrived unaccompanied and not wishing to claim asylum.
According to the council, the minors “frequently go missing” because they are either seeking work or being trafficked by criminal gangs, CYP Now has learned.
-
Questions on revamped national child asylum transfer scheme
-
Asylum transfer reforms prompt questions over commissioning
The council also says that these young people don't qualify for the government's National Transfer Scheme (NTS) because they are not seeking asylum so cannot be dispersed to other local authorities across England, meaning they remain in the care of Kent.
Sarah Hammond, director of children’s services at Kent County Council (KCC), said: “There has been an unusual and unprecedented number of arrivals from Albania including minors.
“This represents a new problem for Kent because this cohort generally don't want to claim asylum, which means they are not part of the system for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children or the NTS and they are the responsibility of the authority where they arrive.
“The minors frequently go missing from our care and from Home Office hotels because they are not seeking asylum but seeking work or are being trafficked by criminal gangs into modern slavery work.”
At the end of June, 355 unaccompanied children between the ages of 11 and 18 were placed in hotels after arriving in the UK.
A freedom of information request submitted by the Every Child Protected Against Trafficking UK charity found that 45 unaccompanied child asylum seekers went missing from hotels between June last year and the end of March.
Hammond said: “The vast majority of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children from Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and Sub-Saharan Africa arrive here and claim asylum and are under the care of local authorities.
“Reports of missing minors are unlikely to be from this cohort of people but more so from the Albanians or even the Vietnamese, where an element of trafficking is involved.”
She added: “They'll arrive; they'll come into our care very temporarily and despite everything we do - because we can't lock them in - they'll be missing usually within 24 hours. And that’s because they have been trafficked into the UK, and the traffickers will be moving them onwards to a final destination where they will be put to work.”
The Refugee Council said that they know from their direct work with Albanian refugees that many have been trafficked and are victims of criminal and sexual exploitation.
On two occasions - in 2020 and 2021 - KKC was forced to stop accepting lone migrant children arriving at Dover because it was unable to “safely” care for increasing numbers of new arrivals.
This year, 1,400 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children came through Kent’s care, before being transferred onto another local authority through the NTS.
And in the past month, Kent’s permanent cohort of unaccompanied children has increased by 103 from 243 to 346 following changes to rules surrounding the scheme which were announced by the Home Office last month.
On top of this, it has 120 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children at any one time housed in its reception centres and female-only semi-independent supported accommodation.
Hammond said: “We’re a large authority and we believe that we have an important part to play in this national problem but we urge our other local authority colleagues, despite the difficult circumstances we are all in, to play their part.”
