Snapshot of _Migrant Channel crossings hit new record high for start of the year_ :
An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2024-05-01/migrants-channel-crossings-hit-new-record-high-for-start-of-the-year) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2024-05-01/migrants-channel-crossings-hit-new-record-high-for-start-of-the-year)
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What’s Labour’s solution? Neither party seems to have any idea of how to reduce crossings.
The Tories have the failing Rwanda scheme, and Labour has “well just fast-track decisions”, something that will have absolutely zero downward impact on migrant arrival numbers.
Labour seems to be focused on the idea that if they can speed up the processing time, they will be able to bring the numbers down, but I suspect this will turn into "approve everyone," followed fairly rapidly by a surge in homelessness. Their second string is to work more with EU nations to slow the flow, but the reality of this is that EU nations don't want these people and are going to want a lot from us to stop the flow. So I suspect this will turn into "EU will stop boats, if we agree to transport these people to the UK".
This sentiment is common amongst people who seem to accept the Tory way of doing the bare minimum and getting the mail to write a glowing headline about it as being normal. Under the last labour government we had a lower acceptance rate and returned more failed asylum seekers. Because we funded the system properly.
Labour has been out of power for 14 years, and the world has changed dramatically since then. So yes, the Tories have been shit at this. But no, Labour isn't going to be able to put it back to how it was a decade and a half ago and will need to adapt to the current realities of migration.
So far, Labour have avoided saying much about what they would do, but what they have said leans more towards the idea of accepting a lot more asylum seekers if only to clear the backlog.
Nah, thats a very tory attitude to problem solving. This is hard so we'll just brush it under the carpet and accept everyone.
I think I trust labour to at least make a good faith effort at this. Plus of course they get actual press scrutiny.
Total numbers were lower, countries of origin were more easily deported to, the modern asylum industry and asylum legal industry had not yet figured out the best tactics for prolonging a claim and putting off deportation. You really think deportations to Taliban Afghanistan and Assad’s Syria will shoot up under Labour?
We can always deport them to South Georgia or if need be the Outer Hebrides/Shetlands/Orkneys. There are quite a few habitable islands thst are no longer inhabited.
I don't think it's fair to say that the Tories have done the minimum really. The real issue is that no matter who's in power, the country's hands are tied.
> Labour seems to be focused on the idea that if they can speed up the processing time, they will be able to bring the numbers down, but I suspect this will turn into "approve everyone,"
https://data.spectator.co.uk/asylum
Asylum grant rate was 26% in 2010. It's 67% in 2023, dropping from 76% in 2022.
"Approve everyone" seems to be the Tory strategy, only it's after 18 months of them being unable to work and put up in a hotel at taxpayer expense.
Wild thought, but maybe the fact the Home Office has completely toppled over, you get potentially a year or two working as a sub for a deliveroo rider while your room and food is covered, and if they do finally reject you they aren't good at sending anyone back so you can just stay... Maybe, maybe that's a massive pull factor?
The select committee that discussed this like a year ago said the spike in Albanians was because they knew they'd have a long time in limbo. They'd work illegally, sometimes drug dealing etc. and then they'd leave of their own accord to repeat the process elsewhere before they're rejected. The slowness is a benefit to them.
If people who obviously didn't qualify were promptly rejected and returned, just take us back to 2010 levels before austerity ran it into the ground, then this would be less appealing. The economics of paying a smuggler no longer add up.
To reduce crossings labour plan is correct though, at least at the moment and certainly miles better than the Tories plan with a good chance of success.
A lot of the small boat crossings are due to people not having an avenue to initiate a VALID asylum request so they MUST get on a boat to even start this process. If we have a processing area setup in France so claims from people residing in France currently can be put in the system to be processed we can reduce almost all of the genuine asylum seekers crossing on boats as they can walk into the UK embassy and start the process.
It's a simple solution and a perfectly valid one, the Tories have closed off safe and legal routes which has significantly contributed to small boat crossings, they have helped cause this and seemingly done it just for an attempt of PR at the cost of genuine lives.
