Cost to taxpayers rises as UK considers larger payouts to rejected asylum seekers
Approximately 700 Albanian families might be offered more than £3,000 to leave the UK, as ministers handle a rising immigration bill.
Taxpayers are still providing housing for asylum seekers with children, whose claims have already been rejected and who have declined to go home voluntarily.
Last month, the Home Secretary criticized the lack of urgency by her department in deporting them, as she announced extensive changes to the immigration system.
Shabana Mahmood is now considering increasing the amount of money offered to migrants who agree to leave, in order to expedite their removal.
Alex Norris, the border security minister, told LBC it was a ‘good investment for the taxpayer’ but declined to specify how high the payment could go.
“Currently, we can pay people about £3,000,” he said, “and I make no apology for that.
“It means we can get them removed more quickly and the taxpayer saves money because they’re not being housed in hotels with expensive nightly rates.
“We are considering whether increasing that might help, especially with families, because we have 700 Albanian families who are failed asylum seekers in the system.
“If a small incentive encourages them to leave, then that of course is the right thing to do, and that’s why we’re looking into it.”
This is occurring as officials warned that the lack of priority around removing families has meant the “personal benefit of placing a child on a dangerous small boat outweighs the considerable risks of doing so.”
An eighth immigration removals center was opened by the Home Office this week, near Oxford, to help increase deportation flights.
Campsfield House adds 160 beds to the 2,400 currently available across UK detention sites and is set to expand further, by another 240 spaces, in the future.
The site will detain small boat arrivals alongside foreign national criminals due for deportation and immigration offenders found to be working in the UK illegally.
Surveying the facility before the first migrants were moved in, Alex Norris told LBC: “The public expects order and control in our migration system, and a core part of that is increasing the number of people being removed.
“To achieve that, you’ve got to have really good detention. So that’s the facility we’re opening here for that final leg before people leave the country.
“We’ve made really significant strides during our time in government, but we do want to see more.
“We’re going to make changes, as we committed to a couple of weeks ago, to the law, to ensure that, whether it’s the domestic interpretation or international treaties, they don’t hinder that.”
Politics Editor
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