Tuesday, November 01, 2022
A major embarrassment
Has it really got to the stage when one of the major offices of state is being held by a right-wing extremist, whose actions and words would be better suited to a 1970s National Front rally? The only difference it seems to me, is that the National Front would have been targeting Suella Braverman and her family, whereas she seems determined to prevent desperate asylum seekers and economic migrants from following in her family's footsteps in establishing themselves as British citizens.
The Home Secretary's performance in the House of Commons yesterday, was a disgrace. As the Guardian reports, Braverman described desperate people seeking to clain asylum from war, torture, hunger and drought as an 'invasion'. She is right that many of them are being facilitated by criminal gangs, but that is largely her government's fault for not putting proper processes in place.
The fact remains that if the UK Government worked with France to process asylum seekers before they crossed the channel, and if they got their act together and processed people quicker, then there would be fewer families risking their lives on the English Channel, while the scandal of overcrowding and illegal detention at the Manston asylum seekers centre could have been avoided. It is only ideological posturing by Tory ministers that is stopping that happening.
As Emily Maitlis tweeted yesterday, the immigration numbers have grown bigger since Brexit not got smaller. The reason is not “ marauding criminal gangs “ (more than 80% whose cases are heard are ultimately granted asylum) but a break down in relations with France and others.
She also believes that if we spent more money on speeding up the asylum process there would ironically be far less pressure on the system. You only have to look at this graph to see that the backlog is not due to the number of arrivals, but the incompetence of the government in processing them:
The Home Secretary's performance in the House of Commons yesterday, was a disgrace. As the Guardian reports, Braverman described desperate people seeking to clain asylum from war, torture, hunger and drought as an 'invasion'. She is right that many of them are being facilitated by criminal gangs, but that is largely her government's fault for not putting proper processes in place.
The fact remains that if the UK Government worked with France to process asylum seekers before they crossed the channel, and if they got their act together and processed people quicker, then there would be fewer families risking their lives on the English Channel, while the scandal of overcrowding and illegal detention at the Manston asylum seekers centre could have been avoided. It is only ideological posturing by Tory ministers that is stopping that happening.
As Emily Maitlis tweeted yesterday, the immigration numbers have grown bigger since Brexit not got smaller. The reason is not “ marauding criminal gangs “ (more than 80% whose cases are heard are ultimately granted asylum) but a break down in relations with France and others.
She also believes that if we spent more money on speeding up the asylum process there would ironically be far less pressure on the system. You only have to look at this graph to see that the backlog is not due to the number of arrivals, but the incompetence of the government in processing them:
The fact is that Brexit did not give us control over our borders as was claimed, it put us outside the EU and prevents us working with European partners to better deal with migration pressures. This Home Secretary and this government are an embarrassment, and the suffering their policies is causing is making the UK a pariah on the international stage.
