London, Wednesday, 14 December 2022
With harsh new restrictions on unauthorised immigration and stricter standards for allegations of modern slavery, Rishi Sunak will work to decrease the surge in Albanian people seeking asylum in Britain.
Sunak presented a set of proposals to clear the backlog of unresolved claims cluttering the U.K. asylum system in his speech to the House of Commons on Tuesday.
According to U.K. official statistics, 18% of undocumented migrants who crossed the English Channel in small boats to enter the U.K. in the first half of 2022 were Albanian nationals. Many people argue that they were trafficked as slaves and immediately ask for refuge. As of September, the number of pending asylum petitions from all nationalities exceeded 143,000, according to Home Office statistics.
According to Sunak, fresh guidelines will be provided to Home Office personnel as part of the new set of actions that "crystal clear that Albania is a secure country." According to him, this will enable the processing of claims from Albanian people to take "weeks as opposed to months," with many more being rapidly dismissed.
“One of the reasons we struggle to remove people is because they unfairly exploit our modern slavery system,” Sunak said. “So we will significantly raise the threshold someone has to meet to be considered a modern slave.”
Additionally, according to Sunak, the U.K. government would "increase the number of asylum caseworkers," "reduce paperwork," and "attach caseworkers to certain nationalities of claimant." This includes a group of 400 caseworkers specifically assigned to managing applications from Albanians.
(Source: Politico // Edit and Report by: The Decision Maker – Finance editors)