UK charities say government’s immigration plan will hit most vulnerable

Refugee groups have criticised the UK government’s controversial new measures to tackle immigration and asylum seekers as “militarised”, saying the Home Office’s actions and rhetoric risk fuelling divisions and punishing those most in need of help.

The Home Office announced plans on Wednesday to crack down on people arriving on British shores in small boats, including creating a new investigation and intelligence unit, expanding detention centres for failed asylum seekers and “breaking down criminal people-smuggling gangs”.

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said the government was aiming to increase the rate of deportations of people whose asylum claims have been rejected to “the highest level since 2018”.

The move comes after riots rocked the UK earlier this month, largely fuelled by anti-immigration sentiment, with two hotels housing asylum seekers targeted by mobs.

Thousands of people arrive in the UK every year by small boat, often from war-torn countries in the Middle East and Asia, as well as people facing political, religious or ethnic persecution.

Refugee groups said the government’s new plan failed to create safe routes for asylum seekers and the measures would not stop people in need coming to the UK.

The charity Refugee Action, which supports asylum seekers in the UK, said it was “disappointing” to see the government focusing on crime while failing to offer a positive outlook for people seeking asylum.

Tim Naor Hilton, Executive Director of Refugee Action, said: The New Arab that the government must focus on “creating an anti-racist asylum system that respects people’s rights, lifts the ban on work and houses people with dignity in our communities.”

“Once again, the people most likely to be caught up in these detention and deportation policies will be from racialized communities and countries that were formerly British colonies.”

Stopping small boat arrivals and reducing immigration was one of Labor’s key pledges in its landslide victory in the July 4 election.

For years, immigration has been a major political issue for successive Conservative governments who have pledged to reduce refugee numbers, placing refugees at the forefront of the political debate.

Steve Valdez-Symonds, director of the refugee and migrant rights programme at Amnesty International UK, said the government was “spreading an age-old message of fear and hostility towards some of the most victimised and traumatised people”.

Valdez-Symonds said The Guardian that the “‘security’ approach” will punish many of those most in need of asylum, “people who are therefore often most vulnerable to criminal exploitation.”

Afghans, Syrians, Iranians and Pakistanis are among the most common nationalities seeking asylum in the UK.

The Labour plan aims to replace the Conservative government’s abandoned policy of relocating asylum seekers to Rwanda – a policy widely opposed by human rights groups.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer has pledged to prioritise the arrest of people-smuggling groups, who are often paid thousands of dollars by individuals attempting the dangerous sea crossing.

More than 19,000 people have arrived in the UK on small boats from France via the Channel so far this year, higher than the same period last year but lower than the level in 2022.

According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), more than 20 people have died attempting the crossing.

One of the government’s plans to increase capacity at deportation centres for people whose claims have been rejected has sparked concern after the chief inspector of prisons warned that conditions at the centres had deteriorated and they were unsuitable for vulnerable people.

Carla Denyer, leader of the minority left-wing Green Party, said it was “shocking” to hear that closed detention centres would be reopened.

“Labor must end the cruel and widespread use of immigration detention centres and open safe routes to sanctuary,” Denyer wrote in a message posted on X on Wednesday.

The measures, billed as a way to “strengthen the security of Britain’s borders”, will also penalise employers who hire unlicensed workers and see 100 new investigators added to the National Crime Agency to track people-smuggling operations.

The UK government is working with French border control teams and European law enforcement agencies, such as Europol, to track down people smugglers who may be operating across borders and who have been linked to operations as far afield as Turkey and North Africa.