Mapping the Boundaries of Support Provision: A Cross-Sector Analysis of Frontline Workers’ Experience Supporting Insecure-Migrant Women Affected By Border Harms and Gendered Violence in Post-Brexit Britain

This paper will present the preliminary findings of a doctoral research project on the intersection of harm to migrants and violence against women following Brexit, drawing on qualitative insights from practitioners working with women with insecure migration status. Victim-survivors of violence with insecure migration status, predominantly women, are largely excluded from access to mainstream support and protection. Dramatic changes to the national immigration and asylum regime coming into force after 2020 have exacerbated exclusionary support mechanisms for non-citizens with temporary status in England and Wales. These legislative changes created new structural insecurities in an immigration system characterised by classed, gendered, and racialised mobility inequalities. However, the practical implications for the heterogenous group of insecure migrant women accessing vital support services post-Brexit remain largely unknown to date. This analysis of expert interviews with a range of practitioners from both the migrant support and the domestic abuse sectors aims to address this gap. Using contemporary grounded theory methodology, I will map the perspectives of frontline workers on navigating socio-legal barriers in contexts of harm and violence against insecure migrant women in both two sectors. In doing so, I will explore some of the situational effects of an emerging post-Brexit hostile environment on practices of help-seeking and support provision, as well as strategies for mitigating barriers and disadvantages. By combining empirical findings with theoretical concepts from the sociology of Brexit, feminist victimology, border zemiology, and critical migration studies, this research will contribute to the emerging field of sociology of violence. Preliminary findings will shed light on how bordering practices and violence against women interventions interfere with the post-Brexit immigration regime. Consequently, this study seeks to contribute to the sociological understanding of bordering mechanisms within support provision with a critical focus on the translation of national policy into local practice.