Solsticewitch13's BOS: How 'child' migrants are straining the care system - and British children are paying the price

Thursday, October 20, 2016

Published: 00:50 GMT, 20 October 2016 | Updated: 11:42 GMT, 20 October 2016

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Some time ago, I was sitting at a table with ten foster parents in West London. I had been told such parents were in short supply, so it was with shock that I learned that nine of them were not looking after vulnerable British youngsters — but unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

There was a further, even more disturbing, revelation. Three of these children were not children at all. They were adult men posing as boys. The foster parents seemed to take the situation for granted, even joking drily about it.

Some admitted they found it awkward having a young man in the house who was probably 25 but claiming to be 17. But they had no proof and the authorities did not seem interested. ‘We just have to put up with the situation,’ sighed one.

Three young migrants who arrived in Britain from France yesterday

Their stories seemed especially pertinent this week when I saw those pictures of ‘child’ migrants arriving at the immigration registration centre in Croydon, fresh off a coach from the Calais Jungle. They had all claimed to be under 18, yet most looked considerably older, with facial hair, muscular physiques and an adult look to their faces.

Yet to some people working in the care system to whom I spoke, their appearance came as no surprise.

Yesterday, I talked to a worker in a residential home in Kent for children in care. Speaking on condition of anonymity, she told me that half of the children in care there are unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

And it goes without saying that places in these homes are precious and much in demand. Yet she told me that in her estimation more than half the migrants are not children at all, but in their 20s.

‘They can be quite frightening at times,’ she said. ‘They are aggressive and have an attitude problem. Many have no respect for women because of their culture.

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