The Homes for Ukraine Scheme Homes for Ukraine – Homes for Ukraine – Local Sponsorship Scheme for Ukraine (campaign.gov.uk) was launched on Monday 14 March to allow individuals, charities, community groups and businesses in the UK to bring Ukrainians to safety – including those with no family ties to the UK.

What happens next

Once a Sponsor is matched with a Ukraine citizen or family, and a visa application has been submitted to the Home Office, your details are downloaded by Suffolk County Council via the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) portal daily, Monday to Friday. This information is usually received by Suffolk County Council within 1-2 working days of the visa application being submitted.

Suffolk County Council aims to call each sponsor within 2 working days of being made aware that the visa application has been applied for, to gather information which feeds into the initial accommodation and Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks that are undertaken in parallel with the Home Office considering the visa application.
 
The visa process, accommodation and DBS checks are not done in any specific order, but they must all be completed. Sometimes Visas will be issued before other checks are completed.

We are working our way through our list of Sponsors. If you have not already heard from us, we will be in touch soon. Please bear with us as we work through this process.

Government guidance advises that guests who arrive via the Homes for Ukraine scheme are eligible for a one-off payment of £200.00 per person. Sponsors are also eligible for a monthly payment of £350.00.

As part of the initial contact with Sponsors, Suffolk County Council will be asking if Sponsors will be wishing to claim the £350.00 and if so, will request bank details from the host. Payments are made monthly in arrears.

We are currently establishing the process to enable us to make the £200.00 payment to guests arriving via the Homes for Ukraine scheme. Please bear with us as we develop this new system. We will share more information as it becomes available.  
 
How to access support

We are conscious of the plight of Ukrainian refugees and want to do all we can to ensure that their arrival into Suffolk goes as smoothly as possible. To assist with this, we hope that most hosts will be able to support refugees to register with a GP and apply for school places, however we recognise some people will need some additional support and we are putting networks in place for this, which includes support for sponsors, refugees and community groups.

We will be getting in touch with all sponsors about how you can get involved in due course.

We are considering how best to meet Ukrainian guests’ health and wellbeing needs and how we can offer support to help with integration and ESOL (English for speakers of other languages), particularly if there are lots of people arriving in dispersed, rural locations.
 
About the Homes for Ukraine Scheme:

• There will be no limit on the number of Ukrainian refugees who can come to the UK for up to three years
• Refugees will be able to work, claim benefits, and access health and education provisions
• The portal for host households to offer accommodation either in their own homes or separate properties is now live and can be accessed at Homes for Ukraine: register your interest – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
• Arrivals will be split into two waves, with the first being host households who have already linked in with Ukrainian refugees and will submit a joint application, and the second consisting of refugees who have been matched to host households by charities and community groups
• Host households must commit to offering accommodation for a minimum of six months and will be entitled to claim £350 per month as a ‘thank you payment’ for up to one year
• Safeguarding checks will need to be carried out on adults in the host households
• Any accommodation offered will be assessed for suitability
• Once a host household stops accommodating the refugees, there will be an expectation for local authorities to help the refugees find alternative accommodation

Further information, and Frequently Asked Questions about what we are doing in Suffolk to support Ukrainian Refugees and how you can help, can be found at: www.suffolk.gov.uk/SupportingRefugees

Please check this webpage first. If you cannot find answers to your questions here, please emailrefugeesupport@suffolk.gov.uk and we will endeavour to respond as soon as possible.