A potential “ban” on asylum for migrants crossing the English Channel would be “barbaric” and unlawful, charities have said.
Suella Braverman is expected to use her first major speech as home secretary to announce a new bill that would go further than a huge raft of immigration laws passed just five months ago.
Sources told The Times the legislation would be designed to create a “blanket ban” on anyone who enters the UK illegally, including by small boats, from claiming refuge.
It is not yet clear how the new home secretary’s plans would be implemented or deviate from measures previously brought in by Priti Patel.
Ahead of Ms Braverman’s address to the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham, the Refugee Action charity hailed a “day of shame for the government”.
Chief executive Tim Naor Hilton said: “It is now clear that this home secretary cares only for keeping people out, not keeping them safe.
“Banning those crossing the Channel from claiming asylum is a blatant breach of the international refugee laws that the UK proudly helped create in the first place.
“These plans wilfully ignore the fact that it is a lack of safe routes into the country that pushes people into the hands of smugglers.
“The government cannot continue to run roughshod over its international responsibilities and threaten refugees with deportation or jail simply for asking for help.”
So far this year more than 33,500 people have arrived in the UK after making the journey from France, with the number surging to new records despite measures the Home Office claimed would act as deterrents – including the Rwanda deal and a £100,000 online communications campaign.
Home Office figures show that between January 2018 and June 2022, 94 per cent of migrants crossing the Channel on small boats claimed asylum.
Record numbers are stuck in a decisions backlog but of the applications considered, only 8 per cent were refused. Half were granted and the British government refused to assess the remainder by declaring them “inadmissible” under internal immigration rules.
Parliamentary committees, experts and charities have long called for the government to tackle Channel crossings by creating alternatives.
There is no visa for those travelling to the UK to seek asylum, and resettlement schemes do not apply to refugees who have already reached Europe on their journeys.
Clare Mosley, the founder of refugee charity Care4Calais, called the reported proposals “barbaric, untruthful and unnecessary”.
“There is a mountain of evidence that the vast majority crossing the Channel are genuine refugees, this criminalisation of them is blatant victim blaming of incredibly vulnerable people, simply for the purpose of grabbing headlines,” she said.
“Those who have escaped from the worst horrors in this world should not be risking their lives once again simply to claim asylum in the UK. The obvious answer is to give them safe passage. This would break the model of people smugglers and save lives.”
Ms Braverman is also expected to announce measures to increase the number of migrant boats intercepted by French authorities and support operations against smuggling gangs on the European mainland.
A spokesperson for the Conservative Party said the home secretary would “commit to looking at” new laws to deport people who arrive in Britain illegally, and set out her intention to ensure that government policies “cannot be derailed by abuse of modern slavery laws, the Human Rights Act or the European Court of Human Rights”.
The Safe Passage International charity accused Ms Braverman of “re-heating the same cruel and illegal ideas of her predecessor”.
Home Secretary Suella Braverman is considering new laws on deportation (Aaron Chown/PA)
Chief executive Beth Gardiner-Smith added: “The home secretary should be taking action that would in fact save lives and prevent the exploitative smuggling trade.
“This has to include a safe route for refugees in France, including unaccompanied children, who currently have no way to safely reunite with their family here in the UK.
“Trashing Britain’s record on human rights, and as one of the architects of the Refugee Convention is reckless – it will cost lives and is bad news for us all.”
Steve Crawshaw, the director of policy and advocacy at Freedom from Torture, said the proposals so far seemed to “offer little new to the ever more extreme anti-refugee policies introduced over the last decade”.
A previous legal change making being intercepted in a dinghy in the Channel “illegal entry” came into force in June, and before that date the Court of Appeal had ruled that such crossings by asylum seekers were not a crime.
The government has already changed its immigration rules to allow it to refuse to consider asylum applications from people who have passed through safe third countries.
Any harsher measures would run the risk of breaching the 1951 Refugee Convention, which states that countries “shall not impose penalties, on account of their illegal entry or presence, on refugees”.
The UN Refugee Agency has said that there is no requirement in international law supporting the British government’s contention that people must seek asylum in the first safe country they reach.
The authority has intervened in ongoing legal challenges to the Rwanda deal, which is on hold until the High Court rules on two cases alleging that the plans are unlawful.
Despite the ongoing action, the government told more asylum seekers they may be sent to Rwanda in legal notices issued during the period of national mourning following the Queen’s death.
Last month, The Independent revealed that the government spent almost £90,000 on three months of social media adverts aiming to deter English Channel crossings.
Migrants in northern France and Belgium are being targeted with sponsored Facebook and Instagram posts, which contain messages in multiple languages including “you could die trying to get to the UK” and “don’t trust smuggling gangs”.
Charities called the adverts “useless and absurd” after several specialist groups rejected an appeal to help the Home Office “understand migrant perceptions of migrating to the UK” for the campaign.
