Opening Doors

Up to June 2009, CIH worked with hact (Housing Associations’ Charitable Trust) in a project called ‘Opening Doors’, which was funded by the Housing Corporation and CLG. The project addressed the housing needs of refugees and other new migrants. It involved partnership working with eleven housing associations in six different areas of England.

Opening Doors produced a range of material which should be useful to any housing organisation wanting to expand its services to refugees and new migrants. Included below are:

The Opening Doors evaluation report
The Opening Doors Toolkit
An extract from the report which specifically covers Action Learning Sets
Details of new housing provided by three OD partners and of the ‘Refugee Futures’ scheme in Nottingham
UCAN Drive, details of a driving course for migrants/refugees in Bolton
Focus group on migrant housing needs in Bolton
A set of training modules on refugee and new migrant housing issues
St Vincent’s HA training portfolio which is based on the main modules
A literature review of national, regional and local policy reports on new migration, especially migration from the EU member states.

In addition, through Opening Doors CIH and hact created a website giving clear advice on the housing entitlements of different types of migrant – www.housing-rights.info