A member of LD4SOS and a local Councillor has asked us to publicise this petition to ensure households housing refugees do not lose the 25% single person discount.

The Government has said that council tax discounts will not be affected if someone sponsors and host a Ukrainian household in their home, but refugees have not been added to the list of people disregarded for the purpose of council tax, so it is not clear how this will be achieved.

We understand that the House of Commons will be debating the House of Lords amendments on 26 and 27 April. There is still a chance that some of the Government inhumane proposals can be defeated as the recent significant setback to the Government in the House of Lords gives us another opportunity to press our MPs to represent their constituents and vote for the priority amendments.

Maternity Action have complied a new report which explores the maternal experiences of pregnant women seeking asylum. Report is available on their website.

Following an excellent campaign by Praxis the Government has announced a permanent extension of free school meals to ALL families affected by No Recourse to Public Funds. Well done Praxis!

In March the majority of MPs voted to reject all of the Lords' amendments to the Nationality & Borders Bill. It returned to the House of Lords this week where, again, the House of Lords defeated the Goverbment and insisted that its key changes where looked at again by the House of Commons. An unusually high number of amendments were voted through (12 out of 13) . In particular the Peers voted to scrap clause 11 which seeks to treat refugees differently based on how they arrive there rather than on their need for protection. Peers also voted to allow asylum seekers to work if their case was not resolved within 6 months, and that the government had to publish how many refugees it will resettle each year . This represents another major win although the revised amendment dropped a specific reference to a number. The amendments will have to go back to the House of Commons where MPs will vote again. Peers have shown that they are going stand up for rights of refugees and the UN Convention; the government has a raft of bills it needs to get through this parliamentary session, and has been pushed firmly onto the backfoot on its response on refugees from Ukraine. The Bill is expected to return to the House of Commons just after Easter and we think the first opportunity for MPs to vote will be 20 April though it could be later or even the following week. We will soon be reaching out to you to press MPs to lobby ministers not to reject the Lords amendments and to respond to public concern for refugees. Together with Refugees will be organising an event at Westminster on 20 April - so keep your eyes open for that.