This activity report describes the activities the Citizens Rights Project have carried out over the period from June 2020 to December 2021. A major part of those activities has been our programme of support for EU citizens to obtain settled status with funding from the Scottish Government and the Home Office. In this document, we also include information about our pilot Rights Centre in Edinburgh, funded by the National Lottery Community Fund and our collaborations in All Our Rights in Law and Settled.
Due to the pandemic, most of our work and activities for the four programmes have been carried out online, with a limited number of exceptions of face-to-face support when restrictions allowed it, or when providing help online was not an option. In those cases, risk and health and safety assessments, procedures and measures have been put in place to safeguard our staff, volunteers, clients, and any other person who was part of it.
We were able to develop these activities thanks to a committed team of 7 members of staff (two full time and 5 part time) and 51 volunteers, 45 of which are OISC Level 1 (limited to the EUSS) advisers, who worked incredibly hard to make sure our services reached as many citizens as possible, to avoid leaving any one behind. Our close cooperation with other organisations providing EUSS support, local authorities, consulates, third sector organisations and grassroots and community organisations from different areas of Scotland, but also UK-wide, has also been key to the success of our programmes.