It won't stop all boats but it will reduce them in a massive measure. Dealing with the backlog is also a reason for being able to cut hotel costs which can be spent on better things.
If we go with the safe and legal routes then firstly we're going to need a solution for everyone who bypasses them, or is rejected and decides to come anyway. Because they aren't just going to accept a No in France and give up on getting to the UK forever. So, at some level, we'd need a process where anyone who bypasses the safe and legal route is immediately denied and deported without appeal rights.
Secondly we're going to have to talk about numbers, which we refuse to talk about currently. Because our resources are not infinite, there is no point accepting an asylum seeker if we're immediately going to make them homeless because they can't support themselves, and we have a housing crisis so bad that even couples who are both earning above-average incomes cannot find housing.
It wouldn't matter if there was an asylum centre at Calais accepting applications, those refused would still take the boat option.
The truth is that so much of the Third World is so corrupt and downright filthy even winding up in one of our shit hole ghettos is a thousand times better than being in Bangladesh, Afghanistan or Pakistan. (To name but three)
The boat that sank in the Mediterranean last year with the loss of 700 lives had 400+ Pakistanis on board. None of them would have succeeded in an asylum claim. Unless claiming to be from Afghanistan, perhaps.
All the well wishers overlook the fact that we know nothing about the vast majority of those arriving other than what they claim. They are well briefed in their narrative to claim asylum. Few have any documentation to support their story and could be criminals, terrorists, rapists or on the run from the police in their own lands.
The country (and the rest of Europe) can only absorb so many with an alien and incompatible culture, intent on maintaining that culture before the very nature of the continent is irrevocably changed.
Nonsense like spending untold millions on the Rwanda charade is futile.
Like it or not, the unpalatable truth is to defend our frontiers. How you do that will be a decision for the military. They could repel with high power water jets or take stronger action. This is a thistle that will have to grasped sooner or later.
Part of the draw for illegal migrants has to be knowing that no matter what, you get to spend about 2 years living in a paid for hotel.
Cutting that time down to a few months is going to have a impact, certainly more of a impact than potentially being one of the unlucky 1% who get sent to Rwanda.
Wouldn't knowing you'll get processed quickly and removed if failing an asylum claim be the deterent of trying in the first place - if this Rwanda idea is good enough for the tories, then avoiding sending people to country they aren't from, which has recent historic cases of refoulement (although unofficially as they didn't have a "formal" agreement with Israel) come across as better for the UK image on applying the human rights agreement?
No, because even refused claimants are let free into the UK to live their lives until they’re deported, which in many cases never happens because it’s illegal for the UK to deport to countries with serious human rights issues, which almost every one of these people is from, and with whom in many cases the UK has little or no diplomatic relationship and so can’t run deportation flights. That’s exactly the issue.
>which in many cases never happens because it’s illegal for the UK to deport to countries with serious human rights issues
Can you expand on that or provide a source? I haven't heard of that, but if they're at risk, then I would presume that's reasonable claims for asylum, and if found that it can't be demonstrated they would be at risk, unless found otherwise, in which case I'd like to know the law/reason why they can't be deported.
The core of the issue is that this is all being managed through the framework of laws designed following WW2 which are completely unfit for purpose in this day and age. They were never intended to deal with the scale of one-way migration coming from Africa and the middle east.
We simply must enforce strict border controls and stop this problem before it becomes critical. Politicians throughout Europe have so far failed to address this and its leading to disastrous policies like brexit, the rise of the AFD, Le Pen in France etc.
It's also bad in the long run for places like Syria, Sudan etc. People now view fleeing as the easy alternative, which removes resistance to dictators and groups like ISIS allowing them to flourish. Europe went through 2 cataclysmic wars in the 20th century to get to the state of relative peace it enjoys today - Africa and the Middle East need to do the same.
>They were never intended to deal with the scale of one-way migration coming from Africa and the middle east.
