Asylum - how does it work, what would providing ‘safe routes’ look like?

[rickyrickygrimes]

I’ve been reading the illegal immigration thread 101 and have a question. Some posters propose that ‘safe routes’ should be provided, for people to apply for asylum in the UK.

What are ‘safe routes’? Where do people seeking asylum apply from - and how? Are there any rich / developed countries that have functioning, safe routes to asylum? How do we prevent them becoming a free for all?

Or if they were told in their own country they had failed more likely to go to other country or come here after chucking their documents.

@Slimbear I'm not saying it's perfect; nothing is.

If we've got their biometrics and they're caught here, and disappearing isn't as easy as is made out, then they'll be going back.

What might work to stop the smugglers?

It’s a beast to fix. One way is to apply equal
opportunities to claims from
abroad - most asylum seekers are young fit men from safe countries.

If you set - for example - a rule for 50/50 men and women the numbers would drop overnight. Ditto allowing a quota for disabilities. Current rules favour healthy men hugely.

The system is broken and most claims aren’t legitimate human rights needs, to put it politely.

The UK working poor are the losers, sadly. Asylum seekers cost about £1 million each and that’s before the social housing and benefits after they get LTR.

On the upside you can’t yell ‘they’re taking our jobs’ cos none works prior to LTR and seldom afterwards. We’re working in our borough on a new scheme post-settlement where integration and employment are offered.

Would you cap the total number of visas being issued (because i could see an immense demand for them)? What conditions would you attach and how would you ensure they were met? How would you ensure that people left at the end of two years of they has failed to establish themselves by that point? If they broke the conditions of their visa or did something illegal (remember a lot of people coming from these places are utterly traumatised by what they have experienced), would you send them back to the country that they fled in the first place?

I’ve moved countries / continents several times, and it’s very unusual for visas to just be issued with no strings attached - usually they require proof of exit ticket, proof of funds to support yourself, etc.

There are good reasons why those arriving on boats are men of military age; one of them is in a conflict they're subject to conscription or forced service for rebels. Another is that in pretty much all societies it's men who take on dangerous tasks.

There are conditions to be given refugee status, what makes you think people getting it are not in fear of persecution?

Where do your numbers for cost and failure to work after getting refugee status come from?

The issue with this is you can’t say yes to everyone who applies as numbers would be incredibly high. The people who don’t make the quota can still try via boat unless you opt out of international laws or deter them.

Unless you would say yes to all that meet asylum criteria in which case how many do you envisage?

Draft-dodging isn’t a human rights issue at the mo in law.

£ figs from The Times last week.

I work with refugees, and I’m always fascinated by people who ignore the human stories in front of their faces in favour of feel-good mottoes about the saintliness of every arrival.

Your blood runs cold when you’re faced with a real refugee up against an economic migrant.

Bringing a rescue system into disrepute is not a great way to human,

@Supersimkin7 would you include Russians avoiding the front, or Syrians at risk of being gassed, in your definition of draft dodgers?

To be clear there are no perfect solutions; safe routes have downsides.

We seem unable to deter the boats in the Channel and excluding some 'deals' with, if I recall correctly Tunisia and part of Libya, the nations around the Med haven't stopped them either.

What are ‘safe routes’? Where do people seeking asylum apply from - and how? Are there any rich / developed countries that have functioning, safe routes to asylum? How do we prevent them becoming a free for all

Can speak for a developed country that is not the UK. Our government has agreements with countries where boats typically set off from to get to us. People can claim asylum there and apply for refugee status in our country. Our government pays those countries to allow this. Of course the actual process takes years, and that is far from ideal. It’s also reality that not everyone making a claim is valid, among valid refugee claims are a lot of hopeful economic migrants. When claims are refused that leaves the ‘hosting’ country in a pickle as now they are stuck with the claimant and have to try mechanisms to get them to leave and that can potentially have human rights implications and so forth. Irrespective, they are now safe from whatever they claim was unsafe in their originating country. Also, oddly, inability to speak the new local language is commonly made as an argument, however the vast majority of those making that argument cannot speak English either so🤷‍♀️. If people use the proper routes they get free English classes and a lot of associated social support when they get here.

While we have a LOT of water to manage, it’s narrowed down somewhat re the routes people can realistically take in a boat from other countries they may have reached. So, the strategy is for constant surveillance and to detect boats before they enter our waters. If a boat is detected the Navy/border force gets permission to enter the neighbouring water (they have agreements with all those countries essentially), and tows the boat back to the country that it would have originated from, and if boat not seaworthy, takes people on board while towing, and hands them over to that country and burns the boat on the water in front of everyone. Sounds harsh but it’s to deter people using boats for their own safety.

If a boat does make it into our waters then the people don’t come to our country as they didn’t use a valid route. If they claim refugee status and don’t want to return to their own countries, they are sent to another country ours has an agreement with, and will never be allowed in. Essentially, a really shit country. The premise being they are safe there from what they are claiming refugee status from. Just so happens there are zero economic prospects in that country (it’s a developing country). This is all widely supported as was the basis for a political win for a government some years back and opposition governments know it’s suicide with voters to change this. There’s always a small subset who protest though, but not nearly enough for political change.

Russians can evade national service safely. The Syrian war won’t stop anytime soon.

It’s more that it won’t do much with a cap as you’d still have trafficking.

Starmer pledged to ‘smash the gangs’, which won’t do it but it’s quite something he believed and stated that was an answer. And many believed him.

The only ways to stop crossings is a strong deterrence eg Aus style policies or opting out of international laws.

