A million people are estimated to have been displaced from their homes in southern Lebanon since Israel’s air strikes began against Hezbollah. These include many Syrian refugees who had previously fled to Lebanon to escape civil war. And Iran’s missile attacks in retaliation is in turn forcing Israelis living near the border to flee to shelters. Long before the Israeli airstrikes began Hezbollah had been firing rockets into northern Israel, which means that many Israelis had already fled south even before these recent developments.
Meanwhile, in Austria, the far-right Freedom Party’s performance is the latest in a series of election victories for populist European anti-immigration parties.
And immigration dominates the Conservative leadership contest, with Kemi Badenoch warning that some immigrants will not share British values, and Robert Jenrick calling for the UK to leave the European Convention on Human Rights, to make it easier to deport migrants.
All these issues remind us that mass migration is a major global concern, as escalating conflicts add daily to the numbers of people being uprooted from their homes.
I am vocal on this issue because the debate has become so unpleasant that we can easily forget that migrants and refugees are human beings just like us. Terms such as ‘illegals’ and ‘invaders’ dismiss and dehumanise them, and create the impression of hordes of dangerous criminals swarming onto our shores. In fact many are fleeing from war, persecution and other horrors that we are deeply fortunate not to experience in the UK. Who doesn’t want a secure home and to live without fear?
No-one is suggesting we fling open our borders to all-comers. But this is clearly a fluid situation requiring international co-operation. And we must consider refugees with compassion and humanity at all times.
Keir Starmer has been speaking with Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni about her policy of making deals with countries that migrants travel through, such as Libya and Tunisia, to stop them reaching Europe. But reducing the numbers arriving on Italian shores doesn’t mean the refugees simply disappear. Instead many report kidnap, rape, arbitrary detention and other abusive treatment during their arduous journeys through these areas. So we need to be deeply concerned with the human consequences of any agreements the UK makes.
I support the PM’s desire to stop criminal gangs profiteering from the plight of desperate migrants. But stamping out the gangs won’t remove the demand from people fleeing persecution. Refugees will still attempt to reach Britain, and other malign actors will step in to offer even more dangerous options. A case in point is this: when inflatable boats are prevented from reaching France, they are in reality replaced with poorer quality vessels, which are then vastly over-filled, leading to further deaths as they capsize en route. Again we need to think through the consequences of these policies.
There is no silver bullet to stop channel crossings – and I doubt we will altogether – but we must consider the reasons why smugglers have become an integral part of the way asylum seekers reach the UK.
People fleeing their lives will journey however they can, and with no legal routes for travel to the UK to seek asylum, they will pay a smuggler. This is the reality. So let’s offer certain groups the choice of a safe route and the criminal gangs will lose custom. It also gives us control over the numbers, and time to prepare for arrivals.
Alongside this we need a functioning asylum system which can process applicants quickly. This will deter those who should not be here, and ensure that people are not lodged for months in hotels, banned from working, claiming benefits or having any sort of a life. Mental health issues and suicide attempts are alarmingly high among those who are simply left in limbo. We should humanely return those who do not have genuine claims, and welcome and integrate those who do.
Other humane policies would include a renewed global resettlement scheme quota, where the UNHCR selects refugees whose protection needs cannot be met in their current location. Once a person has refugee status in the UK, the process of family members joining them under Refugee Family Reunion should be expanded where the closest living relatives are not a partner or child under 18.
Finally, let’s pilot a capped Humanitarian Visa for selected countries where we already grant a high rate of asylum applications, such as Iran, Eritrea and Sudan.
In this debate we need some perspective. Not everyone is trying to reach the UK. 85% of refugees settle in the country next to their home. The French take three times more refugees than we do.
Most importantly, we need to think of asylum seekers as human. It was right to scrap the inhumane Rwanda plan, and we must reject any language or approach that treats migrants as objects, vermin or invaders.
But I’m disappointed that we’re not hearing anything from government to address the dangerous journeys people take to get to the UK to claim asylum. As well as going after the gangs, a proper conversation about safe routes would go a long way towards reducing the attraction of these dangerous and desperate attempts to reach our shores.
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