Vietnamese People in The United Kingdom - History and Settlement

History and Settlement

Vietnamese immigration to the United Kingdom started after the end of the Vietnam War in 1975, with the UK accepting refugees from Hong Kong, its colony at the time. Most early immigrants were refugee boat people fleeing persecution by the victorious communists, the rest were students, academics or business people. Vietnamese refugees initially found it fairly difficult to settle into a British lifestyle. Because the Vietnamese community in the United Kingdom was then small, the new wave of immigrants found it much harder to integrate than, say, in France or the United States where the Vietnamese populations were much larger. The early government policy of spreading newcomers thinly compounded matters by depriving them of vital mutual support. Many began gravitating towards larger cities such as London with the majority settling in the Lewisham (Vietnamese is the second most common language in the borough), Southwark and Hackney areas. The existence of much larger and more established overseas Chinese communities in the UK has had a significant though perhaps understated effect in helping the new immigrants setting roots in their new country.