Tales from the UK Border Agency

This is a post was originally published by the New Statesman, 28 March 2013

Theresa May announced in parliament that the UK Border Agency will be split in two, and operations brought under the control of Home Office ministers. May said the UKBA was too large, secretive and unaccountable, lacked decent IT operations and struggled to navigate the law.

The announcement came a swift 24 hours after the Home Affairs select committee published a damning report on the UKBA’s operations. Among many other things the committee raised concerns about a backlog of more than 320,000 cases, a 53 per cent rise in the number of refugees waiting more than six months for an initial decision, and 150 boxes found in a room in Liverpool containing thousands of unopened letters from applicants, MPs and lawyers.

I meet many migrants and refugees who have come to loathe the UKBA. The stories are of its sprawling ineffectiveness and severe lack of humanity towards those who rely on it. In this article for the New Statesman I touch on David’s story, as well as an investigation I undertook into the UKBA’s methods of interviewing asylum seekers to verify their country of origin.

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