A lot of African countries are set for population growth measured in the hundreds of millions. What would happen in the future if the numbers entering Europe became colossal, like 10's of millions? Would Europe panic and use the military or opt to fundamentally change our societies to accommodate it? So far the plan seems to be the latter, the UK is in a particularly bad place since our social system isn't contribution based, so I can imagine that would be the first thing they'll change.
We have already adopted the changing society to accommodate it phase. EU just signed their new migration rules, which took years to approve. This is all about shared acceptance, not a strategy of deportation.
We have promoted diversity in every media communication possible, we have added it to legal framework for business hiring, we are encouraging there to be a more diverse pallet in everything.
It’s been ongoing in the EU since about 2015 right? Soon it will be the 10 year anniversary. Plenty of time for these individuals to move past being an asylum seeker and obtain citizenship meaning they can bring family members too.
Sure you could stop the “new entries” but fundamentally it has already permanently changed our societies, our society has accepted that and protected these people so strongly with the legal framework.
They are the vulnerable and we are the accommodating hero’s protecting them.
It’s unlikely the asylum process will ever be cancelled. These people who have benefited for at least two generations of family now, will likely vote to be accepting of more unless they lean to be more conservative once they see the strain on society that they moved into.
It’s an interesting prospect to think about, but change can only happen under an emergency, see Finlands closed border as an example.
Is that what most Europeans want? The area that have gone through diversification in the UK are *grim.* I've seen it. There is no way I want to live in that, or maybe I'm out of touch and most Europeans like it?
I think we are seeing the opposite from second generation immigrants. You don't need to look far to see the likes of braverman advocating pulling up the ladder behind them. People are tolerant now, but as the original reply said Africa is expected to explode in population over the coming century. The numbers will only greatly increase and society will turn against that. We are already seeing the beginnings of this in the rise of far right politics in Europe over the last decade, and it can even be argued that Russia is framing it's war in Ukraine in terms against western values - which seem to have widespread support not only in Russia but has spread to other countries like Hungary etc.
The only way to solve this is to stop all entry unless via approved methods. Anyone entering illegally is turned back and guaranteed never to be granted asylum.
Enforce that and there will be no more crossings and we can focus more resources on actually helping people that need it, not economic migrants spending thousands to be smuggled from France to England.
Rich countries should cooperate on changing the rules because they are not fit for purpose in a modern world, especially one filled with evil state actors such as Russia, who like the sow the seeds of chaos and sabotage our nations as part of their ongoing war against the west.
Yep, and just to put things in perspective, at one point we only had 557 places left to spare in England and Wales
https://prisonreformtrust.org.uk/decision-time/
Nimbyism strikes again when in comes to building new prison and expanding capacity, no-one wants one built next door to them.
Surely it makes more sense to put them in jails which at least deters others than putting them up in hotels and handing out money as they then dissappear off the grid?
It would be a simple matter for cabin crew to gather passports on boarding or for immigration officials to check everyone disembarking. No passport, back on the plane. Once that happens a few hundred times suddenly there will be no more lost passports between departures and arrivals.
We have a government so utterly incompetent and incapable of elementary measures.
Careful now, you're coming dangerously close to a sensible policy and we can't have that.
You can't put criminals in prison for illegally entering the country, it's against their human rights.
It's because they are only criminals until they claim asylum. So you can put them in prison via a court, and we tend not to imprison people without fair hearing. Then as soon as they claim asylum you would have to let them go.
> Careful now, you're coming dangerously close to a sensible policy and we can't have that.
If the UK doesn't have any jail space how is it sensible policy?
The UK's already looking in to sending male prisoners abroad.
Snapshot of _Migrant Channel crossings hit new record high for start of the year_ : An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2024-05-01/migrants-channel-crossings-hit-new-record-high-for-start-of-the-year) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2024-05-01/migrants-channel-crossings-hit-new-record-high-for-start-of-the-year) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Rishi: the Rwanda scheme is working, stick to the plan, no I’m not tetchy. Yeah, but Labour . . .
