Why do Asylum Seekers cross the channel on small boats

So GNHQ has now entered the discussion with a Channel 4 Factcheck which says:

Under British law, it’s illegal to enter the country without a visa or special permission. That means someone who reaches the UK on a small boat could face up to four years in prison. But people who make the Channel crossing are protected by international law if they claim asylum once they arrive. That means they can’t be punished while their application is being considered – and if they’re successful, they won’t be prosecuted for the way they arrived. So, arriving by small boat is only illegal if you don’t claim asylum – or if you make an asylum claim and it’s rejected.

So apparently anyone who claims asylum and is rejected is an illegal immigrant and faces up to four years in prison. Can you see a flaw in this reasoning? If we put all the unsuccessful asylum claims in prison then we end up looking after them for four years whether they are successful in their claim or not.

It seems once they’re here they don’t leave. Is this Hotel California?

silverlining48

38,000 is very few over a year spread over the whole country.
3,000 a month really is not a lot of people. Relatively speaking compared to other European countries,

We are not talking about one month or even one year. You need to realise this is endless and will never stop, so 38,000 a year is 190,000 in 5 years. Keep the ball rolling and you have 380,000 in 10 years and so on.

38,000 is very few over a year spread over the whole country.
3,000 a month really is not a lot of people. Relatively speaking compared to other European countries,

My point was that some of these new arrivals can fill those posts.

silverlining48 Heard on the radio this morning that social care and teaching, I think it was, are short of 300,000 people.

So let's add to the shortage by bringing a whole load more people into the country. Keep increasing the population and you just add to the shortage of housing, schools, hospitals, GPs and so on. The BBC have just reported 38,784 'irregular' arrivals in the last year. (their words not mine). These are what were previously known as 'illegal immigrants'. A strange term, I wonder if that's a physical description.

Think this has been said many times but those who arrive as asylum seekers are not illegal immigrants because there is no opportunity to claim asylum anywhere other than here in this country, in person and nothing
has been put in place since Brexit to make things work better.

If they apply and are subsequently denied asylum then they could be seen as illegal but until then they aren’t and can’t.
Problem is the government has been lax in assessing these people and now naturally there is a huge backlog.Because we, unlike most of Europe, don’t have ID cards people can disappear and who can blame them if applications are taking years to decide.

As for homes I put full responsibility or rather blame mrs thatcher for selling off perfectly good council homes at massive discounts to anyone who wanted to buy. These homes were not replaced, so they have been lost for ever, have been resold by those canny purchasers, often children of the tenants, at full price on the open market.

T he refugees I know are decent honourable hard working and very grateful people and I am happy to call them friends.
Heard on the radio this morning that social care and teaching, I think it was, are short of 300,000 people.
Now there’s a thought ……

Witzend did you miss the 1.5 million new homes policy- Angela Rayner etc? Also by forcing pensioners to downsize by increasing heating costs, and abolishing WFA for the just about managing, more family houses should come onto the market.

Whatever the rights or wrongs, the stark fact remains that we do not have nearly enough decent, affordable housing for those already here, both natives and migrants.

Chestnut

'Ignoring reality' comes down to a matter of opinion at to what reality is Iam64. Many of us will not be here in 10 or 20 years time to see the results of your reality. It's our children and grandchildren who will have to deal with the future of our country, and keep living with this endless stream of new arrivals taking everything we can give them.

Absolutely right.

Chestnut, absolutely bang on! In my previous response I was referring to illegal immigration. Some posters seem to get muddled and think I am referring to any kind of immigration!

Sorry my phone has changed your name Maerion.

Thanks for the articles Marrion, informative straightforward helpful reading. Would recommend for everyone especially those who seem to believe that we have more refugees than anywhere else. We don’t.

'Ignoring reality' comes down to a matter of opinion at to what reality is Iam64. Many of us will not be here in 10 or 20 years time to see the results of your reality. It's our children and grandchildren who will have to deal with the future of our country, and keep living with this endless stream of new arrivals taking everything we can give them.

