Comparison with UK asylum policy

If we want to put our country asylum’s jurisdiction side by side with other countries, United

Kingdom (UK) would be undisputedly be the most practical choice. It is proverbial that the UK

has been receiving immigrants that seek for asylum from all around the world since the mid-20th

century. However, these numbers have been booming throughout the recent years, this is due to

factors like the Syrian war, food shortages, climate changes as well as the crippling governments

in third world countries. Based on the analysis of United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

in 2016 the highest numbers of asylum seekers entering UK were Syrian, Afghan and Iraqi1.

UK is said to have one of the most complete and complex legal system when it comes to

dealing with asylum seekers and immigrants. Just to name a few, there are the Immigration Act

1971, Immigration and Asylum Act 1999, UK Borders Act 2007, as well as Nationality

Immigration and Asylum Act 2002.

UK as the members of United Nations (UN) follow suit with the outlook in asylum matters.

The very first legal expression of asylum was drafted by UN in 1946 Article 14(1) of the 1948

Universal Declaration on Human Rights 2 , it was drafted due to the dystopia situation in

Germany during World War 2. Under Article 14 of this act it is provided that “Everyone has the

right to seek and to enjoy asylum protection and this right may not be invoked in the context of

non-political crimes prosecutions or from any acts that contrary to the objective and principles of

1
“Global Trends forced displacement in2016” (UNHCR 2016)
<https://www.unhcr.org/globaltrends2016/> accessed 25 July 2019
2
Universal Declaration on Human Rights 1948, Article 14(1)
the United Nations.”3 This article generally articulate that every man and woman are subject to the

right of being an asylum seeker in foreign land when certain conditions are fulfilled.

The multilateral treaty, 1951 Refugee Convention4 agreed among United Nations, denote

the basic requirements to get asylum for an individual, must prove he or she has a well-founded

reasonable apprehension of persecution based on one or more of the five elements (Race, Religion,

Nationality, Members of certain social group and Political opinion).

Nevertheless UK realize that they need to have their own regulation in controlling Asylum

seekers as they cannot allow everyone to enter their nation freely. To cope with the circumstances

Immigration Act 1971 5 was drafted by UK parliament to restrict the number of immigrants

entering UK. This act also introduce the Right to Abode which say to be partial on one, who has

connection with UK, where they have special immigrant status by having unrestricted right to live

and work within UK soil. Moreover commonwealth citizens have lost their right to enter UK under

this act, they only allow to stay in UK if they work and live for more than 5 years6.

The act is said to be discriminatory in nature, if we applied it on Malaysia jurisdiction it

would cause tremendous sound of oppose. If we favor on either side of races it would cause

imbalance in distribution of resources and result in unfair situation. Our citizen are very sensitive

with their autonomy and if government showed a hind of favoritism citizen will raise their voice.

3
“Universal Declaration of Human Rights” (United Nations ,2012) <https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-
human-rights/> accessed 25 July 2019
4
The Refugee Convention, 1951
5
Immigration Act 1971
6
“UK immigration acts through the ages” (BBC, 10 October 2013)
<https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-24463873> accessed 25 July 2019
 By virtue of R (European Roma Rights Centre) v Immigration Officer at Prague

Airport7 is a UK asylum case where British immigration officials refused to allow the entry of

passengers with asylum claimed. The claimant argued that the officer’s act was a direct

discrimination and breaching international obligations. The House of Lords held that there is no

present of motive in discrimination of races and it is irrelevant. However the appeal failed as

international law agree that the apply of asylum must be done before entering the country.

Moving on to another point, UK Immigration and Asylum Act of 19998 was born and

designed for one purpose which is to revamp the UK's immigration system with a stricter

regulation imposes on asylum seekers9.

UK government aspire that the act could cope with the demanding number of asylum

seekers thus setting strict fencing towards migrant applications. All asylum seekers are not entitled

to any kind of welfare and benefits that the local citizen enjoy. Next, under this act asylum seekers

are often dispersed to all corners of the country mainly rural areas as it serve to reduce economic

competitiveness with local inhabitants 10 . On top of this, this act also gives more authority to

immigration officers for patrolling and arresting illegal immigrants. It was written under Schedule

2 of the 1971 Immigration Act, where Home Secretary has the power to detain any immigrants

who seek asylum in UK for a limited duration11. Soon after, the detention center has expanded

their capacity to cope with the rising demands which has quadrupled over the years.

