The home secretary is preparing to announce a major shake-up of the immigration system that would be modelled on Denmark – which has one of the toughest systems in Europe.
Officials are thought to be looking at Denmark’s tighter rules on family reunion, as well as considering restricting most asylum seekers to a temporary stay in the country.
A delegation of senior officials was sent to Copenhagen last month to learn about their interventions and draw lessons that could be applied to the UK.
The plan to copy Denmark comes as the government ramps up its efforts to bring down migration amid growing public anger over the issue.
Sources told the BBC that the decision to look at the Danish system comes as part of an attempt to slash the “pull factors” that draw people to the UK, as well as making it easier to remove those with no right to stay.
Labour MPs are split on the move, with some in so-called red wall seats – seen as vulnerable to challenge from Reform UK – wanting ministers to go further in the Danish direction, while others believe the policies will estrange progressive voters and push the party too far to the right.
Left-wing Labour MP Nadia Whittome, who is a member of the party’s Socialist Campaign Group caucus, urged against emulating the Danish model, suggesting it was “far-right”.
“I think this is a dead end – morally, politically and electorally… I think these are policies of the far-right. I don’t think anyone wants to see a Labour government flirting with them,” she told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
But Stoke-on-Trent Central Labour MP Gareth Snell said that any change bringing “fairness” to an asylum system that his constituents “don’t trust” is “worth exploring”.
He said it was “worth looking at what best practice we can find from our sister parties around the world where they have managed to find practical solutions” to managing immigration.
It has been a difficult few months for the government, with the UK experiencing rising numbers of small boat crossings in the Channel and a migrant, who was deported under the UK’s returns deal with France, re-entering the country.
The Iranian man was detected on arrival and removed after he arrived in the UK for a second time on 18 October, a month after he was returned to France.
At Labour’s party conference in September, Shabana Mahmood pledged to “do whatever it takes” to regain control of Britain’s borders.
But the government is yet to get a grip on the number of people making the dangerous crossing, with the total who have arrived in the UK by small boat this year reaching 37,575 on 6 November.
Last year, the Danish government said it had approved a “historically” low number of asylum applications – something that is said to have impressed the home secretary.
While refugees who have been targeted by a foreign regime are likely to be provided protection in Denmark, most people who have been granted asylum are only allowed to stay in the country temporarily.
There are conditions, such as being in full-time employment, that are applied to people seeking settlement rights. The length of time necessary to acquire settlement rights has also been extended.
Home Office officials are also said to be looking at the country’s tighter rules for family reunions, which include a minimum age of 24 for refugees applying for their partners to join them, which the country says is to protect against forced marriages.
A person who has been granted residency in Denmark must not have claimed benefits for three years, and they must put up a financial guarantee. Both partners must also pass a Danish language test.
Denmark also takes a tough approach to integration, with a law that allows the state to demolish apartment blocks in areas where at least half of the residents have a “non-Western” background – a law that was found to be discriminatory on the basis of ethnic origin by a senior adviser to the EU’s top court.
Refugees who live in these housing estates would not be eligible for family reunion.
In September, former home secretary Yvette Cooper announced plans to suspend all new applications under the refugee family reunion route as part of a series of measures to clear the asylum backlog and clamp down on the number of people crossing the Channel.
The changes mean that refugees will temporarily be covered by the same family migration rules and conditions as everyone else while a new, tougher framework for family reunions is drawn up.
