Britain will carry out “the most significant overhaul” of its asylum system in decades to address the challenge of illegal immigration, UK Home Secretary Priti Patel said on Wednesday.
“Because while people are dying, we have a responsibility to act,” Patel told the House of Commons.
“People are dying—at sea, in lorries, and in shipping containers—having put their lives in the hands of criminal gangs that facilitate illegal journeys to the UK. To stop the deaths, we must stop the trade in people that causes them.”
“For the first time, whether people enter the UK legally or illegally will have an impact on how their asylum claim progresses,” said Patel.
The government will “make every effort to remove those who enter the UK illegally having travelled through a safe country first in which they could and should have claimed asylum,” she said.
People smugglers will face harsher sentences and can now be jailed for life, she said.
Patel stressed that Britain has always celebrated “those who have come to the UK lawfully and helped build Britain.”
Since 2015, the UK has resettled nearly 25,000 refugees and welcomed over 29,000 close relatives through refugee family reunion, according to the Home Office.