7
[2004] UKHL 55
8
Immigration and Asylum Act 1999
9
“UK civil liberties” (The Guardian, 19 January 2009)
<https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/libertycentral/2009/jan/13/immigration-asylum-act> accessed 25
July 2019
10
“Asylum in the UK”( UNHCR, 2018)
<https://www.unhcr.org/uk/asylum-in-the-uk.html> accessed 25 July 2019
11
Immigration Act 1971, Schedule 2
By virtue of Secretary of State for the Home Department ex parte Saadi12 (also known as the

‘Oakington’ case) it was expostulate that the mere detention without reasoning of asylum seekers

was amounted to breach of the right to liberty under Article 5 ECHR. The purpose of detention

was undeniable for the sake of administrative convenience of the Home Office. Sadly the Lords13

held the government’s policy of detention was reasonable and it was justified under the terms of

Article 5(1) (f)14.

Nevertheless, this act received tons of criticism from international community. One of the

most dispute issue of the act is dispersing the asylum seekers and they were forced to agree with

the location they are being assigned with. If not, the local government will not lend a hand and no

aid will be given. In reality, the system made good use of those unused housing areas that are often

aged and rusty to relocate asylum seekers. In essence this denote asylum seekers are relocated to

neighborhoods with deteriorating economics and facilities, thus they are often isolated with the

urban world and are exposed to potentially areas with high crime rates and violence.

Asylum seekers are often blamed for all these violent acts, however this could be blamed

on the economic isolation imposed on asylum seekers by the local government. It only makes the

local authority harder to manage the situation and harder for asylum seekers to look for local

support or organizations to back them up. As the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants

stated: "These policies are not only discriminatory in nature towards one of the most vulnerable

sections of our society yet it also sculpture one of the worst kinds of social’s code of conduct15."

12
Secretary of State for the Home Department ex parte Saadi [2002] UKHL 41
13
“Judgments - Secretary of State For The Home Department Ex Parte Saadi”( House of Lords, 2002)
<https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200102/ldjudgmt/jd021031/regina-1.htm> accessed 25 July 2019
14
ECHR, Article 5(1)(f)
15
Tosin Sulaiman “The asylum alternatives: proposals for reform” (19 August 2001)
<https://www.theguardian.com/society/2001/aug/19/asylum1> accessed 25 July 2019
 To make things worse, the asylum program in UK is deteriorating as most of the asylum

seekers face numerous restriction and tight security control. Hence some of them who did not cross

the bar of requirement set by the Home Office were forced to return to their homeland and wait

for their appeals16. Nonetheless, Article 3 of Human Rights Act acknowledge that the court should

not grant removal of asylum seekers back to their home land as it would otherwise result in a ‘real

risk’ of unfair circumstances17. Moreover they are curtailed in accessing medical supply and each

individual is only given £37.75 per week for their food and apparel18.

Under the case of R v Secretary of State for the Home Department ex parte Limbuela19,

House of Lords upheld the decision that “…the government’s policy of putting a halt for support

until an asylum seeker was in dire poverty, suffer from inhuman and degrading treatment before

reinstating proper support was in essence breach of Article 3 ECHR.”

On the other hand, in the case of Maaouia v France20 the appellant was born in Tunisia

entered France at age of 22 and was being charged for committing armed robbery. As such Minister

of the Interior made deportation order against him. He failed to comply with the order. The Court

sentenced him to one year of imprisonment and made an order preventing him from entering

French territory for ten years. The issue here in this case is whether the proceedings for the

blacklisting order is in connection with ‘civil rights and obligations’ for the purpose of Article 6(1)

16
“UK Settlement Scheme”( Home Office in the media, 2018)
<https://homeofficemedia.blog.gov.uk/2018/06/21/fact-sheet/> accessed 25 July 2019
17
“Freedom from torture and inhuman or degrading treatment”( Equity and Human Rights Commission, 2010)
<https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/en/human-rights-act/article-3-freedom-torture-and-inhuman-or-
degrading-treatment> accessed 25 July 2019
18
“Asylum Support “(Turns 2 Us, 2015)
<https://www.turn2us.org.uk/Your-Situation/A-Migrant/Asylum-Seekers/UK-Visas-and-Immigration-support>
accessed 25 July 2019
19
R v Secretary of State for the Home Department ex parte Limbuela [2005] UKHL 66
20
Maaouia v France [2000] ECHR 455
of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights21. In other words the House of Lord was in

question that whether the basic right of an asylum seeker was being deprive.

