Comments by "TJ Marx" (@tjmarx) on "Home Office to move asylum seekers back onto Bibby Stockholm barge" video.
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@edix1673 Roflmao. Yeah, that isn't how any of that works. These are defined by the UDHR in 1948, and expanded by the refugee convention 3 years later in 1951. Both are ratified in whole by the UK. Only those countries whom are ratified signatories are subject.
An asylum seeker is a person who invokes their rights under the convention. To qualify you must be either
1. Fleeing war in your source country, where the war directly impacts your safety.
2. Be facing one or more of a list of specific kinds of persecution by the government, or other authority in the source country for a trait protected by the UDHR.
Asylum seeker is a legal term and status. One becomes an asylum seeker upon entry to their host country and submitting an asylum claim. They remain an asylum seeker until such time as their application has been approved by the host country.
Refugee is likewise a legal term and status. ONLY upon approval of an asylum claim does an asylum seeker become a refugee. Refugee status is ONLY applicable in their approved host country. Should a refugee leave their host country and seek asylum in a third country for any reason they return to asylum seeker status.
Where an irregular border crossing does not involve an asylum claim, or where an asylum claim is not approved, that individual has committed a crime and is eligible to be deported.
Importantly, the UDHR nor the refugee convention provide protection for poverty. Indeed both documents are explicit that poverty is not cause for asylum.
The ECHR, which the UK is a signatory to; provides other reasons for leave to stay. A person seeking leave to stay under the ECHR is neither an asylum seeker nor a refugee. Those are terms exclusive to claims under the UDHR clause 14. The ECHR discusses immigration on compassionate grounds, such as where an asylum claim has been refused yet it has taken so long to decide that the claimant has set down roots in the community as defined through criteria by the ECHR. This clause is a loophole that has been exploited across all of its signatories for the last few decades. All such signatories are cracking down on it now because too many people from undeveloped and developing countries are getting leave to stay. That is the point of keeping claimants on a barge for example, they can never become part of the community.
Importantly the ECHR is also explicit that poverty is NOT protected by any of it's compassionate immigration clauses.
There are many reasons why, but not least of which is because it's just another form of colonialism by developed countries like the UK against developing countries like the source countries the illegal economic migrants are coming from. Also because it does things like create high inflation, housing crisis', and overburdened services with unsustainable funding requirements.
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@Jfalways What aren't the home office doing exactly? There are many more people showing up on the border than in previous years. Each one of whom has to be processed to the same standard.
If I show up at your house and say I'm from where ever, please help me I'm going to be murdered, but have no documentation how do you verify my story? What if more and more people started showing up at your doorstep claiming the same without documentation. What if it was a legal requirement for you to house me and the many other people who turned up until you could demonstrate factually that no one was trying to murder us. But you can't make us permanent in your house until you know we aren't lying. Then there's the problem of there no being enough room for us all. What steps would you take? How long do you think it might take to find that information?
I think the home office do a wonderful job with the bad situation they're faced with. We're talking about people who turn up without as much as basic ID. Their identities have to be verified. Their stories have to be verified. The immediate risk of death has to be verified and assessed. Their criminal past has to be verified and assessed, the UDHR is clear that criminals, war criminals and people fleeing reasonable prosecution should never be granted asylum. How do you achieve all that without documentation? That's why it takes so long. These cases involve diplomatic relations, even the intelligence services sometimes.
Labour always talk about speeding things up in the home office when in opposition, but never deliver that when in office. Because there is no switch you can just flick to make the process faster. It takes as long as it takes. By the official figures 81% are granted leave to stay, but the make up of that statistic is concerning. Only 13% are found to be genuine asylum seekers, the remainder are illegal economic migrants granted leave to stay on humanitarian grounds under the ECHR. It takes so long to process their claims they develop community roots and must be allowed to stay even though their asylum application is denied.
The solution to this problem is not found in the speed of processing at the home office. The solution is to deter illegal economic migrants from coming in the first place. That's the point of the barges. It's the point of offshore processing (such as the Rwanda policy). Deterring illegal economic migrants is the difference between the home office dealing with just 5K claims a year, verse 45K+ claims a year.
Greece and Poland shoot at them. Processing them in a third, safe neutral country is quite humane by comparison.
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