Helen Bamber Foundation

The Helen Bamber Foundation supports refugees and asylum seekers who have experienced extreme human cruelty, such as torture and human trafficking. We provide specialist care to meet the complex needs of some of the most marginalised and vulnerable people in the world. We offer survivors specialist psychological and physical therapy, housing and welfare support, legal protection and creative arts and skills programmes to help people rebuild their lives.

The Helen Bamber Foundation (HBF) is a human rights charity based in London which was founded by Helen Bamber in 2005. Our specialist team of therapists, doctors and legal experts hold an international reputation for providing therapeutic care, medical consultation, legal protection and practical support to survivors of human rights violations.
“The crucial lesson to master is how to hold, contain and sustain people who have suffered immense atrocity and loss. ” - Helen Bamber
HBF grew from the recognition that people who have suffered any kind of prolonged inter-personal violence - whether from human trafficking; war; community, domestic or gender-based violence - present with similar physical and psychological symptoms to torture survivors. The Foundation extends the model of care that Helen has developed over decades for people who suffered state torture to include a wider range of survivors who had previously lacked such specialist support.
Abuses of human rights are taking place in 150 countries around the world. 30% of people requesting international protection in the UK are estimated to have experienced torture or serious harm. 30 million people are estimated to be living under conditions of slavery worldwide; more than at any time during the transatlantic slave trade. Even these figures are unlikely to fully represent the scale of the problem because of systematic failures in recognising survivors, flaws in immigration processes and the clandestine nature of extreme human cruelty.