Did state back meagre half-hearted aid initially for migrants? (8)
I believe the answer is:
diaspora
'for migrants?' is the definition.
(a group of people outside of their home country)
'did state back meagre half-hearted aid' is the wordplay.
'did state' becomes 'said' (state can mean to say).
'back' says the letters should be written in reverse.
'meagre' becomes 'poor' (I've seen this before).
'half' indicates taking half.
'hearted aid' becomes 'ra' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'said' in reverse letter order is 'dias'.
'poor' halved is 'po'.
'dias'+'po'+'ra'='DIASPORA'
'initially' is the link.
I am not very happy about this link. It may belong to another bit of the clue.
(Other definitions for diaspora that I've seen before include "Scattering in exile" , "Great dispersion of people, Jews or Irish" , "Great dispersion of Jews - and later Irish" , "Great scattering of people over the world, Jews or Irish" , "The scattering of a nation's people" .)