How the UK immigration system hurts people: September 2021
This month’s recap features continuing to house asylum seekers in unsafe conditions and keeping hundreds of thousands of EU citizens in limbo with Settlement Scheme applications still awaiting decisions.
7 min readSep 30, 2021
About my monthly recaps
I’m spending 2021 doing a monthly running challenge to fundraise for the Join Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI).
Read my blog post about why I’m fundraising for JCWI
As part of the fundraiser, I will be writing a monthly blog post on:
- how the monthly running challenge went (on my running blog)
- what happened in the world of UK immigration and asylum in the past month (here on Medium)
Past recaps
Now let’s get to September 2021.
Refusing to resettle Afghan refugees if they arrive in UK through small boat Channel crossings
Making refugees live on £39 a week
Placing Afghan refugees in hotels for an indefinite amount of time because of no housing plans
Dragging immigrants into destitution because of No Recourse to Public Funds
Deporting 828 people in 2020 and spending £9 million on flights for it
Refusing blanket amnesty for 3,000 Afghan asylum seekers in the UK
Enabling GP surgeries to wrongly refuse to register undocumented immigrants
Taking 8 months on average to decide on people’s ability to stay in the UK (when they’re promised 8 weeks instead)
Holding child asylum seekers in unregulated hotel accommodation
Not providing hygiene essentials to Afghan asylum seekers in government accommodation
Planning to send boats with migrants in them back across the Channel…
…even though it’s illegal and endangers lives
Making a teenage asylum seeker fear he was going to be deported so he committed suicide
Planning to use armoured jet skis to push back boats carrying migrants
Deporting someone who now fears for his life
Rejecting an application for a British citizen’s EU citizen wife to move to the UK
Potentially criminalising Afghan refugees through new borders bill
Planning an asylum overhaul which will lead to direct racial discrimination
Not deciding on hundreds of thousands EU Settlement Scheme applications 10 weeks after the deadline
Wrongly hounding migrant women to pay for maternity care
Failing to rectify issues with housing asylum seekers in military barracks
Charging an asylum seeker £100,000 in hospital bills
Making Windrush victims wait on average 434 days for compensation
Initially rejecting the application of a boy to join his brother in the UK, claiming there was insufficient evidence of a close relationship
Planning to house Afghan refugees in temporary hotel accommodation for months
Breaking international law through new asylum plan
Issuing confusing documentation rules that will likely lead to EU citizens being barred from flights
Letting EU student reclaim the cost of the Immigration Health Surcharge, but only if they agree not to work while studying
Offering an insulting three-month visa to combat driver and poultry worker shortages
Speedily removing potential victims of trafficking from the UK
Not planning to give asylum seekers the right to work despite promised review
Dumping child refugees in unsafe hotels
Creating the conditions leading to a child migrant dying while trying to reach the UK
Cramming asylum seekers in 24-bed hostel rooms despite Covid-19 risk
Angry? Disgusted? Ashamed? Then donate
If you are in any way appalled at what you just read happens in a single month in the world of UK immigration, please consider donating to my fundraiser for the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants.
They’re doing the important work to both help those affected by the system, and help end the abuses of the system.
