Big Issue meets André Aghasi in Reading’s Biscuit Factory, a local cinema with a cut-price cafe. His 12-year-old daughter Ava diligently translates questions to her parents. This will be the family’s first Christmas together in three years, and they are excited. “Christmas in Reading feels completely different,” Aghasi, who has been here since 2023, says. “The city comes alive with lights.”
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Aghasi fled his hometown of Isfahan after converting from Islam to Christianity, a decision that is punishable by death in theocratic Iran.
He was forced to leave his wife and daughter behind; remembering “those days of fear and uncertainty” is “still painful”.
“My journey began suddenly and under great risk,” Aghasi recalls – but arrival in the UK initially brought little relief. Like so many asylum seekers, he found himself in bureaucratic limbo, living in Home Office accommodation and barred from working.
During that period, he was told he would be moved to the now-shuttered Bibby Stockholm, the controversial asylum barge moored off the coast of Dorset. Aghasi wanted to stay in Reading, where he had joined a church and started volunteering at the city’s Rising Sun Arts Centre, sculpting
and painting. “Around that time, I began to discover the kindness and generosity of the people of Reading,” he recalls.
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The Rising Sun Arts Centre manager put out a call for help – and a local offered Aghasi a flat, rent-free, for a year, voiding his need for Home Office accommodation.
A year later, his refugee status finally arrived, and with it, the chance to apply for family reunion. The eight-month wait for approval was agonising, he says: “I hadn’t seen my wife, Venus, and my daughter, Ava, for two years.”
“Finally, on 16 January 2025, our long wait ended… I was able to hold them again.”
Sitting beside him, Venus nods, speaking in Farsi. Her family laugh. Ava explains: “She loves England, especially the rain… she feels like she was born here.”
The mother and daughter arrived just in time. On 4 September 2025, the UK government suspended applications under the refugee family reunion route, pending a full review.
According to the Home Office’s own assesment, a recent surge in refugee family reunion grants has placed “pressure on local authorities and public services”.
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Under the new rules, refugees must instead apply under the more stringent standard family route, which requires a sponsor to be living here and earning at least £29,000 per year.
The British Red Cross estimates that by April 2026, around 4,900 families could be left in limbo by the pause – including 6,300 children, many of them unaccompanied.
The rightward shift of public discourse is undeniable. A poll from Refugee Council (via More in Common) released early 2025 found that 68% of people believe attitudes toward refugees are more negative today than 20 years ago.
But Venus says that her everyday experience suggests something different.
“What I’ve seen here is kindness and friendship, not distrust.”
This Christmas, the family will honour a mix of English and Persian traditions, celebrating with friends from the art centre. It will be an occasion of “joy”, Aghasi says – a chance to celebrate a new life in a new home.
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“Honestly,” he adds, “words cannot fully describe the kindness I have received from the people of Reading.”
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