ASYLUM SEEKERS

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Asylum seekers were wrongly paid nearly £10 million in benefits last year. A Home Office audit found officials mistakenly handed out £9.6 million in housing benefit and living allowances. Overpayments happened when payouts continued even after asylum cases were concluded. The real total could be even higher because officials at the UK Border Agency have not calculated the cost of errors made in previous years.

Tory MP David TC Davies, who sits on the House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee, said, "This is yet another disgraceful waste of taxpayers' money and another huge blunder by the UK Border Agency. Millions of pounds are being thrown away and very little is being done to prevent it, at a time when the country is economically bankrupt."

The payouts were revealed in the Home Office's official accounts for 2008/9. They showed two-thirds of the total, nearly £7 million, was in cases where payments had been stopped but not within the required time limit. In the remainder, payouts continued after asylum claims were rejected or approved. Officials have been forced to write off the money because of "legal obstacles" to recovering it, the report states. Trying to recover allowances could also leave failed asylum seekers in dire poverty. The document blamed "shortfalls" in the system of bureaucratic controls. It accepts officials do not know how much was wrongly paid out in previous years.

The report states, "When a decision is made for asylum support to be ceased on the casework system, procedures should have ensured that the payment system stopped making payments. There were shortfalls in the controls over those procedures that meant those procedures were not consistently applied. It is possible that cessations made in earlier years were also subject to delays and losses could have occurred, this has not been quantified." New controls have been introduced to stop similar errors in the future, the document states.

Lib Dem home affairs spokesman Chris Huhne said, "This is yet another example of how the Government has created an asylum system that manages to combine staggering incompetence with cruelty. Millions of pounds of taxpayers' money could be saved if asylum seekers were allowed to work to support themselves, rather than relying on state hand outs. Responsibility for the asylum system should be taken away from the blunderings of ministers and given to a Canadian-style independent agency." (Source: 24 Dash, Jan/10)

Thousands of asylum rejects have won a legal battle to get free health treatment on the NHS. Taxpayers face a multi-million pound bill after it was ruled that charges imposed by hospital chiefs were a breach of human rights. More than 11,000 failed asylum-seekers will now get free healthcare after the ruling at London’s High Court. The judgment came after a test case was brought by a rejected Palestinian asylum-seeker on legal aid. Mr Justice Mitting ruled the NHS acted unlawfully by refusing him free treatment for chronic liver disease. Bosses backed down before the case came to court but lawyers continued the battle on behalf of all failed asylum-seekers who agree to go but cannot be removed.

The court heard the man, in his 30s, applied for asylum after arriving here three years ago. His bid was refused due to documentation problems and he was turned away from West Middlesex University Hospital. The judge said charging rules introduced in 2004 by then Health Minister John Hutton were unlawful and said all foreigners given temporary admittance should be treated as UK nationals. Many asylum-seekers enter Britain penniless as “health tourists” seeking costly HIV and Aids treatment. Legal experts say the ruling will open the floodgates for free treatment for virtually all failed asylum seekers. (Source: The Sun, Apr/08)

Asylum seekers are to get trapeze lessons funded by taxpayers’ cash. A UK touring theatre company is spending £60,000 in grants helping teach circus skills in order to improve their confidence. The group also lays on free transport, refreshments and interpreters in Arabic, Farsi, Kurdish Sorani and Kurdish Kurmanji. The Big Top skills, creative writing and drama workshops are offered by BandBazi Circus Theatre, a Brighton-based multicultural performing arts company.

The project is open to people aged between 15 and 25 and backers include Brighton and Hove Council, the Arts Council, and the EU’s Social Fund. A council spokesman said, “The aim is to engage disadvantaged young people, including young refugees and asylum seekers, in positive activities that will encourage them to develop new skills. These include communication and English language skills, and increased self-confidence and self-esteem.” (Source: The Sun, Jan/07)

The Government announced it will stop sending asylum seekers to Derby - at least for the time being. The National Asylum Support Service (NASS), the Government agency that houses asylum seekers while they await the outcome of their residency applications, has called a temporary halt to its dispersal scheme. The move comes after Derby City Council lobbied NASS to stop sending people to the city. Currently, NASS is supporting 1,367 people in Derby - 217 more than the city should have, according to the agency's own guidelines of placing one asylum seeker per 200 of the existing population - which is around 230,000.

The Lib Dem-Tory alliance, which took control of the council in May, says the number of asylum seekers is causing a "serious strain" on housing and health services and that the city cannot cope with a continued influx of asylum seekers. Tory Philip Hickson, council deputy leader, said, "I shall continue to campaign against any more asylum seekers being dispersed in this city. My view is, and always has been, that the policy of introducing large numbers of asylum seekers, which cannot be properly supported, has been a disaster, and I'm glad to see it come to an end."

A few weeks earlier, a petition was handed in to the city council by members of the Asian community of Normanton calling for the council to take action over tensions caused by Iraqi asylum seekers. They claimed that "the asylum seekers should not have been placed in what is a 'majority' Asian community," adding, "this has caused problems because they don't seem to fit in with Western culture." This decision to stop sending asylum seekers here wouldn't have anything to do with the petition, would it?

The Government was accused of "secretly" sending asylum seekers to Derby without informing the city council. Council deputy leader Philip Hickson was outraged. He said it was "highly unethical" of the Government. "We would expect that if there were any changes to the arrangements, they would have to consult with us. They haven't done that. If some sort of dispersal has been arranged, it's certainly a matter we'll take up with NASS and we'll get MPs involved. We wouldn't expect a Government department to under-handedly resume any dispersal."

Mr Hickson estimates there are more than 3,000 refugees in Derby, plus at least 1,500 illegal immigrants. Official figures show there are 1,096 asylum seekers in Derby. David Callow, Derby Voluntary Sector Refugee Forum chairman, which helps asylum seekers and refugees, said most were single working men in private rented accommodation, who would not receive housing waiting list priority. He added, "There's a lot of negativity from people who assume they're drains on society."

Council leaders said they have had assurances that no asylum seekers have been sent to the city since September 2003 saying they would be very unhappy if the Home Office's promises turned out to be misleading. Mr Hickson said, "I will be more than disappointed, I shall be furious. We had an agreement that dispersal to the city would cease. There has been no agreement that it could resume and the council's policy is that it should not resume."

Bill Jeffrey, the head of the Home Office's immigration and nationality directorate, admitted that the Government got it wrong. In a statement, he said, "There has been no dispersal of asylum seekers to Derby since September, 2003, and dispersal to Derby remains suspended. We would not restart dispersing asylum seekers to Derby without consulting fully with Derby City Council and other local partners, to ensure that the needs of the community were taken into account."

Mr Hickson said, "It's an absolute disgrace, an illustration of what a shambles asylum policy is - the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing. I want to reassure people that dispersal will not resume, and the Home Office has now confirmed that dispersal would also not resume, without the city council's knowledge and agreement."

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