What's your thoughts on asylum seekers?

[Lynds778]

I'm all for offering asylum to those genuinely in need but I've seen a lot of negative media recently around 'fake' asylum seekers; people pretending to be from war-torn countries etc to gain entry to the country. Also videos of men giving advice for future asylum seekers on where to say you're from so that you can get in.

Also seen a lot of uproar from local communities about asylum seekers behaving anti-socially, most recently hanging around outside a primary school in Deanshanger and it's got me worried.
I'm also wondering why the large majority of asylum seekers are men and there are less women and children?

So, what's your opinion?

Also, this isn't a racist post. I would have the exact same concerns if these were white asylum seekers from Germany for example. The worry is the system is being abused by some and that we are a bit too lax when it comes to documentation and monitoring of asylum seekers.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14058597/Fake-asylum-seekers-conning-way-Britain-telling-Home-Office-war-torn-Eritrea-bragging-thousands-followers-TikTok.html

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14185169/amp/Four-asylum-seekers-costing-taxpayer-estimated-160-000-year-living-575-000-luxury-home-accused-faking-Afghan-nationalities-UK.html

Your dad sounds like a wonderful man. The NHS works crumble without it's workforce of people who weren't born here. About 20 percent I'm sure

I am so sick of racist dog whistle threads being started on here.

What are your thoughts on people who start disingenuous threads on Mumsnet about asylum seekers?

Who do you think should be classed as "rich"?

( Not sure what that has to do with "cookies" though 🤔)

@Lynds778 send them all home!! our country cannot afford to keep them! remember, charity begins at home, not on the beach at dover!!

It has everything to do with a Government that can't get a hold of illegal and legal migration. Genuine asylum whatever that is atm has been lost due to a loss of control on are borders I'm afraid.

wow

Why are you so surprised?

If you have papers and can prove in a rock solid case that you have come from a place that is unsafe or you face persecution, fine. Asylum should be granted. If not, you should be immediately deported. We need to be much, much stricter. If you are being bombed out of your homes then asylum should be granted. If you as a bisexual Iranian, I have much less sympathy. Sounds harsh.

@AIBot honestly it disgraceful and opening up a disgusting conversation between the racists that hide behind a username nobody would know is them.

So instead I am going to continue to discuss the WONDERFUL experiences I have had or witnessed with people who have migrated to the UK.

I found myself in hospital not so long ago when in A&E which as we all know is normally a bloody terrible experience. I saw probably around 5-6 different medical workers throughout my 6 hours there and I’d say 30% of them were what we would class as “immigrants” and in a time of complete destress for me, I have never in my life been met with so much care and compassion. Many of which went out of their way to make sure I was okay. A lovely Jamaican nurse who had been with me in the beginnings (first hour or so) took it upon herself when she had finished her shift and clocked out, to come back to me and check everything was okay and to say she was going home now but I was in the best place I could possibly be with the best people for it - and she wasn’t wrong. We’re all these people British born… no they were not.

I also have a next door neighbour who is originally from India and often if he sees my car is dirty (which is most of the time) when he is out washing his car, he will also wash mine too. Just because he wants to, he doesn’t get anything in return.
Same neighbour will bring over Samosas and Pakoras that his wife has cooked on Diwali which is honestly my favourite thing ever.

My friend has a builder work for her family who is from Pakistan and he often bring them tubs of food for dinner that he’s made. He lives here on his on own and has for years, his family live in Pakistan and the money he earns he sends over to them to support their life there. My friend and her mother often have him over for dinner as he has nobody else family wise here. He attends all of her family birthday parties… the met through pure chance. He also worked for one of my other friends for a while and gave her £50 when her son was born to welcome the new addition.

This is great, and I too have met wonderful British citizens who started their life here as asylum seekers or immigrants but they are not all like this are they? Do you think we should be allowed to pick and choose who we give permanent residence too? What criteria would you use?

Main sources thus far: The Daily Mail, The Telegraph and 'National World'.

What's this bullshit that if one reads Daily Mail is racist?! If you read The Guardian, are you communist? If you watch BBC are you antisemitic?
When did people become so small-minded? People can read/watch whatever they want and make up their own mind

Some people take massive advantage of the asylum seeker status. And some people absolutely lie about it and abuse the system. It's not their fault. It's the system's fault. The system lost control many years ago.

Another great story
There is a middle eastern man that owns the baguette shop in the area my parents live, I have been going to this shop for over 20 years. Myself and my whole school would go before school, on lunch break and after school to get food. Often the area in which his row of shops was would be an area after school fights would break out between school, for most of us this was just our usual route home and if we ever did accidentally end up getting caught up near it (I think he closes around half 3/4 from memory), he would open his shop door for us to come in and keep safe before it all was over

Do you seriously not find these kind of high streets depressing as all hell?

It's an indictment on the planning and business taxation system if the only shops that can flourish are ones that are clearly a front for something else. Sorry, nobody buys that many phone cases.

