Refugees to face 20-yr wait to settle permanently under asylum reforms

UK to slash protections for refugees under asylum 'overhaul'; asylum claims in Britain are at a record high, with some 111,000 applications received in the year to June 2025, according to official figures

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British Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood appears on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg at the BBC in London.

(REUTERS)

Britain's interior minister on Sunday defended plans to drastically reduce protections for refugees and end automatic benefits for asylum seekers, insisting that irregular migration was "tearing our country apart".

The measures, modelled on Denmark's strict asylum system, aim to stop thousands of migrants from arriving in England from northern France on small boats crossings that are fuelling support for the anti-immigrant Reform UK party.

But the proposals were criticised as "harsh and unnecessary" by the Refugee Council charity and are likely to be opposed by left-wing lawmakers within Prime Minister Keir Starmer's embattled Labour government.

"I really reject this idea that dealing with this problem is somehow engaging in far-right talking points," Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood told BBC television.

"This is a moral mission for me, because I can see illegal migration is tearing our country apart, it is dividing communities."