SIR Keir Starmer pushed for migrants to get more taxpayers’ cash to fund appeals if their asylum pleas failed.
The Labour chief’s attempt to amend the law would have seen a “wholly unmanageable system”, he was warned.
Sir Keir Starmer pushed for migrants to get more taxpayers’ cash to fund appeals if their asylum pleas failed.
The Labour chief’s attempt to amend the law would have seen a ‘wholly unmanageable system’, he was warned
It could have seen failed asylum seekers incentivised to make another claim in order to get cash help – and may have seen people try to game the system with a “cycle” of fresh submissions, ministers told him.
Sir Keir wanted to make sure that taxpayer help was not stopped immediately after an immigration decision was made.
But he was told there was already a chunk of time in the law to protect those in genuine need if they needed to make an appeal.
Then immigration minister James Brokenshire warned: “The system would be wholly unmanageable if a failed asylum seeker were immediately able to access support solely by lodging further submissions”.
Back in 2015 when he was immigration minister under Jeremy Corbyn, Sir Keir called on asylum seekers to automatically get more cash help when “permission to apply for judicial review is granted”.
Sir Keir said his plan was “intended to prevent individuals and families from being made immediately homeless and destitute”.
But the immigration minister told him that most of the claims which applied for further appeals were reheats of old arguments and ended up being rejected by the judges anyway.
And his amendment would “continue the cycle” of people applying for more appeals, he was told.
Tory MP Lee Anderson said last night: “We have just spent over a year getting the Nationality and Borders Bill through Parliament which stops repeat claims and Starmer voted against the Bill at every stage.
“Now we see him backing more calls for more taxpayers money to help with more bogus claims.
“The Great British public are fed up with forking out for illegal immigrants and their dodgy asylum claims. It makes you wonder whose side Starmer is on.”
A Labour Party spokesperson said last night: “In their own words, the Conservatives have presided over a ‘broken asylum system’ with processing of claims grinding to an almost halt, and £5.6 million per day of taxpayer money being spent on hotels whilst criminal gangs send record numbers of people across the channel.
“While the Tories offer headlines and gimmicks that cost taxpayer cash, Keir Starmer’s Labour would fund a new cross-border cell in the National Crime Agency to crack down on the criminal gangs fuelling boat crossings, and to speed up the asylum process.”
