A statement in response to the 'Illegal Migration Bill'
This cruel and unworkable legislation will mean that anyone who arrives in the UK in a small boat will be denied the right to claim asylum.
Hot on the heels of the confusion and panic caused by the government’s recent streamlined asylum processing for people from Afghanistan, Eritrea, Libya, Syria and Yemen, over the weekend a new asylum plan was revealed that is claimed will push “the boundaries of international law.”
Our concern is that the so-called Illegal Migration Bill will see these boundaries not only pushed, but utterly broken. The bill will mean that anyone who arrives in the UK in a small boat will be denied the right to claim asylum. They will also be banned from re-entering the country or seeking British citizenship in the future.
The responsibility for thousands of vulnerable people will be put into the hands of the Home Secretary, who will have a “duty to remove” that legally supersedes people’s right to claim asylum. In practice, this will look like detention and deportation on a huge scale.
According to Refugee Council, the government’s legislation “would leave over 45,000 at risk of destitution and homelessness each year, stuck in limbo and facing long periods locked up in detention.”
This legislation contravenes the UN Refugee Convention, which states that signatory countries have a legal duty to protect refugees and that claiming asylum is a human right.
In defence of the bill, the Prime Minister has said, "Those arriving on small boats aren't directly fleeing a war-torn country or facing an imminent threat to life."
"Instead, they have travelled through safe, European countries before crossing the Channel. The fact that they can do so is unfair on those who come here legally and enough is enough."
This rhetoric, that on the surface sounds like it could be common sense, is a dangerous misrepresentation of the reality of the situation.
The people the PM refers to as having "come here legally" is misleading - there are no safe and legal routes for people seeking safety to come to the UK from the majority of countries in the world. Except for a very small number of specific resettlement schemes (e.g. for people from Hong Kong or Ukraine), there are simply no formal routes for people to claim asylum here in the UK.
The argument that people arriving on small boats aren’t “directly” fleeing a war-torn country is again misleading. The vast majority of refugees either remain as internally displaced people within their home countries or settle in neighbouring countries. But for those who come to the UK to claim asylum, they are well within their rights to do so. There is nothing in international law that states people must claim asylum in the first country they reach.
To refuse people the right to claim asylum for this reason is to absolve ourselves of the responsibility we have to refugee protection based on a geographical coincidence. Just because our country happens to be an island, and happens to be further west than others in Europe does not mean that we can choose not to hear people’s asylum claims.
On top of all this, many people crossing the channel in small boats are doing so for very legitimate reasons. The push factors are clear - conflict, persecution and human rights abuses. But alongside these, there are also pull factors that mean people choose to come to the UK, rather than remain in another European country.
Some have family already in the UK, who they want to reunite with. As a legacy of colonialism, many will speak English as their second language and so want to rebuild their lives here. Some will have other ties to the UK - for example, having served with our military.
As the new law goes before parliament today, at Boaz we want to call for the government to focus its efforts on creating a just and compassionate asylum system.
Instead of quick fixes and papering over the cracks, we want a workable system and effective asylum processing. Instead of the hostile environment and "rights brakes," we want to see a culture of welcome implemented at national and local level. And instead of ineffective deterrents, we are calling for safe, legal routes for people to get to the UK.