I agree with you, Iam64.

Good article from freemovement debunking the myth that asylum seekers must stop in the first safe country.

freemovement.org.uk/are-refugees-obliged-to-claim-asylum-in-the-first-safe-country-they-reach/

The Ukraine, Poland, Moldova example explains it very clearly.

Also, reminding us that the UK was once part of the Dublin agreement ...

Final paragraph from the article:

So, to sum up, there is no obligation on refugees to claim asylum in the first safe country they reach, although many in fact do. The United Kingdom receives a tiny number of refugees compared to other countries in the EU and beyond. There are multiple reasons why refugees might want to move on from refugee camps or travel to find family members or better prospects. If they do so, and would face a well founded fear of being persecuted in their home country, they are still refugees. There is a system within the EU called the Dublin system under which refugees can be sent back to their point of entry to the EU to have their asylum claims processed there. But the United Kingdom lost access to that system due to Brexit and has not been able to come up with a functioning replacement.

foxie48

On that basisBevsec being an island the UK would never take any asylum seekers unless they were Irish! International humanitarian law does not support your view and, thank goodness, the UK still abides by those laws.

Thanks foxie48, though this calm, accurate and non patronising response will have no impact on posters who continue to ignore reality or legality.

On that basisBevsec being an island the UK would never take any asylum seekers unless they were Irish! International humanitarian law does not support your view and, thank goodness, the UK still abides by those laws.

Racingsparrow please take no notice of these patronizing and unpleasant responses to your post. You are absolutely correct in your comments. These illegal immigrants are indeed passing through safe countries. They should not be coming here.

There are many reasons why asylum seekers come to the U.K. and Racingsparrow clearly you have limited understanding. Do you think it humanitarian to turn flimsy inflatables back mid channel so that desperate people including women and children may drown?
I consider your post ignorant and provocative so won’t engage again.

Racingsparrow

Why do members of this site keep referring them as asylum seekers. They are all illegal immigrants . True asylum seekers would apply for that at the first safe country they entered.

Why then travel through many safe countries to then pay for a smuggler to bring them across the channel.

The answer is that our government is too soft and will not send them straight back . The Australians intercept them at sea and turn them round. We should do the same, our coastline is much much shorter than theirs.

Your post is simply wrong,ill informed and frankly lacking in any understanding of the lives as those seeking asylum
We have crooks and criminal in our existing population, some will be found amongst those seeking asylum
No amount of nonsense about why don’t the stop in another European country and stay away from us will change reality

There is no system for asylum seekers to legitimately request asylum outside of this country. That’s why they are indeed asylum seekers.

Why do members of this site keep referring them as asylum seekers. They are all illegal immigrants . True asylum seekers would apply for that at the first safe country they entered.

Why then travel through many safe countries to then pay for a smuggler to bring them across the channel.

The answer is that our government is too soft and will not send them straight back . The Australians intercept them at sea and turn them round. We should do the same, our coastline is much much shorter than theirs.

A lot of these people come from countries they cannot be sent back to because they are at war and too dangerous.

This why they were prepared to risk the dangerous journey from their home to France and on to the UK, because what they have left behind is far more dangerous than the channel crossing.

MaizieD

GrannyGravy13

Oreo 👍🏻

It is very naive to assume that everyone arriving in the UK is going to be an ^upright citizen^

It's equally naive to assume that they are all going to be criminals out to cheat the system.

That isn’t the point.
The point is that Iam64 wondered if we could really send people back to places like Syria, the legal route.
I have no idea if we can but think we certainly should be able to do this in cases like this criminal and any similar one.

There is a young asylum seeker on Freddie Flintoff's programme, "A Taste of Dreams" who talked about his journey from Afghanistan. His mother sent him because she feared for his life if he stayed there. I think he was only 15 when he left on his own, was beaten many times on his journey. He is now in a 6th form on a sports scholarship (I don't quite know how that came about), is a delightful young man. I found his story moving.