What’s Labour’s solution? Neither party seems to have any idea of how to reduce crossings. The Tories have the failing Rwanda scheme, and Labour has “well just fast-track decisions”, something that will have absolutely zero downward impact on migrant arrival numbers.
Labour seems to be focused on the idea that if they can speed up the processing time, they will be able to bring the numbers down, but I suspect this will turn into "approve everyone," followed fairly rapidly by a surge in homelessness. Their second string is to work more with EU nations to slow the flow, but the reality of this is that EU nations don't want these people and are going to want a lot from us to stop the flow. So I suspect this will turn into "EU will stop boats, if we agree to transport these people to the UK".
This sentiment is common amongst people who seem to accept the Tory way of doing the bare minimum and getting the mail to write a glowing headline about it as being normal. Under the last labour government we had a lower acceptance rate and returned more failed asylum seekers. Because we funded the system properly.
Labour has been out of power for 14 years, and the world has changed dramatically since then. So yes, the Tories have been shit at this. But no, Labour isn't going to be able to put it back to how it was a decade and a half ago and will need to adapt to the current realities of migration. So far, Labour have avoided saying much about what they would do, but what they have said leans more towards the idea of accepting a lot more asylum seekers if only to clear the backlog.
Nah, thats a very tory attitude to problem solving. This is hard so we'll just brush it under the carpet and accept everyone. I think I trust labour to at least make a good faith effort at this. Plus of course they get actual press scrutiny.
It's not about Tories vs Labour. It's about what options are open to us.
Total numbers were lower, countries of origin were more easily deported to, the modern asylum industry and asylum legal industry had not yet figured out the best tactics for prolonging a claim and putting off deportation. You really think deportations to Taliban Afghanistan and Assad’s Syria will shoot up under Labour?
Labour will just let them all in, you don't need an asylum backlog if you just give all the boat people passports.
Yep, and then people will vote for someone who can stop it.
There was a higher rejection rate under Labour than there is now.
Because they were coming from different countries.
Tory excuses, anything rather than to properly find a public service.
We can always deport them to South Georgia or if need be the Outer Hebrides/Shetlands/Orkneys. There are quite a few habitable islands thst are no longer inhabited.
I don't think it's fair to say that the Tories have done the minimum really. The real issue is that no matter who's in power, the country's hands are tied.
Utter bollocks.
> Labour seems to be focused on the idea that if they can speed up the processing time, they will be able to bring the numbers down, but I suspect this will turn into "approve everyone," https://data.spectator.co.uk/asylum Asylum grant rate was 26% in 2010. It's 67% in 2023, dropping from 76% in 2022. "Approve everyone" seems to be the Tory strategy, only it's after 18 months of them being unable to work and put up in a hotel at taxpayer expense. Wild thought, but maybe the fact the Home Office has completely toppled over, you get potentially a year or two working as a sub for a deliveroo rider while your room and food is covered, and if they do finally reject you they aren't good at sending anyone back so you can just stay... Maybe, maybe that's a massive pull factor? The select committee that discussed this like a year ago said the spike in Albanians was because they knew they'd have a long time in limbo. They'd work illegally, sometimes drug dealing etc. and then they'd leave of their own accord to repeat the process elsewhere before they're rejected. The slowness is a benefit to them. If people who obviously didn't qualify were promptly rejected and returned, just take us back to 2010 levels before austerity ran it into the ground, then this would be less appealing. The economics of paying a smuggler no longer add up.
To reduce crossings labour plan is correct though, at least at the moment and certainly miles better than the Tories plan with a good chance of success. A lot of the small boat crossings are due to people not having an avenue to initiate a VALID asylum request so they MUST get on a boat to even start this process. If we have a processing area setup in France so claims from people residing in France currently can be put in the system to be processed we can reduce almost all of the genuine asylum seekers crossing on boats as they can walk into the UK embassy and start the process. It's a simple solution and a perfectly valid one, the Tories have closed off safe and legal routes which has significantly contributed to small boat crossings, they have helped cause this and seemingly done it just for an attempt of PR at the cost of genuine lives. It won't stop all boats but it will reduce them in a massive measure. Dealing with the backlog is also a reason for being able to cut hotel costs which can be spent on better things.
