The Labour government is facing mounting criticism over its plans to overhaul the UK’s asylum system, as ministers defend what they insist are tough but necessary measures to “restore order” at the border and rebuild public confidence.

The package, billed by the Home Office as the most sweeping reform of the asylum system in modern times, has triggered a wave of concern from Labour MPs, human rights advocates and opposition parties. At the same time, figures on the right argue the changes either do not go far enough, or will never be implemented.

At the heart of the row are proposals to make it significantly harder for people who arrive in the UK via irregular routes to build permanent lives in the country, alongside measures to seize certain assets from asylum seekers and to rewrite the way human rights protections are applied to removals.

For Labour, the political stakes could hardly be higher. With a budget looming in ten days and the rise of Reform UK fuelled in large part by anger over small boat crossings, the asylum plan is one of the defining early tests of Keir Starmer’s premiership.

The core of the plan

Ministers say the reforms are designed to make the UK a less attractive destination for those arriving illegally, speed up removals, and preserve “fairness” for people using safe and legal routes.

A central proposal is to place most people who reach the UK irregularly on a long, precarious route to settlement. Rather than granting refugees a clear path to permanent status after a number of years, many would face a 20-year wait before they could secure indefinite leave to remain.

In addition, the Home Office wants to subject refugees’ status to repeated reviews, on the basis that conditions in their home countries may improve. While critics say this will trap people in limbo for decades, the government argues it is a reasonable response to “broken” rules that have allowed people who no longer need protection to remain indefinitely.

The plans also include:

The prime minister’s spokesperson summarised the rationale from Downing Street’s perspective: for too long, he said, Britain has lived with an asylum system “that’s broken, spiralling costs and growing public frustration”, undermining trust, putting pressure on public services, and leaving genuine refugees “trapped in limbo”. Over the last four years, around 400,000 people have claimed asylum in the UK, with more than 100,000 currently housed and supported at the taxpayer’s expense.

“This is about reducing the pressure caused by uncontrolled immigration while keeping Britain true to its proud tradition of offering refuge to those in danger,” the spokesperson said.

Jewellery, assets and a backlash over ‘repugnant’ symbolism

One of the most emotive elements of the package is the suggestion that asylum seekers with valuables could have them taken to help cover the costs of their claims and support.

Alex Norris, the border security and asylum minister, confirmed in interviews that the government wants those with means to contribute. He cited the example of an individual reportedly receiving £800 a month from overseas who had bought an Audi, and said that if people had cars or e-bikes they should not be fully subsidised by the taxpayer.

“The British taxpayer subsidises bed and board and support for individuals to the tune of multiple billions of pounds per year. It is right if people have assets that they should contribute,” he argued.

The proposal immediately drew comparisons with controversial policies in Denmark, where authorities can seize some assets from asylum seekers, and prompted a sharp response from Labour backbenchers.

Sarah Owen, the Labour MP for Luton North and chair of the women and equalities committee, condemned the threat of removing valuables as “repugnant”. In posts on Bluesky she stressed that refugees and asylum seekers are “real people, fleeing war and persecution”, and said a strong immigration system “doesn’t need to be a cruel one”.

She argued there is no evidence that “stripping refugees’ rights one by one” would deter people from crossing the Channel, likening the policy to “painting over murals for refugee children” – a reference to a previous row over attempts to remove child-friendly artwork at asylum facilities.

“These repugnant ‘deterrents’ did not work for the Tories, and they won’t work for us,” she wrote, insisting that most people wanted dangerous crossings and exploitation by smugglers stopped, but also a “compassionate, fair & legal path for those seeking refuge”.

The Liberal Democrats’ home affairs spokesperson, Max Wilkinson, joined the criticism, warning that “stripping vulnerable people of their family heirlooms will not fix a system that is costing taxpayers £6m every day in hotel bills”. While Norris later insisted the government would not take “family heirlooms”, opposition parties argue the policy is both morally wrong and a distraction from the structural problems in asylum processing.

Long waits, work routes and benefits

Another flashpoint is the proposed 20-year wait for permanent settlement for many people who arrive irregularly. The idea is to create a tougher, more conditional route to long-term residence for those who bypass official channels.

Norris attempted to play down how many people would, in practice, face the full 20-year period. He said those on this route would be given the opportunity to switch to work or study visas, provided they learn English, contribute to the economy and become more integrated.

“If they do that, they can earn their right to settlement, like others on work and study routes do already,” he said. When it was put to him that this would mean the 20-year route would apply to almost no one, and that the government was primarily seeking a “tough” headline, he rejected the characterisation. Instead, he argued that the measure was aimed at people who see the asylum system as a way to secure status and then “sit at home, not contribute, not learn English [or] integrate into the community”.

