Advancing Rights and Equality
We believe in equality, and that everyone should have their rights and dignity protected. Through public campaigning and advocacy, research and engagement, as well as direct support and advice to people on their rights, we help our communities stand in our power.
We push for systems change through our campaigns and advocacy, as well as knowledge production and sharing that empowers people most affected by systemic injustice. We also empower individuals to know and assert their rights through direct individual advocacy.
Our areas of advocacy and campaigning include:
Migrants Rights
ESEA Migrants Alliance
Together with ESA Scotland and Kanlungan, we built the ESEA Migrants Alliance to join forces as a platform that empowers migrants from East and Southeast Asia to enforce and raise awareness about labour rights and contribute to the wider campaign for racial justice through a series of community co-learning and campaign design.
Enabling ESEA Community Resilience
Enabling ESEA Community Resilience was a 3-year project to provide support, resources and opportunities to vulnerable ESEA communities and individuals from diverse backgrounds. With Bahay Kubo Housing Association and Kanlungan, we addressed crucial issues related to employment, housing and mental health, with the ultimate goal of building adaptable and resilient ESEA communities capable of overcoming future challenges.
Visa Fees Campaign
Together with people directly affected by extortionate visa costs and long settlement routes, we are advocating for a fairer and more just system, as part of a coalition led by Migrant Voice. Recent fee increases from October 2023, and a 66% increase to the Immigration Health Surcharge from February 2024, mean each person could now pay £3,635 every 2.5 years. There have since been more policy plans to extend the time before someone can settle in the UK, prolonging this period of precarity. The costs aren't just financial - many people suffer mental and physical health problems, with some sacrificing food and utilities to save for visas. Join the campaign for a fairer system.
Status Now 4 All
SEEAC is a signatory and reference group member of the Status Now 4 All campaign, calling for regularisation of people with insecure immigration status. We believe everyone deserves access to food, housing, health care and decent living, but people who are undocumented are forced into destitution simply because they don’t have the right papers. By giving people the legal right to stay, we can lift thousands of people, families and children out of poverty and ensure they can thrive like everyone else.
Racial Justice
CATCH: A community response to hate and discrimination
We stand firmly against racism and all forms of discrimination, but know too well how our communities often face hate, harassment, and violence. As part of the CATCH network of organisations supporting people facing hate and discrimination, we support anyone from East and Southeast Asian communities who have experienced racial discrimination, harassment or abuse. You can learn more and access this support here
Workers Rights
Agriculture and Care Workers
SEEAC, in collaboration with Focus on Labour and Employment (FLEX) and academic researchers, have conducted extensive field research and co-published research reports on migrant agriculture and care workers:
UK Agriculture and Care Visas: Worker Exploitation and Obstacles to Redress
Bound to work: Improving access to redress on the UK’s Seasonal Worker Scheme
Not Here for the Weather: Ensuring Safe and Fair Conditions on the Uk’s Seasonal Worker Scheme
>> You can read more of our research reports here.
Modern Slavery
SEEAC was invited to facilitate a new research project on labour exploitation conducted by the Modern Slavery Policy and Evidence Centre (MSPEC) at the University of Oxford with domestic, care and hospitality workers in our communities. The study of the nature and causes of labour exploitation in high-risk sectors aims to better understand the risks workers face and to evaluate responses to labour exploitation, examining changes in law and policy that can improve protection from exploitation and access to support. We look forward to continue building on the findings and advocacy to strengthen the rights of migrant workers.
Employment Rights Advice
Many migrants are vulnerable to exploitation, especially where immigration status intersects with insecure work. But safe and decent work is essential to our wellbeing and dignity. We support people with understanding their employment rights, guide them on their employment issues, and signpost to legal and specialist support. If you need help with your employment rights, you can get our help here.
Gender-Based Violence
Harmful Practice Knowledge Ambassadors Programme
SEEAC will be joining Barnardo's and the National FGM Centre’s Harmful Practices Knowledge Ambassadors Programme to raise awareness of harmful practices that can cause physical and psychological harm, often rooted in discrimination based on gender, age, or other factors. As part of this programme, we will deliver interactive, community-based workshops that create safe spaces to openly discuss these issues, including with young people and community groups. We focus on sharing clear information about rights, legal protections, and where to access support, while encouraging honest conversations that challenge harmful norms in a culturally sensitive and practical way.
Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women
SEEAC is a member of the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women (GAATW), an alliance of more than 80 non-governmental organisations from Africa, Asia, Europe, LAC and North America with its Secretariat based in Thailand. The collaboration was established in early 2020 in a consortium research project From Southeast Asia to Europe: Strengthening Migrant and Trafficked Women’s Rights to Inclusive Re/Integration and continues until today in Voice and Participation of Impacted Communities in Processes of Change. The connection has since afforded us a generous space for knowledge exchange and collective actions on issues related to trafficking, forced labour, migration, sex work, and human rights. We also published a report with support from GAATW. Beyond this project, SEEAC continues to use FPAR to document and address our communities’ experiences.
Climate Resilience and
the Just Transition
London Resilience Equalities Partnership
We are a member of the London Resilience Equalities Partnership to ensure community representation and involvement in London’s emergency response. Coordinated by Protection Approaches, we advocate for East and Southeast Asian communities’ experiences and expertise to be integrated into community resilience and emergency response design, making sure that equality and justice are at the heart of the city’s resilience.
Just and Caring Transition
We are embarking on a new community project and participatory research and design to centre the experiences of migrant women in responses to the climate crisis. With marginalised groups most affected by climate shifts, we believe women and disenfranchised groups should be leading the just transition. The new programme, developed in collaboration with the Just and Caring Transition team of researchers, will engage Southeast Asian women in creatively designing their own involvement with the just transition, with the hope to scale up the approach for wider systemic change.