Unfair, unworkable and unsafe: Government’s new asylum Bill  

Yesterday the Government published its new long-awaited Immigration and Asylum Bill – the Government’s second round of immigration legislation, following the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Act 2025.  

Regrettably, the Government’s new Bill is likely to make the UK’s asylum system more unfair, unworkable and unsafe. The proposals appear to be driven by short-term expediency – in particular, by the need to appear tough on immigration – rather than the requirements of justice and respect for human rights and international law. 

Some of the Government’s main proposals include: 

Appeals which are less independent and expert: The Bill aims to abolish asylum appeals heard by judges in tribunals. Instead, it intends to replace them with an Independent Immigration Appeals Authority (IIAA) staffed by “adjudicators”, who will not be judges and need not even be legally qualified.  

Asylum appeals involve protecting human rights of the gravest life-and-limb importance – including the right to life and the prohibition of torture. A decision of this magnitude requires the attention of a fully trained and independent judge, not a system designed to prioritise speed over justice. 

Weakening human rights: The Government plans to downgrade the protection of the right to respect for private and family life in UK law (Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights). It will do this by interfering with how appeals can be decided, forcing adjudicators to give pre-eminent weight to immigration control rather than human rights.  

This is despite independent research confirming that it is rare to win immigration cases on Article 8 grounds and that successful cases involve very serious interferences with a person’s private and family life. The Government is setting up litigation with the European Court of Human Rights based on a non-issue for very little, if any, benefit and despite its own repeated commitments to respect international law. 

PLP believes that it should be for independent judges to decide the balance between the rights of individuals and the public interest in human rights cases on their merits, without interference from the other branches of government. 

Placing disproportionate financial burdens on refugees: The Government proposes that individuals granted protection should make financial payments to the Home Office, up to £10,000. The Government provides no estimate as to how much is likely to be generated by this policy and what the costs of enforcing it would be. Its financial benefits are, therefore, wholly unclear. Worse, the policy places an excessive financial burden on refugees, undermining their ability to start a new life and integrate as equal members of British society. 

These proposals will weigh the UK’s asylum system even further against victims of modern slavery and refugees fleeing persecution and harm. Public Law Project’s February 2025 report on the experiences of Albanian nationals illustrated the many ways in which the UK’s asylum system “punishes the victim”.  PLP is concerned that this Bill is another step on that path. 

The only certainty is that this Bill will produce significant litigation in the courts because of the real risk that these proposals breach human rights. This could include cases up to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. This contradicts the Government’s regular commitments to respect international law and the European Convention on Human Rights in particular.  

Instead of these unwelcome proposals, the Government should be working towards an asylum system that is fair, workable and safe by:  

Fixing the immigration rules: First, ensuring that the Home Secretary cannot make arbitrary and unfair changes to the Immigration Rules without consultation or parliamentary approval, by requiring consultation with people and organisations with lived experience of the asylum system and requiring changes to be approved by Parliament before they come into effect. We saw this troubling use of the Immigration Rules recently, for example, to undermine refugee rights to remain in the UK, by making decisions to grant refugee status subject to review every 30 months.  

Legal aid in detention: Second, providing automatic legal aid to people who are in immigration detention within 48 hours. Because of so-called “legal aid deserts”, a survey in 2025 by Bail for Immigration Detainees found that only 27% of respondents held in immigration removal centres had a legal aid solicitor. Guaranteeing early legal aid will ensure that people who are in fear for their life, safety and future are supported at a time of extreme vulnerability and helped to navigate the confusing labyrinth that is the UK immigration system.  

Ending expedited appeals: Third, repealing provisions (sections 20-8) in the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 which allow “expedited”, rushed and unfair, appeals for people in immigration detention.  The Court of Appeal has previously found a similar policy to be “systemically unfair and unjust” and if used these provisions will provoke significant expensive litigation based on procedural fairness concerns. 

In response to the Bill, Jamie Peters, PLP’s Interim CEO, said that: 

“The purpose of the UK’s asylum system is to protect people who face death, serious harm and persecution abroad. It also enables survivors and refugees to become valued neighbours, colleagues, friends, and partners and to heal in safety with the support of their family. This Bill undermines all that and for no proven benefit. Less independent and expert appeals, weakening human rights, and undermining the UK’s commitment to the ECHR will achieve no good. PLP believes in a fair, workable and safe asylum system and these reforms will take us further away from that. The Government should abandon this Bill and put forward a plan based on PLP’s recommendations which is fair, workable, and safe.” 

In making “the most significant policy proposals in a generation” so soon after additional major changes to immigration law, the Bill will make the UK’s immigration system even more complex and unwieldy. The House of Lords’ Justice and Home Affairs Committee recently commented that the “farrago of immigration rules and legislation…[is] anathema to good governance” and causes “delay, additional cost, poor decision-making, and miscarriages of justice.” This Bill is another step on that regrettable path.