Therefore, hereby we could sum up that every judicial system, legal principle, legal rules

and regulations has its own Achilles’ heel and exceptions. The issue of asylum seekers is an

international affair, every jurists system has their own protocol to abide with, and sometimes they

might even get politically influenced for the purpose of safeguarding their own country’s interest.

Nonetheless, all nation should not be egocentric and should treat everyone equally.

Moreover, Malaysia as a member of United Nation (UN) similar with UK should continue

follow the footsteps and take precedent from all those 1st world countries when dealing with issue

like immigrants or asylum seekers. Despite UK’s Asylum Act having all the pros and cons, our

country legal system could not attach on it 100 percent as what it is. Why? It simply due to the

different of local circumstances with EU countries, for instance could be our limited land mass. If

our government allow to pour in a great numbers of immigrants our population demographic could

has a huge impact and we just could not afford to provide all the infrastructure or welfare to them.

We need to acknowledge that even our own local citizen that belong to minority groups like natives

do not even receive all their welfare equally, how do we aspect the government to give it to the

“outsiders” that are in destitute. In essence we need to take precautions review when applying

UK’s asylum laws it must suit our local circumstances.

21
International Journal of Refugee Law, Volume 13, Issue 3, July 2001, Pages 381–399,
<https://doi.org/10.1093/ijrl/13.3.381> accessed 25 July 2019
Statistics of asylum seekers in EU

22

Figure 1

Figure 1.1 illustrates the number of asylum applicants in the EU member states from the

year 2008 to 2018. These asylum applications are made under the Protocol Relating to the Status

of Refugees and The Refugee Convention 1951. In the period of 2008 to 2018, the lowest amount

of first time applicants was in the year of 2008 whereby there were 152.9 thousand applicants

while non-first time applicants amounted to 72.3 thousand. In total there were 225.2 thousand

applicants in 2008. This amount peaked in 2015 whereby first-time applicants amounted to 1.256

million, non-first time applicants at 66.2 thousand. In total there were 1.323 million applicants in

2015 as the Syrian War crisis deepens and living conditions deteriorate. There was a sharp fall in

22
'Asylum Statistics - Statistics Explained' (Ec.europa.eu, 2019) <https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-
explained/index.php/Asylum_statistics#Number_of_asylum_applicants:_drop_in_2018> accessed 29 July 2019
asylum applicants in 2016 to 2017 due to EU members cracking down on refugees such as

Denmark and Sweden23.

Figure 2

Figure 2 shows the countries of origin of first-time applicant asylum seekers in the EU in

the year 2017 and 2018. As illustrated, the three highest nationalities of asylum seekers who are

first time applicants are Syrians, Afghans and Iraqis. In 2017, the number of Syrian totaled at

102 thousand, Afghans totaled at 43 thousand and Iraqis totaled at 45 thousand. In the year of

2018, Syrians totaled at 80 thousand, Afghans at 41 thousand and Iraqis at 39 thousand.

23
Crouch D, 'Sweden And Denmark Crack Down On Refugees At Borders' (the Guardian, 2016)
<https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/03/sweden-to-impose-id-checks-on-travellers-from-denmark>
accessed 30 July 2019
 Figure 3

Figure 3 pictures the amount of asylum seekers taken in by various EU member

countries. In 2017, Germany took in 195 thousand first-time applicants while in 2018, Germany

took in 165 thousand first-time applicants totaling at 360 thousand for both years. The second

country which took in the most applicants is France. In 2017, France took in 90 thousand

applicants while in 2018 it took in 110 thousand applicants, totaling at 200 thousand. Thirdly is

Italy which took in a staggering 125 thousand applicants in 2017 and 50 thousand in 2018,

amounting to 175 thousand applicants.