We were delighted to share the findings of our research project, Care, Inequalities, and Wellbeing in Transnational Families in Europe at two events in the North of England where we had conducted fieldwork – in Leeds (15th November 2024) and Manchester (29th November 2024). City councillors, community leaders, practitioners, community researchers and research participants attended to listen and respond to presentations of the Report findings and watch screenings of the films co-produced by the UK team with transnational families and actors with lived experience of migration and disability.
Leeds
The Leeds event was opened by the Lord Mayor of Leeds, Councillor Abigail Marshall Katung, who highlighted the importance of the research and its relevance to Leeds where a quarter of the population were not born in the UK. She noted the importance of recognising that meanings of ‘family’ may differ among different groups and how the COVID-19 pandemic had exposed long-standing inequalities facing migrants.
Professor Ruth Evans and Dr Rosa Mas Giralt presented the key research findings. Working in collaboration with the project, MESH developed a set of online resources to support English language learning on the theme of ‘Family Challenges’, based on the project film, Young Caregiving in Transnational Families. These resources were introduced to the audience by Angela Palmer and Safina Arif from MESH. The film Addressing Barriers to ESOL Classes was introduced by Ruth Evans and Rosa Mas Giralt, which was followed by responses from key regional policy and practice stakeholders.
Councillor Fiona Venner of Leeds City Council recognised the invisible impacts of caring on women’s and children and young people’s wellbeing, highlighted by the Report, and pointed to the important collaborative partnership work being undertaken in Leeds to support the Third sector and raise awareness of language and intercultural issues. Leeds is proud of being a City of Sanctuary, and the City Council is currently applying to become a Council of Sanctuary. Councillor Venner emphasised that the Council is committed to providing fair access to services for migrant families and to tackling inequalities. She also highlighted the power of the films produced in the project to show the challenges that families face, but also their strength and resilience. Councillor Venner’s comments were followed by responses from staff from two of our project partners – John Zavos from the Migrant English Support Hub (MESH) and Julie Linley of the St Vincent de Paul Society, Leeds, accompanied by two community researchers.
The questions and wider discussion focused on how the film might be used to train service providers to deliver better intercultural awareness. The role of young carers as language brokers was discussed, particularly the concerns around young people interpreting in healthcare situations, whilst acknowledging that there are positive aspects for young people in terms of their skills and pride in supporting their family. The findings and films support new initiatives taking place in Leeds, such as the Manuel Bravo project, Leeds Volunteer Interpreter Sharing Project that aims to build capacity among Third sector organisations in Leeds.
The discussion also highlighted how restrictive family reunification policies infringe children’s and adult family members’ rights to family life. Participants also voiced their concerns about imminent changes to the e-visa system which, due to the increasing requirement to use online platforms, risked further excluding older generations and those who lacked digital literacy skills from essential services – an issue also raised by participants in Manchester.
Manchester
The Report was launched with key regional stakeholders in Manchester on the 29th November. Dr Rosa Mas Giralt and Dr Tony Capstick presented the key research findings. Next, Safina Arif and John Zavos, from MESH, introduced their online learning resources on ‘Family Challenges’ based on the project film, Young Caregiving in Transnational Families.
There was a significant number of ESOL practitioners in the audience, who were very appreciative of the resources and valued the fact that they were free and open access. To continue considering challenges related to language learning, the research team showed the film, Addressing Barriers to ESOL Classes.
Responses were led by our project partners, Sandra Penaloza T.-Rice, Migrant Support and John Zavos, MESH. Sandra emphasised the benefits of the participatory approach adopted by the project, which had provided opportunities for collaborative work and co-production and the meaningful involvement of community researchers and participant families. She highlighted that the issues raised in the project are common among those they support and urged all those present to use the report, briefings, resources and films to raise awareness and help effect change. John focused on the ESOL and language findings, reflecting on how a combination of digital and language barriers affect different generations of transnational families, while also emphasising the value of multilingualism as a social asset. He also stressed the value of the learning resources and films co-produced through the project to make research messages accessible and to help ensure that ESOL learners’ own experiences are acknowledged and recognised in learning materials, which thereby hopefully nurtures their sense of belonging.
The questions and discussion showed a keen interest from attendees and a very positive reception of the diversity of families who participated in the project in relation to migration routes, legal statuses, length of residence, cultural/ethnic background, and other characteristics. Audience members from third sector organisations and local authority services agreed that those arriving via asylum seeking or resettlement routes were likely to face greater challenges. There was also a wider discussion on the current climate in the UK in relation to migration and greater possibilities to perhaps influence specific aspects of family reunification policy for transnational families who have specific care needs. The importance of being able to receive support from family members and appropriate care in these situations was recognised as a priority.
Two further films were shown after the break: Young Caregiving in Transnational Families and Refugee Families Caring and Seeking Reunification. This was followed by a discussion focusing on language and digital barriers. Audience members highlighted that the transition to digitally based application forms and procedures to access social, health and other services was increasing the barriers and inequalities faced by migrants, refugees and asylum seekers and their families. There were also positive responses about the migrants’ use of ‘interlinguistic connections’, where other shared languages are used to establish connections between different ethnic or linguistic groups, and the ways that learning another language (different to the that of mainstream society) may help to establish interlinguistic connections (Russian was mentioned, or other languages). Shared experiences were an important source of commonality and support, even with language barriers. The importance of providing opportunities for children to learn and consolidate their family language were also raised as important for the wellbeing of all generations.
Overall, all the films were very well received, with the young caregiving film inspiring particularly strong reactions. There was agreement that the films should be used to raise awareness and for training with key professionals such as teachers, social workers, healthcare providers.
Further information:
Download the Report and Summary of key findings here.
Watch all the project films on our YouTube Channel: @CAREWELLTransnationalFamilies
Download the MESH ‘Family Challenges’ ESOL Learning Resources for ESOL practitioners
Contact: Dr. Rosa Mas Giralt, University of Leeds. Email: r.masgiralt@leeds.ac.uk.