For heaven’s sake, the DM is a disgusting rag with a long and inglorious history of right wing propaganda and conspiracy theories, fake news, failing to check facts, and generally low credibility.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/daily-mail/

Of course, people can ‘read whatever they like and make up their own mind’, but they’re not likely to have much mind to make up if they think the DM is in any way a credible source of information.

@Turbottimes no I completely agree that not everyone who immigrates or seeks asylum is like this. Unfortunately I am not 100% clued up on the current vetting process so I wouldn’t want to give my opinion on something I don’t know LOADS about
But I do agree that the immigration/asylum seeker vetting should be stronger, for example think similarly to America or Australia. It should be an instant no for anyone who has a criminal record.

Again I don’t completely want to talk about something I’m not 100% sure on. But from what I know we have a more relaxed process than the likes of Australia, when actually we could be using Australia as a good example to follow. You have to prove why you would be a beneficial addition to Australia and you have means to provide for yourself.

I really enjoy these discussions, so I work in humanitarian aid - spend my life sent to different war torn countries supporting programming for various well known and less well known orgs - also have advised on asylum processes on the common European Asylum framework (which the UK followed prior to 2022) was invited to give feedback on the new UK system and am familiar with the guidance given to case workers for the current UK system (also this is all available online on the gov website for people to read)

Firstly for the OPs question - well unfortunately all systems especially human systems are open to abuse as humans have the ability to abuse a system. That being said, of course there are risk mitigation measures - firstly I think it important to note, if we look holistically the number of claims proven to be false are low compared to claims accepted as true - depending on what type of publication we get our news from there are always going to be news outlets that want to highlight certain facts over others to suit their publication goal.

Secondly, some posters have mentioned about forging or destroying documentation - yes this is correct - there are different tools in the interviews staff can use to try to ascertain the correct location. For Middle East countries (as this is my background) spoken dialects are very specific to countries and even locations within that country, people will be “tested” via interviews by people fluent and native to those dialect areas, they’re asked to speak in a very detailed way about the locations they mention in their claim. For example, years ago two Iraqi sisters had destroyed docs and claimed to be Syrian from Damascus after arriving in the UK at the height of the Syrian civil war (as Syrians were given immediate status based on the factor of being Syrian but Iraqis needed to have their claim determined based on personal factors) the person who did their interview got a vibe, so brought in an someone (on the phone) who was originally from Damascus who eventually realised they were falsifying their story as they couldn’t explain exactly where a hotel is they said they worked at (as he was from Damascus and knew that hotel and the street it was on etc) - obvs this is very specific but just an example of how things can be investigated

I'm not mad on the modern high street but I accept it is how it is. I would much rather have an old fashioned high street with bakers, butchers, green grocers, florists etc. However, because of modern life (everyone shops at supermarkets or online) this is what we're left with. We sometimes get lovely independent cafes opening and I'd love to see more of them. Unfortunately, many don't last long.
Our local mobile phone repair shops, Turkish barbers, vape shops are busy. When I take my son for a haircut at the Turkish barbers we have to wait in a queue for quite some time. I'm sure some of these places might have underhand dealings but I don't believe they all do. It seems another example of xenophobic assumptions that all these businesses run by immigrants are somehow criminal.

Where is that?

@OneAmberFinch i don’t find them depressing, what I do find depressing is cheap and rubbish looking shop fronts. But that is something the local council should govern and have regulations to keep areas looking their very best. Not everyone can afford the same shop fixtures, but harsher regulations would make sure that these shop fronts don’t look like utter rubbish.

Where do you go for unbiased info? The Guardian?! 😂

They don't take any as I understand it. None of those countries are party to the convention

If you and OP are both in good faith wanting some solid answers to these questions I can definitely return after work and provide them :)

But very quickly as regards your Ukraine reference since it's very easily answerable it's a totally different scenario and as such a deeply unfair comparison to make in the way you have. The government opened a direct pathway for people seeking asylum from Ukraine to come here which simply does not exist for nationals of other countries. That's one reason for the significantly larger numbers of women and kids arriving by this route. There is no way for anybody else wanting to seek asylum to apply from outside of the UK to do so. There is also no way to legally enter the UK for the purpose of seeking asylum. However, the right to enter a country for the purposes of making an asylum claim is one that is in fact enshrined under human rights law.
I'm sure you see the conundrums revealing themselves here

No they aren’t, but neither are Brits.

I would suggest we start by insisting on British values, so racists wouldn’t be allowed citizenship. Ideally we could go further and kick out the indigenous racists, too.

My builders were Albanian and I’ve never seen such hard working and diligent craftsmen. They were polite, cleaned up every day, their work was beautiful and they gave me some cash at the end of the build ‘for the children’ which I believe is a custom / good luck thing.

My school friend’s aunt is an immigrant from a country much maligned on here who was made a dame for her services to this country.

Shit people come from everywhere - and plenty are born here.

But the same is true for wonderful people.