If we go with the safe and legal routes then firstly we're going to need a solution for everyone who bypasses them, or is rejected and decides to come anyway. Because they aren't just going to accept a No in France and give up on getting to the UK forever. So, at some level, we'd need a process where anyone who bypasses the safe and legal route is immediately denied and deported without appeal rights. Secondly we're going to have to talk about numbers, which we refuse to talk about currently. Because our resources are not infinite, there is no point accepting an asylum seeker if we're immediately going to make them homeless because they can't support themselves, and we have a housing crisis so bad that even couples who are both earning above-average incomes cannot find housing.
It wouldn't matter if there was an asylum centre at Calais accepting applications, those refused would still take the boat option. The truth is that so much of the Third World is so corrupt and downright filthy even winding up in one of our shit hole ghettos is a thousand times better than being in Bangladesh, Afghanistan or Pakistan. (To name but three) The boat that sank in the Mediterranean last year with the loss of 700 lives had 400+ Pakistanis on board. None of them would have succeeded in an asylum claim. Unless claiming to be from Afghanistan, perhaps. All the well wishers overlook the fact that we know nothing about the vast majority of those arriving other than what they claim. They are well briefed in their narrative to claim asylum. Few have any documentation to support their story and could be criminals, terrorists, rapists or on the run from the police in their own lands. The country (and the rest of Europe) can only absorb so many with an alien and incompatible culture, intent on maintaining that culture before the very nature of the continent is irrevocably changed. Nonsense like spending untold millions on the Rwanda charade is futile. Like it or not, the unpalatable truth is to defend our frontiers. How you do that will be a decision for the military. They could repel with high power water jets or take stronger action. This is a thistle that will have to grasped sooner or later.
Part of the draw for illegal migrants has to be knowing that no matter what, you get to spend about 2 years living in a paid for hotel. Cutting that time down to a few months is going to have a impact, certainly more of a impact than potentially being one of the unlucky 1% who get sent to Rwanda.
Wouldn't knowing you'll get processed quickly and removed if failing an asylum claim be the deterent of trying in the first place - if this Rwanda idea is good enough for the tories, then avoiding sending people to country they aren't from, which has recent historic cases of refoulement (although unofficially as they didn't have a "formal" agreement with Israel) come across as better for the UK image on applying the human rights agreement?
No, because even refused claimants are let free into the UK to live their lives until they’re deported, which in many cases never happens because it’s illegal for the UK to deport to countries with serious human rights issues, which almost every one of these people is from, and with whom in many cases the UK has little or no diplomatic relationship and so can’t run deportation flights. That’s exactly the issue.
Which every one of these people CLAIMS to be from. Fixed it for you.
>which in many cases never happens because it’s illegal for the UK to deport to countries with serious human rights issues Can you expand on that or provide a source? I haven't heard of that, but if they're at risk, then I would presume that's reasonable claims for asylum, and if found that it can't be demonstrated they would be at risk, unless found otherwise, in which case I'd like to know the law/reason why they can't be deported.
Labour are not in power.
They've listed it dozens of times. It's not our fault you're not willing to listen or read. A quick Google search for Yvette Cooper will sort you out.
The core of the issue is that this is all being managed through the framework of laws designed following WW2 which are completely unfit for purpose in this day and age. They were never intended to deal with the scale of one-way migration coming from Africa and the middle east. We simply must enforce strict border controls and stop this problem before it becomes critical. Politicians throughout Europe have so far failed to address this and its leading to disastrous policies like brexit, the rise of the AFD, Le Pen in France etc. It's also bad in the long run for places like Syria, Sudan etc. People now view fleeing as the easy alternative, which removes resistance to dictators and groups like ISIS allowing them to flourish. Europe went through 2 cataclysmic wars in the 20th century to get to the state of relative peace it enjoys today - Africa and the Middle East need to do the same.
