UK: The Lilley-Howard package (feature)
01 November 1995
The most extensive package of anti-immigrant and anti-refugee measures ever have been proposed by Home Secretary Michael Howard and social security secretary Peter Lilley. It threatens to destroy asylum rights and the immigration appeals system as well as creating untold misery among immigrants and refugees in Britain and leading to a spiral of popular racism.
The Bill
The Asylum and Immigration Bill was finally published on 29 November, after a long summer of hints and pronouncements from Michael Howard. Its main provisions are:
* a "white list" of designated countries of origin of asylum-seekers deemed safe. Asylum claimants from these countries will have to meet a legal presumption of safety; on 11 December Howard announced the list of countries: Bulgaria, Cyprus, Ghana, India, Pakistan, Poland and Romania. Amnesty commented: "We have serious concerns about all the countries on the list."
* the extension of "fast-track" appeals, currently used for asylum-seekers who have travelled through "safe" countries, to a raft of other claims deemed "manifestly unfounded";
* the abolition of an in-country or suspensive right of appeal in asylum claims involving "safe" countries of transit;
* criminal sanctions for employers who hire people who are here illegally or whose conditions of stay give them no right to work for the particular employer (subject to the statutory defence that the employer has seen documents to be specified by the minister;
* up to seven years' imprisonment for anyone who helps an asylum-seeker to get in to the country (except those acting "otherwise than for gain" or who work for a bona fide refugee assistance organisation);
* no local authority housing for immigrants "of a class to be specified" by the minister;
* no child benefit for immigrants (including permanent residents).
Lilley's regulations
The main provisions of the Social Security (Miscellaneous Amendment) Regulations are:
* removal of all benefits from asylum-seekers immediately their claim is rejected by the Home Office (they are currently entitled to Urgent Cases Payments, which is 90% of Income Support, and to Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit, which continue during appeals);
* denial of entitlement to all benefits from anyone who claims asylum after coming to the UK in other capacity, eg visitor (currently 70% of asylum-seekers);
* denial of benefits to any immigrant who has been refused further leave to remain in any capacity, or told to leave the country (currently, benefits continue while appeals are pending);
* denial of all benefits to "sponsored immigrants" (eg, children and elderly parents of people settled here), even when they themselves are granted permanent residence, unless sponsor dies.
The justification
Howard justified this package by crying "bogus refugees", pointing to the very low recognition rate for refugees in the UK (4%). This is a sleight of hand which adds insult to the injuries perpetrated on asylum-seekers over the past decade: the visa requirements, the carrier sanctions, the reception conditions and the dramatic slashing of the proportion recognised as requiring asylum (either by refugee status or by the grant of exceptional leave) from around 4/5 of claimants to 1/5 in the past two years. The dramatic reduction in the proportion of asylum-seekers allowed to stay was in part due to a policy decision all but abolishing exceptional leave to remain or "humanitarian" status for victims of war or civil war in countries such as Somalia, Sri Lanka and Lebanon. In part it was the removal, after the 1993 Act came in, of a number of procedural safeguards which the Home Office had been forced to concede to compensate for the lack of an in-country appeal right. These included a "minded to refuse" stage which allowed the asylum-seeker to address Home Office objections and present further evidence or argument before a definite refusal. Once the 1993 A