Causeway Coast and Glens to welcome multiple refugees through Homes for Ukraine scheme

Multiple visas have been issued for Ukrainian refugees to stay with Causeway Coast and Glens residents, new figures show.

The Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme, also known as Homes for Ukraine, was announced in February by the UK Government, allowing citizens to volunteer to house refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine.

Sponsors agree to offer accommodation for at least six months, with those receiving sponsorship allowed to live, work and study in the UK for up to three years.

Provisional data from the Home Office and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities shows that fewer than five visas had been issued for refugees staying with hosts based in Causeway Coast and Glens as of Wednesday (April 6).

Figures for areas with fewer than five successful applications have been suppressed for data disclosure reasons.

They were among the 12,500 sponsorship visas issued nationally by Thursday (April 7), though just 1,200 refugees – less than 10% – had arrived in the UK through the scheme by April 5 – the latest point at which data on arrivals is available.

The Home Office and DLUHC cautioned that a very small number of visas issued across the UK had no postcode linked to them, while the data is likely to include some duplicate records and therefore may not be an exact record of the number of people with visas.