Migrants and Mental Health Disability All-Day Conference

Migrants and Mental Health Disability All-Day In-Person Conference

Asylum-seekers, refugees and other migrants with mental health disabilities face particular challenges accessing their rights and entitlements, particularly where they lack the mental capacity to navigate the social welfare and immigration systems responsible for ensuring the protection of their human rights. Barriers to services have particularly acute consequences for migrants who need to regularise their immigration status, without which they are placed at risk of immigration enforcement action and the impact of the ‘hostile environment’ denying them access to essential services and support.

Through this conference we aim to encourage collaboration, networking and knowledge-sharing between professionals working in the UK’s migrant and disability rights fields, in order to share practical approaches in advocating on behalf of migrants with mental health disabilities across these practice disciplines. The conference also seeks to reflect on strategies for promoting rights-based and responsive services, better able to accommodate the needs of migrants with mental disabilities, in accordance with domestic equality duties and the UK’s obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

This all-day conference is organised by Doughty Street Chambers and Migrants Organise and will be relevant to legal professionals practising in immigration, community care and the Court of Protection, as well as local authority and clinical colleagues more broadly.

Panels and workshops will include:

• Facilitating effective multi-agency coordination
• Identifying immigration issues within health and social care
• Supporting migrants detained under the Mental Health Act 1983 and on discharge
• Using the Court of Protection as an immigration practitioner
• Practical migration issues in the Court of Protection: capacity and best interests
• Mental capacity in the First-tier Tribunal and Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chambers)
• Immigration applications for Discretionary Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR)
• Advancing trauma-informed and client-centred practice

We are delighted to be joined by, Emeritus Professor of Mental Health and Cultural Diversity at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience King’s College London, and a well-known authority on cross-cultural psychiatry and migrant mental health among other specialisms, who will provide our keynote address.

Other confirmed expert speakers will include:

• A senior representative of the Home Office
• , Honorary Medical and Research Director, Helen Bamber Foundation and Royal College of Psychiatrists’ lead on Refugee and Asylum Mental Health
• Dr Piyal Sen, Consultant forensic psychiatrist and medical director at Elysium Healthcare and Honorary Professor at Brunel University, Milton Keynes
• Fran Busby, Clinical Service Lead, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (SLAM)
• , Head of Policy and Research, British Association of Social Workers (BASW)
• , Legal Officer, Migrants Organise
• , Barrister, 36 Group
• , Barrister, Doughty Street Chambers
• , Barrister, Doughty Street Chambers
• , Barrister, Doughty Street Chambers

Details of further speakers and the full programme will be published on this page in due course.

Register now to secure your spot!

As part of our commitment to accessibility, we will offer Zoom attendance upon request to those who cannot attend in person. If you require online attendance, please email [email protected] with a confirmation of your ticket purchase number. Panel and workshop events will not be recorded in order to encourage open discussion and exchange.

Tickets: £25 full price and £15 concession. All proceeds for this conference will be donated to Migrants Organise. Due to limited space, we kindly encourage each organisation to limit ticket purchases for in person attendance to a maximum of two attendees.

Migrants Organise is a registered charity based in London. The charity provides ongoing and holistic support for vulnerable migrants and asylum seekers and combines this with community organising, campaigning and policy, research and legal work to dismantle the hostile environment. It also runs the strategic Migrants Mental Capacity Advocacy (MMCA) project, which is the only specialist project in the country which provides support for migrants who have issues with their mental capacity to engage in the immigration process.

Host or Publisher Doughty Street Chambers