“Let’s not forget, I’m afraid, that of those who have successful [asylum] claims, 50% of them end up on benefits,” he said. “If your intention is to come to the country illegally, to have a claim assessed and, if you’re successful, then sit at home… then that is going to come with much greater checks.”

Critics say the rhetoric risks stigmatising refugees as scroungers and ignores the structural barriers many face in accessing work, housing and language training.

Legal reforms and the ECHR

Another major strand of the plan centres on the European convention on human rights. Home secretary Shabana Mahmood is preparing legislation designed to narrow the circumstances in which courts can use article 3 and article 8 to prevent removals, particularly in asylum and deportation cases.

The hope among ministers is that by sending a signal to domestic judges and government lawyers that they should be less cautious about litigation risks under the convention, more people can be removed more quickly.

Tony Vaughan, a newly elected Labour MP, immigration law KC and one of the most prominent internal critics of the package, has challenged both the practicality and the honesty of this approach. He points out that only a small proportion of removals are actually stopped by the Strasbourg court itself, and warns against overselling the impact of legal tweaks.

“The numbers of people who are prevented from return by the Strasbourg court are very, very small,” he told the Today programme. “We need to be realistic about what those sorts of reforms are going to achieve. We can’t promise the public things which it’s not going to deliver.”

He argues that the real work needed is on “the politically salient challenge of small boats arriving on our shores”: making the deal with France effective, fixing the asylum accommodation crisis, clearing the appeals backlog and speeding up initial decisions.

Vaughan is also deeply uneasy about the idea of putting recognised refugees on a kind of rolling probation, with their status reassessed every few years on the assumption that their home countries might become safe.

“The idea that recognised refugees need to be deported is wrong,” he has said. “Where immigration controls decide to grant asylum, we should welcome and integrate, not create perpetual limbo and alienation.”

The Home Office, for its part, says that while only around 2.5% of those facing deportation currently challenge removals on ECHR grounds, the existence of those cases shapes behaviour across the system. Norris has suggested that the government’s “legal appetite” for pushing difficult cases has been reduced because of a belief that courts will not back them, and that Mahmood has instructed officials to be more robust.

Visa threats and foreign policy leverage

Alongside domestic legal changes, the government is turning to visa policy as a tool to put pressure on other countries. In a briefing to journalists, the Home Office flagged Angola, Namibia and the Democratic Republic of Congo as three states whose nationals could face visa penalties if their governments do not cooperate more fully with UK attempts to remove people.

Thousands of people from these countries who have no legal right to remain in the UK, including foreign offenders, are currently in limbo because of poor cooperation, ministers say. The measures under consideration range from restrictions on visas for elites and tourists to a broader “emergency brake” that could effectively block most travel from specific nations with high asylum claim rates, even on legal routes.

Norris has refused to rule out wider use of visa leverage, saying that while the government is starting with the three named countries, it “wouldn’t rule it out with anybody else”. Asked whether major partners such as India could be targeted if cooperation falters, he insisted ministers were keeping all options open, while stressing that relations with most states are stronger.

Internal Labour unease

While the government insists its approach is both principled and pragmatic, disquiet inside the Parliamentary Labour Party has become increasingly visible – even if open dissent remains relatively limited.

Simon Opher, a GP who gained Stroud for Labour at the last election, issued a pointed statement arguing that the party should “push back on the racist agenda of Reform rather than echo it”. He supports stopping dangerous small boat crossings but believes the current proposals are the wrong way to do it.

“Controlled migration is good for the country, helps build our economy and diversity strengthens our communities,” he said. Hostile policies, he argued, “create bureaucracy and insecurity”, cost money and “weaken the system”, rather than delivering clarity or control.

Opher called instead for faster decisions, working cooperation with French authorities and better accommodation for asylum seekers – a refrain echoed by several colleagues.

Abtisam Mohamed, Labour MP for Sheffield Central and a former immigration lawyer, said the latest proposals repeat “the same mistake” of the past decade. Hostile policies, she argued, had “created chaos, cost, and deeper division” without fixing the system.

“When our own process recognises someone as a refugee, stripping them of stability later doesn’t strengthen control; it weakens trust in the system,” she said. Efforts by other countries to run constant reassessments of refugee status had simply “swallowed resources without delivering mass returns”.

Diane Abbott, the veteran Labour MP, went further, calling some of the planned legal changes “truly frightening”. She warned that abolishing or heavily curtailing the right to family life in this context could ultimately affect many more people than asylum seekers and claimed that overriding such rights “if the risks of violence are greater” amounted to a “mob’s charter”. She also condemned moves to dilute protections in the Modern Slavery Act as “awful”.

