our patrons
lord Dubs
Lord Dubs is a Labour politician and leading refugee rights advocate. He was MP for Battersea 1979-1987, during which time he served for four years as a shadow Home Office Minister.
After leaving the Commons in 1987, he became the Director of the Refugee Council and was appointed as a Labour life peer in 1994.
In 1997, after Labour’s election victory, he was appointed as a Minister in Northern Ireland where he served until the establishment of a new devolved administration following the Good Friday Agreement.
In 2016, he sponsored an amendment (which later became known as the “Dubs Amendment”) to the Immigration Act 2016, to offer some unaccompanied refugee children stranded in camps in Europe safe passage to Britain, having himself arrived in Britain in 1939 as a six-year-old refugee fleeing the Nazis in Czechoslovakia.
He currently serves on the British Irish Parliamentary Assembly and on the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe Parliamentary Assembly. He continues to campaign on human rights and specifically on behalf of refugees.
GAVIN ESLER
A journalist, author and broadcaster, Mr Esler is best known as the long-time anchor of the BBC’s Newsnight (2003-14). Before that, he was the BBC’s chief correspondent in North America (1990-98), and has also worked on Dateline London and other BBC programmes.
Mr Esler is the author of five novels and four works of non-fiction, including Britain is Better Than This (2023). He has won a Royal Television Society Award and a Sony Gold.
Mr Esler is a BAFTA member and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. He is an alumni of the University of Kent, and was awarded an honorary MA in 1995 and an Honorary Doctor of Civil Law in 2005. He is a former UKC Chancellor.
BARONESS NEUBERGER
Photo by Guillermo and Lucy Tomasino
Rabbi Baroness Julia Neuberger DBE is Chair of University College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and Chair of Whittington Health NHS Trust. She was Senior Rabbi of the West London Synagogue from 2011 until March 2020 and is now Rabbi Emerita.
She is a cross bench Peer in the House of Lords, former Chief Executive of the King’s Fund from 1997 to 2004, and won a Harkness Fellowship to study healthcare ethics at Harvard University (1991-2).
Baroness Neuberger is a founding Trustee of the Walter and Liesel Schwab Charitable trust, set up in memory of her parents. She was a Trustee of the Van Leer Group Foundation and Chairman of the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute. She chaired the Review of the Liverpool Care Pathway for Dying Patients in 2013 and was Vice Chair, Mental Health Act Independent Review 2017-2018.
She is also a member of the Executive Board, Leo Baeck Institute London and she is a Trustee of the Rayne Foundation, she was also Chair of Independent Age and a Commissioner of the UK Commission on Bereavement. She a Commissioner on the Integration of Refugees, a Trustee of Yad Hanadiv (Charitable Foundation) and Chair of the City of London Oversight Committee. Baroness Neuberger is Public Voice Representative, on the Jewish Community’s BRCA Testing Programme.
Baroness Neuberger is an author and broadcaster. Her latest book on antisemitism What it is. What it isn’t. Why it matters (Orion Books) was published in May 2019. She is currently working on a book on pain and how we approach pain relief.
Studio Lenca (also known as Jose Campos) is a contemporary artist from El Salvador, now based in Margate, Kent. His work is shaped by his own experience as a young refugee and explores themes of migration, belonging and memory.
Before working full-time as an artist, Jose was a teacher in South East London for 10 years. This background continues to inform his practice, which often involves collaboration with groups and individuals who have lived experience of displacement.
Jose’s work has been shown internationally, with recent commissions including MoMA PS1 in New York and Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid. He is currently based at TKE Studios, founded by Tracey Emin.
Jose first began working with young people from KRAN in 2021 through Arts Education Exchange in Margate. Since then, his relationship with KRAN has grown through a shared commitment to creativity, education and supporting young people with refugee and asylum-seeking backgrounds.
STUDIO LENCA
Our funders
GRANTS (January-December 2024)
AB Charitable Trust
AB Charitable Trust - Solidarity Fund
Bennelong Foundation
Charities Aid Foundation Keystone Fund
Children In Need
Choose Love
Colyer Fergusson Charitable Trust
Cummins
Cycling Uk
Esmee Fairbairn Foundation
French Huguenot Church of London Charitable Trust
Garfield Weston Foundation
John Swire 1989 Charitable Trust
Kent Community Foundation
Kent County Council
Lloyds Bank Foundation
People United
Philip and Connie Phillips Foundation
Postcode Community Trust - Millionaire Street Grant Fund
Saga Group Limited
The Albert Burns Children's Trust Fund
The Bell Educational Trust
The Changing Lives Fund
The Civic Power Fund
The Hardy Family Foundation
The National Community Lottery
The National Lottery Heritage Fund
The Tolkien Trust
The Tudor Trust
Trinity College London Arts Award
University of Kent Student Philanthropy Fund
DONATIONS (January-December 2024)
Airbnb Social Impact Program
Ashford & Folkestone Quaker Meeting
Bedgebury Foundation
Canterbury Cathedral
Canterbury Christ Church Student Union
Deal Film Club
Edward Vinson 1957 Charitable Settlement
Faversham & Villages Refugee Solidarity Group
French Walloon Church Canterbury
Hampstead Fine Arts College
Herne CE Junior School
Ipswich Sangha
Missions Committee United Church Crowborough
Monkton Nature Reserve
Refugee Action
Saga Group Limited
Simon Langton Girls Grammar School
St Dunstan with Holy Cross PCC, Canterbury
St Martin & St Paul PCC, Canterbury
Studio Lenca
The Junior King’s School
USA Pastors Group
Youth Access
LEARNING FOR LIFE
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Canterbury regular partners
University of Kent
Canterbury College
Canterbury Christ Church University
Kent Police
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Trips/Talks Partners
NHS
Kent Fire Service
Natural England
Canterbury Library
Canterbury Cathedral
Dover Castle
ADVOCACY AND SUPPORT
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Activity Partners
Rising Sun
The Gulbenkian
Kent Cricket Community Trust
People United
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Other KEY PARTNERS
Diocese of Canterbury
Cummins
UK Trauma Council
Imix
Refugee Action
Refugee Council ‘My VIew’
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Case work
KCC Social Services
Refugee Council
British Red Cross
Refugees at home
Room for Refugees
Kent Law Clinic
Migrant Law Project
NLS Solicitors
RKB Law

