Our management committee member Laura Gibbons will partake in a cross-continental swim next month!

Fundraising for Right to Remain’s work, the 4.5km distance makes this an exciting, but extremely difficult, mental and physical challenge.

Laura has decided to swim from Europe to Asia! The plan is to swim the Dardanelles, a cross-continental swim across the strait between Europe and Asia in the West of Turkey. It is one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world, but on the 30th August 2018, the strait will be closed for a few hours to allow the swim to take place.

Laura says she is fundraising for us because:

Right to Remain is a UK-based human rights organisation with only three full-time and one part-time member of staff. But that doesn’t stop them from having a huge impact across the UK. They have worked hard to prepare invaluable, accessible materials to assist people to navigate the extremely difficult and hostile immigration and asylum system and are always travelling up and down the country working with other organisations and community groups, raising awareness and providing training. Some of you may have heard of the current campaign “These walls must fall” working to raise awareness and bring an end to the inhumane practice of indefinite detention in the UK (it not please check it out – http://detention.org.uk/) .

She is aiming to raise £500 and has reached 40% of her target. Help here today.

Laura completed a Masters in Human Rights at the London School of Economics and worked with refugees and asylum seekers in the charity sector. Laura then decided to move into the legal sector and qualified as a Solicitor. She currently works for a legal aid firm based in Manchester working in Public and Housing Law where she assists unaccompanied asylum-seeking children in age dispute cases and in securing accommodation and support from the local authority, families with no recourse to public funds in accessing housing and support and refugees and asylum seekers in accessing suitable accommodation and support from the Home Office or local authority as appropriate. She is also an active member of voluntary organisations in the area short-term holding facility based at Manchester Airport.