Merton Ukraine Refugee Hub

At the beginning of March 2022, at a fundraising event for helping refugees from Ukraine organised by the local MP, Siobhain McDonagh, I made a speech. I ended that speech by describing a ‘giant, mighty, humanitarian, human chain – Brits helping British Poles to help Poles in Poland to help refugees from Ukraine’. Ukraine was the front line, Poland was the next line, and we in the UK had to stand shoulder to shoulder with those with contacts in Poland, Romania, Moldova, Hungary and Slovakia as they would bear the brunt of civilians fleeing as a result of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

And bear the brunt they have. We have seen this.

The longer this war goes on, the bigger the strain on the people in the ‘next in line’ countries enumerated above, the more difficult it will be for ordinary people in those countries to carry on helping more and more refugees as they flee over the borders. These are not countries where people are generally well-off, generous as they are, and the last thing we want to see happen next is any up-build of resentment for the newly arrived refugees. If we do not continue to and increase support for our friends and contacts in the ‘next in line’ states (Poland, Romania, Moldova, Hungary, Slovakia) this may become inevitable.

Here, we are focusing on Poland, because that is where we have the on the ground contacts, and that is where the majority of Ukrainians are arriving.

When my colleague Sławek, CEO of Polish Family Association, made his first post-Ukraine-invasion visit to Poland in April this year, he returned visibly shocked. He described people ‘just on the streets with nothing much to do’ and explained how he realised that those refugees who do manage to reach the UK are likely to be those with more stamina, less trauma or more connections – family, friends etc. Many in Poland had had just enough reserves of energy to get themselves over a border – any border – they are not likely to have the energy, the data, the money, the language skills or just the frame of mind to tackle the hurdles that exist to get to the UK. Even with arguably, the most simplified immigration arrangements since the 1970s in place.

And being on the British Isles, islands as they are, must feel a long, long way away from the war. If you have lost everything including your home, and your husband, partner, father, brother is fighting on the front line in Ukraine, it must tear you up inside even to consider moving even further away. Being ‘near in a way’ must be one of the few assurances that you can feel. Even if it is uncomfortable.

And so, the work that we do, that we have been doing, with our contacts in Poland, becomes even more vital. Literally vital: we are saving lives.

Allow me to take you through some of this work and the differences your and our support can make.

Introducing first Łukasz Pawlak and Magdalena Lorenz. They are out and about working their socks off in Poznań and Wielkopolska. If you are not sure where this is, Imagine drawing a line between Berlin and Warsaw and the region of Wielkopolska is roughly in the middle – we are in Western Poland.

Łukasz is by career a logistics and supplies expert. You can probably tell!

• More about Magda in the Polish Association for the Protection of Hedgehogs – „Nasze Jeże” article below.
• Read Łukasz’s description of their group’s mission below.
• Read more about what we’ve done in the articles below.

We want our group to be locally recognised for doing the impossible, for finding everything needed by people who have nothing, with no regard to politics.

We will:

connect families

evacuate animals from the most dangerous regions.

regularly help by supplying muc-needed products on time.

– Łukasz Pawlak