The U.K. will introduce the “most significant changes” to its asylum seeker process of recent times to combat “huge pressure on local communities,” the country’s home secretary has said.
Why It Matters
The current Labour government is battling the rise of the right-wing Reform party and heavy criticism on immigration from the opposition Conservatives. It has toughened up its stance on illegal immigration into the country, particularly on small boats making the journey from France.
London announced a pilot scheme with Paris in August based on a “one in, one out” policy, designed to deter Channel crossings by returning migrants who arrive legally in the U.K. and accepting the same number of approved asylum seekers.
What To Know
Under the new rules, people granted as in the U.K. will need to wait two decades before they can start the process of settling permanently in Britain. This is four times the current waiting period of five years.
Refugees who have homes or family members in the U.K. may also have to return to their home countries if their nation of origin is deemed safe. This will be subject to review every two and a half years.
Asylum seekers who are eligible to work, or those who have committed crimes, will not be able to claim financial support or accommodation paid for by the British taxpayer. Mahmood said on Sunday just under 10 percent of the people currently in asylum accommodation can work in the U.K.
The home secretary said the new rules will “restore order and control to our borders” and slash the number of “illegal arrivals” reaching the U.K. “Genuine refugees” who arrive in the country legally will still be able to access “sanctuary,” she said.
Mahmood sent British officials to Denmark to look at Copenhagen’s immigration controls in October, particularly the Nordic country’s policy on temporary stays, British broadcaster Sky News reported earlier in November.
The home secretary said 400,000 people had claimed asylum in the U.K. over the past four years, with 100,000 paid for by British taxpayers. “Illegal migration is creating division across our country,” Mahmood said on Sunday. “This is a broken system.”
A total of more than 111,000 people claimed asylum in the U.K. in the year up to June 2025, an increase of 14 percent on the previous year-long window, according to the Home Office. This is the highest number on record, according to the U.K. government.
The U.K. received on average 16 asylum claims for every 100,000 residents in 2024, according to experts at the University of Oxford.
The Home Office said on Friday it had “prevented 20,000 Channel crossings” through work with French officials and disrupted hundreds of gang activities in the last financial year.
Mahmood said the current government had overseen “record levels of immigration raids and arrests.”
U.S. President Donald Trump and his administration have supervised wave upon wave of raids carried out by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers across the U.S. Trump has pledged to carry out the “single largest Mass Deportation Program in History” and in June, despite protests, ordered authorities to ”expand efforts to detain and deport Illegal Aliens in America’s largest Cities, such as Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, where Millions upon Millions of Illegal Aliens reside.”
The Department of Homeland Security said on Saturday it was launching a new push, dubbed “Operation Charlotte’s Web,” in the North Carolina city of Charlotte, targeting “criminal illegal aliens.” Local officials in the Democratic-run city criticized the operation.
What People Are Saying
British Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood told the BBC on Sunday: “What the new reforms will do is change that generations-old assumption that sanctuary provided to refugees can very quickly lead to permanent settlement.”
