Callous UK asylum plan puts refugees at risk of labour abuse

Dora-Olivia Vicol is CEO of the Work Rights Centre, a charity that advocates for migrant and low-paid workers, and Evie Breese is Work Rights Centre’s communications officer.

‘British compassion has gone too far’. Or so we have recently been told. For many Brits, the UK has a proud tradition of providing sanctuary to people fleeing war, torture and persecution. But as part of the Labour government’s new plans to upend the refugee system, this journey to permanent sanctuary will have to be earned. Permanent refuge is now set to be granted based on contributions to the economy, not on need alone.

Currently, people who flee persecution and are granted refugee status in the UK receive permission to stay for five years, after which they can apply to permanently settle. The new Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, plans to reduce this to a temporary 2.5-year status. This means that every 30 months, refugees would have to reapply for their status while the home office decides whether or not their country of origin is safe to return to. Only after 20 years - that’s seven re-applications for status - will they be eligible to settle in the country permanently. 

But for those who can secure a job, or pay the fees to study at a certain level, there is the option to switch to a new, in-country ‘protection work and study route’, which will allow them to “earn” settlement more quickly. While critical details related to these routes remain uncertain, Mahmood’s message to refugees is clear: you’d best be fit and well enough to earn your keep.

It is deeply disturbing to see a government that campaigned on a message of solidarity, force refugees into a state of precarity longer than an entire childhood. At the Work Rights Centre, we see every day how difficult it is for people with time-limited leave to secure good work, to find a stable living, and to integrate - which, ironically, is one of the government’s goals.

Families who have fled the Russian invasion of Ukraine are often denied permanent employment due to the short-term nature of their visas, and many have lost jobs or their rented accommodation. One survey of 1,133 Ukrainians in Britain, led by researchers at The University of Birmingham, suggested 41% had lost a new job opportunity because of visa uncertainty, while 26% said their tenancy was not renewed.

Understandably, employers are hesitant to hire someone who may have to leave the country in less than two and a half years. We fear this will shut refugees out of secure work, and push them towards precarious fixed-term contracts and low-paid positions. Is this what British compassion looks like today? 

Amidst the litany of restrictions, the home secretary proposed allowing a strictly controlled number of refugees to apply for safety in the UK from abroad, through community sponsorship, via the government’s newly announced, but as of now undefined, safe and legal routes. 

This is the thinnest of fig leaves. What will it take for a refugee to qualify for work-based protection? And how many refugees will this government resettle; 52,000, which is the number granted humanitarian protection last year, 500, or five?

It gets worse. Asylum seekers facing destitution will no longer be guaranteed housing and financial support. The statutory legal duty to provide this support, including housing and a weekly allowance, would be revoked under the new plans, and become a discretionary power.

Without the basic safety net of housing and financial support, asylum seekers - who are not allowed to work for the most part - will see no way to survive but by taking up dangerous work on the black market, where they risk exploitation and trafficking. This is not a deterrent to dangerous crossings, it is a new low in the history of hostility to migrants that actively creates the conditions for modern slavery.

Then there are the government’s ominous proposals to overhaul the Modern Slavery Act, to prevent “misuse of this protection by those seeking to block their removal". There is no evidence that the Modern Slavery Act is being abused, or that claims made late in the process are spurious claims. There were just three bad-faith disqualifications (where dishonesty was found) out of the 6,414 potential victims of modern slavery referred to the home office from July to September 2025. This government is pushing a narrative that migrants are out to game the system because it justifies draconian policies that strip desperate people of basic support.

Outrage at the sweeping changes has focused, in part, on the proposals to seize asylum seekers’ valuables - possibly including jewellery - to pay towards accommodation costs, though home office minister Alex Norris has said this would not include family heirlooms. This is the most miserly part of the plan, but not the cruellest. 

The harshest part is forcing vulnerable people into limbo for two decades. Twenty years of uncertainty will not act as a deterrence. People who are desperate are concerned with finding safety in the immediate present - even when the future looks so much more precarious now. But these changes will make refugees poorer, less able to integrate, and more vulnerable to exploitation. This cannot be what British compassion looks like today.