>They were never intended to deal with the scale of one-way migration coming from Africa and the middle east. A lot of African countries are set for population growth measured in the hundreds of millions. What would happen in the future if the numbers entering Europe became colossal, like 10's of millions? Would Europe panic and use the military or opt to fundamentally change our societies to accommodate it? So far the plan seems to be the latter, the UK is in a particularly bad place since our social system isn't contribution based, so I can imagine that would be the first thing they'll change.
We have already adopted the changing society to accommodate it phase. EU just signed their new migration rules, which took years to approve. This is all about shared acceptance, not a strategy of deportation. We have promoted diversity in every media communication possible, we have added it to legal framework for business hiring, we are encouraging there to be a more diverse pallet in everything. It’s been ongoing in the EU since about 2015 right? Soon it will be the 10 year anniversary. Plenty of time for these individuals to move past being an asylum seeker and obtain citizenship meaning they can bring family members too. Sure you could stop the “new entries” but fundamentally it has already permanently changed our societies, our society has accepted that and protected these people so strongly with the legal framework. They are the vulnerable and we are the accommodating hero’s protecting them. It’s unlikely the asylum process will ever be cancelled. These people who have benefited for at least two generations of family now, will likely vote to be accepting of more unless they lean to be more conservative once they see the strain on society that they moved into. It’s an interesting prospect to think about, but change can only happen under an emergency, see Finlands closed border as an example.
Is that what most Europeans want? The area that have gone through diversification in the UK are *grim.* I've seen it. There is no way I want to live in that, or maybe I'm out of touch and most Europeans like it?
I think we are seeing the opposite from second generation immigrants. You don't need to look far to see the likes of braverman advocating pulling up the ladder behind them. People are tolerant now, but as the original reply said Africa is expected to explode in population over the coming century. The numbers will only greatly increase and society will turn against that. We are already seeing the beginnings of this in the rise of far right politics in Europe over the last decade, and it can even be argued that Russia is framing it's war in Ukraine in terms against western values - which seem to have widespread support not only in Russia but has spread to other countries like Hungary etc.
The only way to solve this is to stop all entry unless via approved methods. Anyone entering illegally is turned back and guaranteed never to be granted asylum. Enforce that and there will be no more crossings and we can focus more resources on actually helping people that need it, not economic migrants spending thousands to be smuggled from France to England. Rich countries should cooperate on changing the rules because they are not fit for purpose in a modern world, especially one filled with evil state actors such as Russia, who like the sow the seeds of chaos and sabotage our nations as part of their ongoing war against the west.
Why don't they just put these people in jails until their claim is processed?
Because our jails are already under massive pressure.
Yep, and just to put things in perspective, at one point we only had 557 places left to spare in England and Wales https://prisonreformtrust.org.uk/decision-time/ Nimbyism strikes again when in comes to building new prison and expanding capacity, no-one wants one built next door to them.
Surely it makes more sense to put them in jails which at least deters others than putting them up in hotels and handing out money as they then dissappear off the grid?
Aside from the humanitarian issues, there is not enough room in our jails.
Build more, create tent camps in the middle of nowhere. Burnt your passport? you ain't leaving them till you agree to leave the county.
It would be a simple matter for cabin crew to gather passports on boarding or for immigration officials to check everyone disembarking. No passport, back on the plane. Once that happens a few hundred times suddenly there will be no more lost passports between departures and arrivals. We have a government so utterly incompetent and incapable of elementary measures.
Careful now, you're coming dangerously close to a sensible policy and we can't have that. You can't put criminals in prison for illegally entering the country, it's against their human rights.
It's because they are only criminals until they claim asylum. So you can put them in prison via a court, and we tend not to imprison people without fair hearing. Then as soon as they claim asylum you would have to let them go.
> Careful now, you're coming dangerously close to a sensible policy and we can't have that. If the UK doesn't have any jail space how is it sensible policy? The UK's already looking in to sending male prisoners abroad.
Clearly the answer is to build more hotels.
We don't have enough space in our prisons to house another ~ 40k a year