Coronavirus: Home Office accused of prioritising ‘tough’ immigration practices over public health

The Home Office has been accused of prioritising its “tough” immigration practices over public health during the pandemic, after confirming it will continue to require asylum seekers to submit claims in person.

Leading charities said ministers were “fundamentally failing” to adapt asylum and immigration processes to protect the health and wellbeing of the nation, and that the department was instead ”bending over backwards” to maintain its hostile environment policies.

The Independent revealed last week that hundreds of asylum seekers were being forced to choose between travelling to London to submit their claims at the asylum unit or surviving without the support they are entitled to due to a lack of any alternative submission process during the coronavirus lockdown.

The Home Office announced on Wednesday that it had temporarily introduced additional locations to register asylum claims, with “limited operations” in Glasgow, Belfast, Liverpool, Leeds, Solihull and Cardiff.

The department stated that these changes were “contingency measures put in place during the epidemic to fulfil the UK’s statutory requirement to register asylum claims”.

Campaigners said that while the action would mean people travelling shorter distances, it would still in many cases require people to take long journeys through busy areas. They said ministers should instead allow asylum seekers to submit their claims remotely during this time.

Steve Valdez-Symonds, Amnesty UK’s refugee and migrant rights programme director, told The Independent the move “failed to address what the issue”, adding: “It makes absolutely no sense for the Home Office to be insisting on people travelling to make any form of application at this time.

“They should be thinking about how to ensure everybody can do the things that are essential for everybody’s health and welfare. Asking people seeking asylum to travel to make an asylum claim is not doing that.”

Judith Dennis, policy manager at the Refugee Council, said: “It’s clearly not safe for people seeking asylum to travel on public transport during a pandemic to these new regional intake units, which are not on most people’s doorsteps and could require long journeys through busy areas.

“It seems entirely sensible that asylum claims could be made remotely during lockdown, and it’s not clear why the Home Office hasn’t set up a system to facilitate this.”

The Home Office has come under fire in recent weeks for other alleged failings to adapt and change its policies in line with public health guidance during the coronavirus pandemic

Earlier this week, it was accused of causing foreign doctors and nurses in the NHS “unnecessary distress” as they fight coronavirus in Britain’s hospitals after declaring they would have their visas extended free of charge — only to apparently narrow the group that would benefit.

The department has also been criticised for telling people to leave the UK despite travel restrictions. These cases include an elderly woman with lung cancer who was told she must return to Ukraine despite a ban on all air traffic to the country, and a 60-year-old woman told she must return to the US or face deportation.

It also prompted outrage when it emerged a man tested positive for coronavirus after being placed in an immigration removal centre despite his symptoms, fuelling concerns that the hundreds of detainees who are controversially still being held in detention were at risk.

Mr Valdez-Symonds added: “The Home Office is fundamentally failing to evaluate what the situation is now and think about what that means, what power and responsibilities it has and how they can best be used.

“I think it’s pretty shocking that we’re weeks into this and still the Home Office will not fundamentally rethink what its about. It’s basically bending over backwards trying to do the same old thing for the same old reason with as little change to its behaviour as it can.

“It’s the same old culture that has been underlying why our immigration system is so bad, so disrespectful, of the people most affected by them. It doesn’t care about people, it cares about its preconceptions about how to have tough immigration and asylum policies and practices.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “In these unprecedented times the government has adapted its services to keep support in place for vulnerable people like asylum seekers. The new locations across the UK mean they travel short distances for appointments and adhere to social distancing guidelines.”