Wellbeing – a series of blogs
1. Wellbeing in the workplace – Kate Gant, volunteer.
The link between employment and wellbeing is well documented: work can provide an important way for people to find a sense of purpose, meaning and fulfilment in life as well as to achieve financial security. Employment can thus play a role in helping refugees to rebuild their lives in the UK and to integrate into their local communities.
Over the past six years, volunteers from Malvern Welcomes have supported a number of refugee families who have resettled in Malvern through the Government’s Community Sponsorship Scheme and through other schemes coordinated by the County Council and refugee agencies. Those who arrive under these schemes are given Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) and have a full right to work in the UK in any job, at any skill level and for any employer without restrictions.
As people settle in Malvern and become proficient in English, they naturally seek to use their existing skills and qualifications to find employment and to support their families. There is an electrician, a tiler, a chef, a lawyer, teachers and people who have worked in security as translators. Other family members have had to leave university before completing their degrees or never had an opportunity to gain employment after completing their degree.
Regardless of their enthusiasm now and their work history in their home country, people have found it very difficult to gain permanent work in Malvern and surrounding areas. Initially this may have been because of language barriers and levels of understanding of work-based English. An important aspect of our work in Malvern Welcomes is to provide English teaching and also to assist individuals in their studies for work-based qualifications such as Health and Safety. It is to their credit that some are now working in suitable jobs having reached the necessary level of English and passed the required tests. However, for others, despite working hard to develop their spoken and written skills and to overcome communication barriers, finding steady and appropriate employment remains challenging.
People often say that they feel that they have been overlooked for jobs, and applications are rejected. In some cases, this is because professional qualifications and work experience from their home countries are not recognised in the UK. Pressure from the Job Centre often means that people feel under pressure to take any job going, rather than investing time in getting UK-accredited qualifications. They find themselves forced to start in lower-paid, lower-skilled work, regardless of previous experience. In turn, this can result in low self-esteem and contribute to low levels of confidence.
The UK job market can be extremely competitive, particularly in sectors with low wages or high demand. If family members do get lower skilled or manual work, they tend to be offered hourly contracts with little job security. This transient work makes it even harder for people to feel as if they are part of a team. Upskilling is a difficult proposition in the context of irregular shift patterns and sudden requests for work. This, combined with challenging economic times for businesses, can mean people have no, or sporadic, work.
Volunteers from Malvern Welcomes have been supporting people to find work in many different ways. These include developing CVs to include the valuable skills and personal qualities that they bring from their home countries and from the situations they have faced. These skills include resilience, creativity and problem solving. We support people by finding job leads, preparing for interviews and navigating the UK job market.
We have suggested to several people that volunteering is an excellent way to gain work experience. Although this might not be something done in their home country, many have been willing to do this and have enthusiastically volunteered with the Malvern Cube, a toddler group, a primary school, the Malvern Hills Repair Cafe and local Charity Shops. Volunteering can also be a way to network with potential employers but this approach to finding work takes time and can be very frustrating.
The challenges which resettled people face in finding suitable employment are observed by Welcome groups throughout the UK and are not exclusive to the Malvern area. We are very aware that people with refugee status who have the right to work need more help to integrate into the workplace. Additionally, we have found that poor and unreliable public transport can be a serious challenge when getting a job. It is not unusual for people to have to get the first train from Malvern to Worcester or Droitwich to make sure they are in time to start an early shift. To help with this, Malvern Welcomes have supported family members to pass their UK driving tests, thus giving them the possibility of becoming more independent once they are able to buy a car so that they can travel to more rural locations for work.
There are now several aspirational young people whom we are especially keen to support as they move into Further and Higher Education and look to start a career. To further this, we are exploring the development of a Malvern Welcomes volunteer mentoring scheme which would link up family members with local community members or business leaders who have specific knowledge of the type of work in which they are interested. We are particularly interested in recruiting volunteers with experiences of practical trades, the retail sector, and health and social care.
Kate Gant, volunteer
