Rescuing
Democracy in the United Kingdom from our current Elected
Dictatorship
|
Spin, not
face-to-face confrontations with the voters, is the Government's
chosen method of communication. Ordinary
people are dangerous. Ordinary people might ask a question
which throws a politician 'off message'; the Cabinet member
might reveal himself or herself to be a human being like
us, and not a programmed android. Worse still, he or she
might tell the truth.
Ann Leslie - Daily Mail, September
16, 2004
|
How asylum
backlog has cost £500m
by Matthew
Hickley, Home Affairs Correspondent, Daily Mail - June 23, 2004
The
massive backlog of asylum cases has cost the British taxpayer
£500million, it is revealed today. That is how much the
Government has been forced to spend in recent years supporting
refugees while their claims are decided, according to an official
report by spending watchdogs.
The
National Audit Office report, says £500million in public
funds would have been saved if the Home Office had speeded up
the asylum process. It says the number of undecided asylum claims
peaked at mre than 120,000 in late 1999. Since then, more case
workers have been recruited to bring the backlog under control.
It now stands at 20,000.
The
report criticises ministers for squandering a chance to eliminate
the backlog altogether two years ago when they diverted recruits
into enforcement work, trying to achieve more deportations. That
decision cost taxpayers another £200million, it claimed.
The
NAO's report offers the first official estimate of how much Britain's
asylum system has cost in recent years. It says each asylum seeker
costs £7,690 a year to support.
It
criticises the Home Office's rush to recruit more case workers
to decide claims, saying many had only a basic level of training.
In November 2000, bosses scrapped the requirement for case workers
to have at least two A levels and five GCSE's. But they found
that some staff recruited could not handle complex cases and the
minimum requirements were reinstated earlier this year.
Shadow
Home Secretary David Davies said: "It is time the Government
listened to these reports and made the system work, not simply
fiddle the figures."
More
than 400 colleges and language schools in the UK may be fakes
set up to help illegal immigrants enter Britain as students. Around
100 have been exposed by the Home Office, but investigators say
the total may be far higher.
Three
hundred are still under investigation and insiders fear tens of
thousands of illegal immigrants have slipped in with fraudulent
visas after buying places on non-existent courses.
The
astonishing scale of abuse has emerged in the wake of the visa
scandal which forced Immigration Minister Beverley Hughes to resign.
The 439 institutions under suspicion - mostly language schools
in and around London - make up around a third of the UK's private
language colleges. Last year 128,000 foreigners
secured visas to study in Britain.
Enrolling
on the fake courses means the foreign 'students' - many from China
and Easter Europe - obtain the paperwork they need to get a visa
to enter Britain.
