Britain expands 'Deport Now Appeal Later" scheme to 15 more countries

UPI

a day ago

Aug. 11 (UPI) -- Britain tripled the number of countries whose citizens face being deported immediately upon having their asylum claim denied or being convicted of a crime as part of a so-called "Deport Now Appeal Later" scheme designed to prevent foreigners from using the legal system to remain in the country.
An additional 15 countries, including Canada, Australia, India and Bulgaria, were being added to the existing eight whose nationals could now be returned before being able to appeal, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper and Foreign Secretary David Lammy said in a news release Sunday.
They said expanding the scheme, which applies in England and Wales only, would ease pressure on the detention system and prison overcrowding by boosting the government's ability to "remove foreign criminals at the earliest opportunity."
Foreign nationals who have had their human rights claim denied will be deported to their home country, from where they can lodge an appeal, taking part in any proceeding via video-link.
Separately, the Justice Ministry unveiled a parallel scheme that will work in tandem, removing foreign national offenders immediately after sentencing, saving taxpayers the cost of holding them until the current halfway point in their sentence in British prisons before they can be deported.
Prisoners serving long prison terms for terrorism, murder and other serious offenses will have to serve out their sentences before becoming eligible for deportation.
"For far too long, foreign criminals have been exploiting our immigration system, remaining in the U.K. for months or even years while their appeals drag on. That has to end. Those who commit crimes in our country cannot be allowed to manipulate the system, which is why we are restoring control and sending a clear message that our laws must be respected and will be enforced," said Cooper.
People whose asylum claim has been denied can be removed before their appeal if the home secretary can certify it would not breach the European Convention on Human Rights, which says people cannot be removed if they would be exposed to "serious irreversible harm" by doing so.
Most of the other countries being added to the list are in Africa and Asia with the new countries accounting for 774 prisoners, or just 7% of the 10,772 foreigners serving time in prisons in England and Wales. Albanians are the largest foreign group in the prison population with 1,193 inmates.
The Home Office claimed it had removed 5,200 people since the Labour government took office in July 2024, up 14% on the previous 12 months.
The changes are part of a government pledge to tackle "illegal" migration that it said had resulted in 35,000 people with no right to remain being returned in the past 12 months, a 50% jump in workplace raids and arrests and paring down the asylum claims backlog by more than doubling the number of decisions.
Shadow Home Secretary, Conservative MP Chris Philp, criticized what he said was a U-turn by Prime Minister Keir Starmer's Labour government.
"Until Keir Starmer either commits to deporting all foreign criminals or stops rolling out the red carpet for migrants the world over, this problem is not going away," Philp said.
The government is in the early stages of formulating new legislation to crack down on what it claims is abuse of a "right to a family life" clause in the country's Human Rights Act -- incorporating the ECHR into British law -- which it argues is widely invoked in appeals against deportation or when asylum claims are denied.
Under the strategy, defendants with immediate family in the United Kingdom can argue that separating them from their relatives by forcibly removing them to another country is a breach of their human rights.