The leftwing Labour group Momentum branded the plans “divisive and xenophobic”, insisting that “scapegoating migrants will not fix our public services or end austerity”.

Vaughan’s more technical critique has been widely circulated; his social media post setting out why he believes the government has taken “the wrong turning” on asylum has been shared by several Labour MPs, including former shadow chancellor John McDonnell and backbenchers such as Bell Ribeiro-Addy, Stella Creasy and Clive Lewis. McDonnell noted that Vaughan, far from being a “usual suspect” on the party’s left, was reflecting concerns shared by many colleagues.

Even so, the visible rebellion remains small. Observers point out that Labour’s whips have been unusually quick to withdraw the whip from MPs who publicly criticise the government, which may be encouraging restraint. In private, however, there is thought to be deep unease among many on the backbenches, even as others believe drastic action is necessary to address small boat crossings.

Pressure from the right

If Labour is being squeezed from one side by its own MPs and liberal opinion, it is being pulled from the other by Reform UK and the Conservatives, both of whom insist the proposals are either doomed or inadequate.

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, claimed that Mahmood “sounds like a Reform supporter”, but argued that as long as the government remains bound by the Human Rights Act and the ECHR, the plans will “never happen”.

Chris Philp, the Conservative shadow home secretary, dismissed the package as a “pretend” display of toughness. He argued that, while the UK remains inside the ECHR, the reforms would be blocked by “leftwing lawyers and judges – probably including their own attorney general”. The only way to “control our borders”, he claimed, would be to leave the convention entirely and “deport every single illegal immigrant upon arrival, with no court hearings”.

Reform’s deputy leader, Richard Tice, speaking at a press conference on local government spending, joked that Mahmood sounded as if she were “putting in an application” to join his party. Another far-right figure, Tommy Robinson, welcomed reports that most asylum seekers would no longer be allowed to stay in the UK permanently.

The live political tension is clear: Labour is attempting to position itself as tougher than its Conservative predecessors, without embracing the most radical demands of the right or pulling out of international human rights frameworks. Critics, meanwhile, warn the party risks legitimising hostile rhetoric and policies that do little to resolve the underlying problems.

Are these really “the most sweeping reforms”?

Ministers have repeatedly described the package as the most far-reaching overhaul of asylum rules in decades. But some analysts contest that framing.

Sunder Katwala, director of the thinktank British Future, argues that in “analysis, spirit and content” the proposals closely resemble the Nationality and Borders Act introduced by Priti Patel in 2022, which created a form of temporary protection lasting 30 months. He also notes that the Illegal Migration Act of 2023, which effectively sought to bar anyone arriving irregularly from claiming asylum at all, was in many ways more sweeping – and that both earlier attempts ultimately failed to end Channel crossings.

For Katwala, the experience of recent years shows that focusing on “pull factors” in domestic asylum rules is misguided. If the 2025 policy were going to have a major impact on journeys, he suggests, “the boats would already have stopped” when the same or tougher policies were tried between 2022 and 2024.

He also questions the idea that copying aspects of Denmark’s asylum regime will bring similar results, pointing out that the drivers of journeys to the UK and Denmark are different – not least the English language and the specific smuggling routes now in place.

A volatile political moment

The asylum row comes at a moment of wider political instability. Reform UK is trying to capitalise on public anger over migration, local services and perceived elite indifference. At the same time, Starmer is juggling other international and media pressures: Donald Trump has threatened to sue the BBC for at least $1bn over the editing of his 6 January 2021 speech in a Panorama documentary, and claimed he intended to speak to the prime minister about it. Government sources say no such call has yet taken place.

For now, the focus in Westminster is on the Commons statement Shabana Mahmood is due to deliver, in which she will flesh out the legal and operational details of the asylum reforms. That debate, and the reaction on Labour’s own benches, will offer the clearest indication yet of how far the party is prepared to go – and how much internal dissent it is willing to tolerate – in its bid to convince voters that it can both control the borders and uphold Britain’s tradition of offering refuge.

Supporters of the reforms insist they are a “moral mission”, arguing that a country without secure borders is less safe for minorities and that allowing the system to drift fuels the “dark forces” of hate and division. Opponents warn that the policies themselves risk entrenching that division, by treating refugees as suspects and subjects of permanent conditionality rather than as future citizens to be supported and integrated.

Between those two visions lies the hardest question of all: not just how to manage asylum numbers, but what kind of country Britain wants to be when it decides who gets to stay.