By Elise Gill
Political opinions expressed in this article are individual and separate to the society.
With the announcement of the UK’s 'Stop the Boats' Bill on 7th March 2023, it seems that the UK government’s anti-refugee sentiments have reached an all-time high. This bill, should it come into law, would make it effectively illegal for any person who comes here by boat to seek asylum. This bill aims to detain those over 18 who do not arrive by safe routes, with the intention of deporting them either back to their home country, or to an alternative ‘safe’ country, including Rwanda and Albania. This comes less than a year after the passing of the Nationality & Borders Act, which has already severely restricted a person’s ability to seek asylum in the UK. These changes have arisen from an increasingly hostile environment towards migrants in this country. The British government’s narratives - and those within right-wing media (such as the Sun and the Daily Mail) - have made numerous claims about asylum seekers that dangerously run the risk of becoming embedded in our understanding of asylum and refugees. These claims have exacerbated the hostility towards migrants and asylum seekers. However, not only are these claims hugely immoral and reflect racist double-standards in the UK, but they are also often entirely false and misrepresentative of reality. I will discuss some of these ‘myths’ perpetuated by the UK government and right-wing media, and why they are cruel, inhumane, and baseless.
Myth: ‘The UK is overrun with asylum seekers. We cannot take any more.’
Reality: The UK is not overrun with asylum seekers. As of November 2022, there were just over 230,000 refugees, around 127,000 pending asylum cases, and nearly 5.5 thousand stateless persons in the UK, out of 89.3 million displaced people worldwide. They make up just 0.54% of the population. This is a small percentage of the population on its own, and pales in comparison to other countries, such as Lebanon or Germany. Both Lebanon and Germany host over 1 million refugees, significant in both cases, but even more so in Lebanon, a country smaller than Yorkshire. The notion that the UK is ‘overrun’ with asylum seekers is a false narrative perpetuated by the UK government to justify policies of exclusion and to avoid accepting the numbers of refugees it should morally be taking.
Myth: ‘Why don’t asylum seekers stay in neighbouring countries, or stay in France?’
Reality: The 1951 Refugee Convention doesn’t state that a refugee should remain in the first safe country they get to. The majority of asylum seekers - around 70% - do nevertheless stay in countries neighbouring their country of origin. These countries are often overwhelmed with refugees - Syrian refugees make up 20% of Lebanon’s population, putting a significant strain on resources the country is already limited in due to economic crises. This often means refugees cannot get the support they both need and are entitled to according to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, meaning they are often forced to move further afield.
We also see criticisms of refugees who come from France under the guise that France is a ‘safe’ country, so asylum seekers need not travel further. However, France receives three times as many asylum applications as the UK does. French asylum systems are overwhelmed and there are not enough resources under current French legislation, meaning many asylum seekers in France are left waiting for extended periods of time. This means that refugees are often pushed to travel to the UK to claim asylum- which they are perfectly entitled to do so long as they have not already claimed asylum in France or another ‘safe’ country. This information is easy to find from a simple Google search - the UK government and right-wing media’s apparent ignorance of this information highlights a blatant lack of effort to ensure accuracy in our understanding of asylum in the UK.
Myth: ‘Asylum seekers are coming to the UK because they want to exploit our benefit systems.’
Reality: Whilst there is something to be said about the irony of the term British ‘generosity’ given how many refugees’ countries of origin have been impacted negatively in some way by British involvement, the idea that asylum seekers want to come to the UK to exploit our benefits system is also entirely false, constructed to justify restrictive asylum policy. Research by the Refugee Council shows that asylum seekers who come to the UK do so generally because of family or language connections, and often have no idea about the British benefits system. In fact, the most common subject asylum seekers knew about in relation to the UK was football. Furthermore, the idea that they could genuinely exploit our benefits system seems flawed at best, given the support asylum seekers receive from the government is minimal, putting the majority below the poverty line.
Myth: ‘There are legal routes available to seek asylum, asylum seekers should be taking them and not illegally entering the UK’
Reality: It is very difficult to seek asylum in the UK legally. A person can firstly attempt to come to the UK through resettlement programmes, such as that run by the UN’s refugee organisation, the UNHCR. However, in 2022, only 42,300 refugees were resettled worldwide, and less than 2,000 were resettled in the UK. Given there are over 103 million forcibly displaced people worldwide, this is an extremely small number of people who are resettled through this scheme. The next best way to seek asylum then would be to do so on UK soil. However, getting to the UK legally would require a visa, something which is very difficult to gain given the difficulties communicating with embassies in war-torn countries. This means that it is virtually impossible for asylum seekers to arrive to the UK legally and claim asylum. Thus, the government’s claims that asylum seekers must come to the UK legally to be supported by the government are not only misleading and discriminatory, but also hypocritical given that the government perpetuates the difficulties in taking legal routes.
The UK government’s new Stop the Boats Bill is merciless and inhumane. It shirks our duties to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol and is an active attempt to prevent people from seeking asylum in the UK almost entirely, violating the human rights and refugee conventions we are signatory to - something the government has openly admitted they are willing to do. The narratives used to justify this bill are built entirely on false, racist narratives and misrepresentations of the experience of asylum seekers.