Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has insisted his “stop the boats” pledge would cut the “unacceptable” cost of the asylum system, as a further 208 migrants arrived in the UK on Thursday via Channel crossings.
Mr. Sunak warned the asylum system was under “unsustainable pressure” after the bill for the taxpayer almost doubled in a year to nearly £4 billion. Illegal arrivals via the small boats have now been documented for ten consecutive days.
Home Office data showed Channel crossings topped 19,000 for the year so far, despite Mr. Sunak’s vow to voters that he will “stop the boats.”
The provisional total for those making the often dangerous journey across the Channel in 2023 now stands at 19,382.
Government statistics show that 80 percent of asylum seekers are waiting longer than six months for an initial decision.
Plan ‘Is Working’
Speaking to the Daily Express, the prime minister said: “The best way to relieve the unsustainable pressures on our asylum system and unacceptable costs to the taxpayer is to stop the boats in the first place.“That’s why we are focused on our plan to break the business model of the people smugglers facilitating these journeys, including working with international partners upstream to disrupt their efforts, stepping up joint work with the French to help reduce crossings and tackling the asylum backlog.”
Facing questions from broadcasters on Friday, Mr. Sunak insisted that while fixing the issue “would take time,” his plan to end small boat crossings “is working.”
He said: “When I became prime minister, before I outlined my plan, the number of illegal migrants coming to the UK had quadrupled in just the past couple of years.
“But for the first time this year, crossings are down. They are down about 15 percent versus last year. That’s the first time that has happened since the small boats crisis emerged. That shows that the plan is working.”
‘No Evidence’ Indicating Policy Works
Alp Mehmet, director of Migration Watch UK, an independent think tank, told The Epoch Times via text: “That may be the PM’s laudable wish and intention but thus far, we [have] not seen any evidence to indicate that his policies are working.“Indeed, the lack of progress in tackling the problem makes it more likely that the cost to the taxpayer will increase rather than decrease.”
Home Office spending on asylum rose by £1.85 billion, from £2.12 billion in 2021/22 to £3.97 billion in 2022/23.
In perspective, a decade ago, the total cost to the taxpayer stood at £500.2 million.
Overall, a total of 175,457 people were waiting for an initial decision on an asylum application in the UK at the end of June 2023, up 44 percent from 122,213 for the same period a year earlier – the highest figure since current records began in 2010.
Of these, 139,961 had been waiting longer than six months for an initial decision, up 57 percent year-on-year from 89,231 and another record high.
A ‘Disastrous’ Record
Labour said the record-high asylum backlog amounts to a “disastrous record” for Mr. Sunak and Home Secretary Suella Braverman.Mr. Sunak has also pledged by the end of 2023 to clear the backlog of 92,601 so-called “legacy” cases which had been in the system as of the end of June last year.
In the six months since he made his promise, the figure reduced by less than a quarter (23 percent), with 67,870 legacy asylum cases awaiting a decision as of June 30 2023.
The Home Office insisted the Government is “on track” to clear the legacy backlog by the end of the year and said progress has been made since June, citing provisional figures to the end of July which indicated the total backlog of cases had fallen.
The department said the rise in the asylum backlog is “due to more cases entering the asylum system than receiving initial decisions.”
But the number of cases waiting to be dealt with increased by less than 1 percent in the three months to the end of June, suggesting the rise is slowing down.
This was “in part due to an increase in the number of initial decisions made, and an increase in the number of asylum decision-makers employed,” the Home Office added.
Small boat arrivals accounted for 46 percent of the total number of people claiming asylum in the UK in the period.
PA Media contributed to this report.
