News

Social services departments have welcomed proposals contained in the White Paper on asylum seekers but remain concerned that the government is failing to address the immediate financial crisis.

The White Paper says the responsibility for welfare support for asylum seekers should be switched from local authorities to a new Home Office-controlled national body.

Responsibility for unaccompanied children seeking asylum is to remain with social services but local authorities are demanding adequate funding.

The national body will be able to contract out provision of support services, such as accommodation and living needs to approved hostels and bed and breakfast hotels across the country. Neither local councils nor the asylum seekers themselves will have any say over where they are placed.

At present the majority of asylum seekers are concentrated in the capital, with 11,000 adults and 6,000 families being supported by local authorities.

Hammersmith & Fulham social services director Geoff Alltimes said: "I welcome the news that the financial burden will return to the Home Office but am worried about the grant arrangements during the interim period, prior to the legislation being implemented.

"If the present arrangements are not changed, the cost to London will be another £50 million this year."

The annual cost of supporting asylum seekers in Hammersmith & Fulham is £750,000, with the bill in neighbouring Westminster amounting to about £5 million.

Mike Canaham, assistant director of housing in Westminster Council which is currently supporting 3,500 asylum seekers, said he was concerned that the government had given no date for legislation to implement the changes. "To remove our statutory housing and social service duties will require primary legislation and there is no date inserted for that process to begin."

He added that the White Paper was vague on what would happen to people denied asylum. "It is not the local authority's responsibility to deport people but unless there is some enforcement process, these people will just fade into the background and then reappear to claim council resources from another direction," said Canaham.

Under the proposals, 10,000 asylum seekers who have been waiting more than five years will be given indefinite leave to remain, while a further 20,000 who applied between July 1993 and December 1995 will be allowed to stay for at least a further four years if they have family ties or have "given service to the community". At the end of May there were 52,000 asylum applications on which not even an initial decision had been taken.

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Proposals

· National body to contract out the provision of support services using existing voluntary and community support.

· Hit squads to deal with unscrupulous immigration advisers.

· A reduction in the period allowed to submit further representations after interview from 28 days to five.

· All asylum seekers to have only one appeal to be heard within six months.