by Luke Gittos, spiked
A new High Court judgement has just made it even harder to deport illegal migrants.
The High Court has delivered a judgement ruling unlawful a key element of the UK-France ‘one in, one out’ asylum deal.
Under the deal, the UK can send certain people arriving illegally on small boats back to France. In return, the UK has to accept an equivalent number of migrants who apply for asylum in the UK lawfully.
The legal challenge was brought by five small-boat asylum seekers – four from Eritrea and one from Sudan – selected for a return to France. Their lawyers objected to several elements of the ‘one in, one out’ scheme as it affected their clients. The court ruled all the elements lawful, bar one – namely home secretary Shabana Mahmood’s decision to remove a particular protection relating to human trafficking.
The protection in question is known as the national referral mechanism for modern slavery. It means that those asylum seekers the authorities have decided have not been trafficked have the right to ask for the decision to be reconsidered. This provides a means for an illegal migrant to remain in the UK during the reconsideration period.