juliet

Fraud involves an intention to deceive. I worked in immigration law for many years and my partner has done so for nearly 10 years. Neither of us have any naive idealism left. We have met less than a handful of "bogus" asylum seekers. The Home Office and the Courts interpret the Convention definition of refugee as narrowly as possible, so that for example asylum seekers fleeing the well documented chaos in Somalia (not going to go into the imperialist history here, but there sure is one) do not receive refugee status although they are usually given exceptional leave to remain in the UK lawfully. On the face of it though the claims for asylum of those given exceptional leave to remain have failed and are recorded as such. Those who do not fit the narrowly construed definition of refugee in the vast majority of cases genuinely believe their lives are in danger in the countries they have fled from, as the Home Office and Courts freely admit.