Just when you think this Labour Government couldn't come up with a more ridiculous idea, along comes another one. This time it's their latest plan for dealing with asylum appeals.
At the Ministry of Justice they're talking about cutting back the use of juries because the courts are clogged up and the system can't cope. Yet just down the road at the Home Office they're dreaming up a brand new way for ‘ordinary members’ of the public to decide asylum appeals. And we all know what sort of ‘ordinary members of the public’ they will use, the same ones who glue themselves to roads to ‘Just Stop Oil’ and spend their weekends on protest marches.
You really couldn't make it up. It's another classic example of one government department having no idea what the other is doing. One says, "We need fewer members of the public deciding legal cases." The other says, "Let's recruit more."
But the bigger problem is that I don’t think that Labour actually understand what people are angry about. The public aren't crying out for a different type of asylum appeal. They're asking why people whose claims have already been rejected are still here in the first place.
That's the question ministers should be answering. Instead, they're once again fiddling around with the process while illegal immigration continues to dominate the headlines. More bureaucracy, more appeals, more delays. Enough is enough.
If the Home Office has looked at the evidence, considered the case properly and refused an asylum claim, that decision should mean something. Of course there will always be exceptional cases, but they should be exactly that, exceptional.
Most people believe that if you have no legal right to stay in this country, you should be sent back to where you came from. It's hardly a controversial position.
Time and again Labour reaches for another consultation, another review or another clever-sounding reform instead of getting a grip. The reason that people are losing confidence in the immigration system is because they see rules that don't seem to be enforced and decisions that don't appear to have any finality.
We don't need another shiny new process. We need a system that is fair to genuine refugees, tough on those who abuse it and clear enough that everyone knows where they stand. That means stronger borders, quicker decisions and far fewer opportunities for endless appeals.
It's not complicated. Labour should stop trying to reinvent the system and start enforcing it.
