At Whose Cost? Vulnerable Female Migrants with No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) during the COVID-19 Crisis in England

This chapter focuses on the impact of the COVID-19 health crisis on vulnerable female migrants with No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) in England. First introduced in Section 115 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999, the NRPF policy prevents migrants with leave to remain from accessing most state-funded benefits. The UK Home Office's ‘hostile environment’ policies built upon the NPRF policy were created to problematise life for migrants in the UK. This resulted in a growing number of migrants and their families being driven into precarity and poverty with charitable organisations often being their sole means of support. Since its inception, the NRPF policy has attracted a growing number of criticisms, which peaked during the COVID-19 crisis and resulted in two high-profile court cases successfully challenging its lawfulness. Focusing on the gendered impact of the NRPF policy in the context of the COVID-19 crisis, this chapter explores the pervasive ramifications of this policy in vulnerable female migrants’ lives including an increased risk of poverty, homelessness, illegal work, degradation in physical and mental health, and vulnerability to exploitation and violence. Locating the policy in its wider context of existence within the nexus of migration, race, and gender subordination, this chapter argues that the NRPF policy entraps female migrants into interlocking systems and structures of oppression and violence, reinforced, but also made more apparent by the pandemic.