Thursday, August 25, 2011

IT COSTS UK £10B FOR ILL MANAGED ASYLUM SYSTEM


LONDON, U.K. – The study by the Migration-watch think-tank found that 660,000 asylum cases were decided from 1997 to 2010. Some form of humanitarian protection, including asylum, was granted in 243,000 cases. This left 417,000 claimants who were rejected and should have left the UK. But only 36 per cent or 151,540 of those denied asylum were removed. Another 8,615 were found to have left without telling the authorities.
  • Immigration minister Damian Green said it was a symptom of the hopeless chaos which Labour inflicted on border controls. This means more than 250,000 have neither left nor been removed and are therefore presumed to remain in the UK illegally, Migration-watch said.
  • Labour spent £2 million (Dh12.11 million) every day on a shambolic asylum system which failed to remove hundreds of thousands of bogus claimants, reveals a blistering study.
  • An audit of the last government's record reveals how officials spent as much as £10 billion processing applications as they struggled to cope with a surge in numbers.
  • But only one in four of the 660,000 decisions made on asylum claims between 1997 and 2010 led to the applicant being removed.
  • Even where the claim was considered to be unfounded, the majority of failed asylum-seekers were not sent home. They are now living here illegally.
  • Its report also found that between 2008 and 2010, 59 per cent of claims were lodged only after the person had been detected by the authorities.
  • Asylum-seekers with genuine claims are supposed to claim at the first possible opportunity. Britain was also found to approve more claims than France, through which many claimants pass to reach the allegedly soft touch UK. In 2009, Britain granted permission to stay in 28 per cent of cases, compared to 19 per cent in France. Under Labour, asylum cases increased hugely from 32,500 in 1997 to a peak of 85,000 in 2002.
The study estimated the cost of asylum since 1999 at close to £10 billion, including legal aid and court costs. This includes £2.8 billion for temporary accommodation, £927 million on payments to support those awaiting a ruling and almost £500 million for failed claimants who cannot return home or are taking steps to leave the UK.
Source: Agency

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