Rejected asylum seekers to carry out community work

The government this week started to implement its policy of
making people whose asylum claims have failed and who are unable to
return home carry out unpaid community work in order to qualify for
housing and benefits, writes Amy
Taylor.

The Home Office put a tendering notice on the Immigration &
Nationality Directorate website over the weekend for bids for
government funding to run the community work programmes, which are
outlined in the Asylum and Immigration Act (Treatment of Claimants,
etc) 2004.

The people who will have to work are unable to return home
through no fault of their own, such as there being no safe route
available at the present time, and are therefore entitled to
‘hard case support’.

There are currently people receiving this in Manchester, London,
Birmingham, Sheffield and Liverpool.

A Home Office spokesperson said that the scheme would initially
be set up in one area on a pilot basis, but the location had not
yet been decided. He added that draft guidelines on it would be
published and put out to consultation later this month.

When ministers first proposed the plans in the summer, the Joint
Committee on Human Rights said that they could breach the European
Convention on Human Rights.