@Supersimkin7

Most asylum seekers in the world are women and children. Because of the dangerous journey to the UK, it is more often men that arrive on the irregular routes. This is one reason why it makes sense to offer safe and legal routes from refugee camps in other countries. I think it’s preferable to have people arriving in an orderly way and within their family unit.

There is no evidence that most asylum seekers have no basis for their claim. The acceptance rate for refugee status is about 75%. Also when you see the list of countries that they are coming from it becomes fairly obvious that most are fleeing conflict.

Your claim about most not working isn’t true either. About 50% of people work after they get refugee status.

The UK has the 6th largest economy in the world. It’s just very unequal. A few hold a lot of wealth and the many fight over scraps and point their finger at asylum seekers who make up 1% of the population. Even if every single refugee and asylum seeker was deported tomorrow, do you think the working poor would be better off?

If they broke the conditions of their visa or did something illegal (remember a lot of people coming from these places are utterly traumatised by what they have experienced), would you send them back to the country that they fled in the first place

We also have this covered. For everyone, not just refugees. Even for people for whom citizenship has been granted. If people break a law and go to prison, if they were not an original citizen by birth, then on release from prison, they are taken to an immigration centre and get an escorted seat on a flight route back to their originating country. There’s a lot of whoo haa on very this as many cases of people who came here as kids knowing nothing st all of their original country, but that’s the current rule. Again, has broad population support but always protested by a minority.

The idea that a person would need to prove a connection to the UK and demonstrate passable English in order to lodge a request for asylum defeats the point.

Some of the families I work with are currently seeking asylum in the UK due to being at risk of organised crime and cartel violence in their home countries; being targeted and harassed to engage with criminal groups (either as farmers, or persons with a certain skills-set or employment), or lives being endangered due to a family member's involvement (voluntary or otherwise), or having tried to turn to the country's judiciary for help only to find it's placed them at increased risk. Moving regionally isn't far enough away.

There are a myriad of reasons why people seek to start new lives in Britain. It's lazy and deliberately tunnel-visioned to lift forward young men as some sort of undeserving 'culprits'.

Yes it would work in the same way the 2 year working visas works now with the same checks and caps on numbers and would hopefully give potential economic migrants from all countries a legal way of working in the UK. At the moment only young people from certain countries are allowed working visas and this fuels illegal migration.

So these are the countries / quotas that the UK accepts for youth mobility visas. 2 years, no job offer required (though they do need proof of funds).

Australia: 45,000 places
• Canada: 8,000 places
• New Zealand: 8,500 places
• India: 3,000 places
• South Korea: 5,000 places
• Hong Kong: 1,000 places
• Taiwan: 1,000 places
• Japan: 1,500 places
• Monaco: 1,000 places
• San Marino: 1,000 places
• Iceland: 1,000 places
• Andorra: 100 places

where do you see poor, underdeveloped, war torn countries like Syria, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Afghanistan sitting in this list? And most of these agreements are reciprocal - are there many young people in the UK wishing to spend 2 years working in these countries?

Yes it would work in the same way the 2 year working visas works now with the same checks and caps on numbers and would hopefully give potential economic migrants from all countries a legal way of working in the UK. At the moment only young people from certain countries are allowed working visas and this fuels illegal migration

So, any country should allow economic migrants? I live in a developed country, however, economically, I would be better off living in Switzerland or some of the Scandi countries. Should I have a right to just front up to one of these countries because it would be economically beneficial for me/family and expect them to have me, whether it be for two years or the rest of my life?

@HoppingPavlova

it’s always fascinating to consider the impact of geography on how these situations are structured and how they can potentially be managed. The fact that sea crossing routes to your country are very limited means that they can be policed in a way that the UK or European coastline cannot. Plus (I think I’m right in saying) your country has no land borders to police, whereas Europe is the opposite. It also sounds like your country is very much a regional power, and can put a lot of pressure on neighbouring, weaker / poorer countries to accept a deal.

and wow, your rules are harsh. I think there would be outrage in Europe at this treatment if refugees - it’s been tried by both the UK and Italy, and both projects have expensive disasters so far.

Italy has reduced by 60% do you recall Starmer visiting Meloni to get tips on how to do it?

Aus is harsh but bipartisan policy by now, Europe will struggle as numbers go up.

Anyone who comes by boat should be rejected automatically and can't claim, ever. If you want a country to show Goodwill, starting with criminal activity isn't the way.

'
@MyWiseGoose the previous government tried exactly that with no visible effect on the numbers. They just ended up warehousing people in hotels and when the current administration got in they'd effectively no choice but to admit their claims.

Making irregular arrivals illegal, refusing to accept claims even in respect of the most dangerous places and the Rwanda was all performative.

Sunak has more or less accepted that.

@EasternStandard

so agreements with neighbouring countries to prevent the boats leaving are working to reduce illegal arrivals to Italy. The countries in question are Libya, Tunisia etc. Would France (source of the vast majority of small boats) have any interest in making such an arrangement? I can’t see it, and they don’t need the money bribe in the same way as northern African countries do.

i thought the Albania scheme had been blocked by the Italian courts?

@EasternStandard

Italy’s North African detainee scheme doesn’t provide any ‘safe routee’ though (which is what I was interested in tbh). Detainees are specifically prohibited from applying, there is no offshore processing of asylum claims, therefore no safe route for genuine asylum seekers - with might be as much as 60-70% of the detainees.

It’s mostly legal changes to maritime law and illegal pull backs rather than Albania as it’s not happening. You’re likely right that France wouldn’t do similar which is why Starmer asking for that advice wasn’t really going to fly.

OTH he seems to be copying with the Balkans suggestion today but it’s still just headlines. It won’t solve the issue of crossings. It’s failed asylum only and we can send those people back anyway or even less expensive many go back voluntarily after failing claims.