Coventry Refugee Centre is making an urgent appeal for donations to help work with asylum seekers staying in the city.

Baby equipment, particularly pushchairs are desperately needed to help refugees lead a normal life.

The centre was opened at St Peter’s Social Centre in Charles Street, Hillfields last month to provide a drop-in point for asylum seekers.

The aim is to give them a place where they can meet other people from the same country, and also get advice and support.

The main concerns of people visiting the centre are isolation, housing problems and finding solicitors.

Many asylum seekers living in Coventry are moved to the city from parts of London where there is no space to accommodate refugees.

Coventry Refugee Centre was founded to try and provide day-to-day contact for these people, who are in the care of social services departments in the capital and get very little help from the authorities with any day-to-day care.

Penny Walker from the centre said volunteers had been seeing an increasing number of asylum seekers asking for help since it opened its doors.

She said:

“Pushchairs are in very high demand because refugee mothers with babies and young children find it difficult to venture outside the house alone.

“Many are now being housed a long way from the centre and with no cash for bus fares it is very difficult for them.

“Refugee women who are without their husbands, especially, find it almost impossible to go out shopping for daily necessities if they have small children. "

The centre also accepts donations of clothes, shoes, bedding, household equipment, and toys for redistribution to asylum seekers.