Asylum Seekers in UK a harried lot

Along with changes in the immigration rules, UK has also tightened its Asylum procedures. Most Asylum seeks are being turned away from its ports of entry.

Last week, ugly scenes were witnessed at Stansted Airport, where Asylum seekers being deported calling its treatment as falling below the standards of any civilized society.

Even the members of The Independent Asylum Commission, which is led by an ex-senior judge, calling the present system as blemish on UK’s reputation, admitted that the present system fails to protect the genuine cases where as some fraudulent cases manage to bypass the system. The commission attributed the unfairness attitude to the "culture of disbelief" that leads to unjust decisions. The commission rued the mistreatment of women and those in urgent need of health treatment particularly torture survivors.

However, the Border and Immigration Agency was quick to rebut the opinion claiming that presents system is "firm but humane". Continuing further, it says that UK is a country with a basic instinct of fair play - the system denies fair play to asylum seekers not out of malice but because of a lack of resources and to prevent the misuse of the system at the taxpayers’ expense. The agency continued to say that it will enforce the removal of those who refuse to comply.

The Asylum Commission in the meanwhile maintains that the asylum process combines incredible complexity with systemic incompetence and is not fit for purpose.