And another thing…

Twitter for the blind?? – Blogs for the blind??

That’s my best thinking in 3 mins!

I can’t really see it taking off. You have a face for radio and a voice for blogging. )

You know what I think about New Labour’s immigration policy, but…

a) Would *you* risk danger to see your dying father you hadn’t seen for eight years?

b) Why has his asylum claim taken so long? (That’s a rhetorical question.) It’s not surprising he’s had time to get married. Why not speak to his wife? Presumably she’s a British citizen and therefore has rights, including the right for her husband to visit his father and her father-in-law.

Why not get some local referees to vouch for him?

He’s been allowed to stay for years with the blessing of the government, yet in perhaps his greatest hour of need, you are prepared to let him down.

Maybe he’s a charlatan or perhaps he’s the sort of man we need in this country – one prepared to risk his safety and future by doing the right thing.

Stewart Cowan: “Why has his asylum claim taken so long?”

It took less than a month for him to receive a decision. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the decision he wanted.

“Presumably she’s a British citizen and therefore has rights, including the right for her husband to visit his father and her father-in-law.”

Her rights are her own, not her husband’s.

“Why not get some local referees to vouch for him?”

Local referees very often do vouch for failed asylum seekers. Following the advice of the people traffikers who make so much money is human misery, their victims often attend churches in Britain and subsequently obtain references from members of that church. However, the decision of whether or not to grant refugee status should be made only on the basis of whether the applicant would face persecution in his home country. If someone is a fine upstanding pillar of the community, that would have a bearing on an immigration case (where the applicant applies from abroad) but not an asylum one.

“He’s been allowed to stay for years with the blessing of the government.”

No, the government told him to remove himself years ago and he ignored that advice. It’s simply not affordable for any government to forcibly remove every failed asylum seeker.

“yet in perhaps his greatest hour of need, you are prepared to let him down”

How did you work that one out? Perhaps you consider it any MP’s duty simply to say “yes” to every request they receive without the need for evidence, or even where – as in this case – the request itself is effectively an admission that the person has not been telling the whole truth to the authorities.

I much prefer the longer audio pieces to be honest with you.

While it did provide a great look at the issues and technicalities of the subject I just feel a blog-standard (see what I did there?) written entry would have been better.

I’d keep to the written pieces for stuff like this and revert to the audio format for longer, more generalised conversations.

Having said all that, I’m one of those people who don’t see the point in twitter, so maybe I was just never going to “get it”?

Oh, also, I notice the audio problem of previous podcasts has been fixed: Good work!

Well it’s not like you actually gave his name and address, although if it were me I’d have left out the home country as well.

It’s useful to have an insight into the sort of issues MPs help with.

I guess that a lot of the time as an MP you can’t do things that you are asked to do, but you can, sensitively, point out where your intervention can help and how it could hinder. You do nobody any favours if you give people false expectations.

It is a dilemma, though, because even if things have changed for him in his country of origin, I can understand why he might not have been in a hurry to drop the asylum application, and may actually have been advised to keep it going. Life can change a lot in 8 years, and this guy has fallen in love, got married and has an established life here. Like you say, just because he’s married to a UK citizen doesn’t necessarily mean he would be allowed to stay here – and, in fact, he wouldn’t be even able to apply for entry as a spouse without returning to the Sudan anyway.

It may be, of course, that things haven’t changed and he would be liable to persecution in his own country and obviously wants to keep the asylum application going to the last possible minute to avoid going back, even though he knows the odds are against it.

Now that his father is ill, however, I can understand how he might think that if he has to go back anyway, he might as well go back to see his father while he’s still alive.

It’s a real dilemma and I can see both how it could look and how it could actually be, if that makes any sense.

On the immigration rules generally, I find it worrying that the way they’ve been tightened up make it generally more difficult for genuine applicants to be able to come to this country, even if they provide all the evidence. Entry clearance people can be quite arbitrary in the way they deal with these things and the Borders Agency seems to keep giving these outside visa handling people more and more power.

I think it would be much more humane if, instead of rejecting applications outright giving people the option of either re-applying (at enormous cost) or appealing (at enormous wait) that there should be a nominal fee to submit additional (specified) evidence to have a case reviewed before a decision is made.

Is it really the case that a Government informing a failed asylum seeker to remove themself from this Country is viewed as ‘advice’?

If this is the case, then I am not at all surprised that we have so many who choose not to take such advice and remain.

Surely it must be an instruction enforced by law, or am I being too authoritarian is this libertarian world?

You’re right – a notification that they are no longer entitled to remain legally in the UK means that if they choose to ignore the advice to go home, they’re staying illegally. Technically, that means their status changes from “asylum seeker” to “illegal immigrant”. Legal appeals can extend the process, of course.

Tom – thanks for your reply.

In that case, I suppose my question should have been – why is he still here eight years after being told, or in effect, asked, to leave? Because we cannot afford to deport everyone, even though we can apparently afford to keep masses of immigrants on benefits?

One reason the people traffickers make so much money from human misery is because the UK has been made a soft touch, as shown by your Sudanese man. My question is – how long does someone have to stay here before we consider them part of the community and have a duty to care for them?

“It’s simply not affordable for any government to forcibly remove every failed asylum seeker.”

Like I said, above, it’s got to be cheaper than providing benefits. Plus the fact: do our laws count for nothing? Should we give up even trying to enforce them?

What *is* affordable is to let the world know they can’t treat Britain like a doormat. (That’s what Australians have done.) Look at all the problems this would have saved.

So many problems stem from this government’s open door policy. The fact is – your man is here and he is married to a native (I presume). Either they live here, in Sudan, or apart.

If they are to live here then he is entitled to visit his father in Sudan.

He may have lied to be able to try to dupe the ‘authorities’, but the facts remain that he has been allowed to stay and got married. The situation in his country might well have changed. He might be willing to risk danger to see his dad again.

On the other hand, what’s the alternative? Ban him from leaving. It looks like he’s staying in Britain anyway and has a far greater reason to be allowed due to marrying, so it looks like not allowing him to visit Sudan would have the sole effect of denying him the chance of ever seeing his dad again.

Tom is the ” about a particularly difficult asylum case.” Could that be Gordon Brown by any chance or is it someone else.

By the way Tom well done on your number 1 blog spot. You must be the only Labour bod in any kind of number 1 poition.

It shows when you speak your mind and tell the truth have a nice wife and some common sense how well you can do. what are you doing in the labour party.

Tom for PM..

http://johnrentoul.independentminds.livejournal.com/132658.html

Tom!

I hear congratulations are in order . . . you’re top political blogger of the year according to John Rentoul.

Well done you!

Honestly, sometimes I really can’t believe that such a nice guy is a ‘Labour’ MP . . . but then at others . . . ;o)

“particularly difficult asylum case”

Oh hum……

You are a member of the party which currently forms the Government…Make laws that can be governed.

This fiasco has been going on for 50 years

KISS