The voluntary job which changed my life

Since I retired I’ve had the luxury of spending time on a voluntary job which has changed my life.

I started working with the refugee charity Care4Calais in France, then during Covid I found myself back in the UK. It was here I started supporting a Kurdish refugee who was having a rough time. The Home Office had decided he was an adult but he was only 17 years old. Age is a very difficult thing to prove and being thrown into an adult situation can be overwhelming for a 17 year old. I knew this was wrong, so I helped him to find a lawyer and go through the tortuous process of claiming asylum. It took a year, but we got his claim heard – and at last his asylum was granted.

It gave me a good feeling to have accomplished something meaningful, and this led me to sign up with the Care4Calais Legal Access team. The team helps refugees sort out their paperwork, find solicitors, and deal with the asylum system which can be intimidating and complex. We also provide emotional support. I’ve been doing it for two years now and have never looked back.

Aidan Pettitt

I’ve seen over 200 refugees and have many active cases. You have to be organised, and you need to enjoy solving problems. Being determined is helpful too. I do believe I make a difference, and as a team we make a massive difference to the disadvantaged people who end up on our shores. It’s important to me that I do something that changes how Britain engages with the world.

That idea of helping others has been important to me for a long time. I’ve been in education most of my life, as a teacher, and then working for the Department for Education. As a civil servant I retired early, but I still wanted to do something back in the classroom with real learners. So I started teaching English to refugees, and as I got to know my learners I discovered most of them were victims of war, people seeking only to rebuild their lives among us.

I’ve been to Calais numerous times and met with people living in appalling conditions – an experience which never leaves you. With the Access Team I feel like I’m continuing the process started in Calais; helping the same people I used to give dry shoes and coats to.

There have been difficult times when people are rejected, made destitute, and are overwhelmed by an incomprehensible system. The people we help have experienced real trauma and have left everything dear to them behind. To see how they are treated here frustrates me. So I do this work as my commitment to how the world ought to be.

If you’d like to get involved with the Care4Calais Access Team, please email [email protected] and we’ll get you started.