 British children sleeping on night buses or in storage units. An asylum seeker or torture survivor required to pay upfront for medical treatment. These are just some consequences of the hostile environment. We first heard about creating a really hostile environment for illegal immigrants in 2012 from then Home Secretary Theresa May. We want to ensure that only legal migrants have access to the labour market, health services, housing bank accounts and driving licences. And this is not just about making the UK a more hostile place for illegal migrants. It is also about fairness. Prior to that immigration checks were performed mainly by government officers. Now public servants and private citizens including doctors and landlords are required to perform immigration checks on people trying to access services. Even the DVLA and banks are required to perform similar checks. Landlords can be fined to up to £3,000 per adult and sentenced to up to five years in prison. The powers of immigration officers have also been increased. They can now enter licence premises without a warrant to check people's right to work. And inter-recently, EU nationals who were found sleeping rough were detained or removed. The High Court found this policy unlawful in December 2017. When Theresa May said she wanted to create a hostile environment for illegal immigrants, she was in fact referring to undocumented migrants, a general term used to describe people who do not have permission to stay or to enter the UK. There are many reasons why an individual might be undocumented including lack of legal representation, changing their circumstances or simply delays in the processing of the immigration application. There can be survivors of torture or human trafficking. They could even have been born and grown up here. The objective of the government is to prevent undocumented migrants from accessing basic things they need to live a normal life in the UK, such as healthcare, making it unbearable for them to live here. They also want to deter migrants from coming to the UK in the first place. These policies, besides being inhuman, are in practice affecting all migrants, including EU nationals, refugees, asylum seekers and children, not just undocumented children as claimed, but indeed British children too. As part of the changes, the Home Office has now far more powers to access data from other departments, such as the NHS Digital and the Department of Education. Since autumn 2017, the government has pushed to charge migrants for medical treatment, a health surcharge on immigration applications of £150 per year for students and £200 per year for any other visa has been introduced. These figures will soon double. The NHS is also now sharing some patient information with the Home Office, leaving for instance victims of domestic violence, afraid to approach hospital or the GP for treatment, pregnant women avoiding antinatal care and migrants charged tens of thousands of pounds for cancer treatments. One of the worst problems I see in my work is the impact of hostile environment on destitute families. Under the Children Act, local authorities must protect the welfare of children in need in the area and a child in need should receive assistance which can include housing and financial support. Families who cannot access public funds due to their immigration status often need this help. In some London boroughs, immigration officers have been working within children and young people's services and as a result, even street homeless families are afraid to approach their local council to receive the support they may be entitled to. Since the introduction of these policies, reports of discrimination and racism are rising. Migrants and advocates fear that a door has been opened by the government to publicly consider them as certain class citizens. The impact on children is significant and most of these policies are disproportionately affecting single women of minority groups. Campaigners and lawyers have also been critical of what appears to be a lower level of data protection for migrants. Many groups are mobilising to challenge these policies. They are, amongst others, Migrants Rights Network, Doctors of the World, Migrants Organised, MEDAC and NELMA and the ABC School Campaign. Locally, organisations such as Project 17 and Carries Haringey have been actively advocating to reduce destitution. Local residents, including migrants, have raised a voice too. In Haringey, a new campaign, Haringey Welcome, has been launched to promote dignity and respect for all. A welcoming environment is the best response to hostility. This is something we should all be involved in creating and should all be a part of.