Policy Briefing: Building back confidence in the asylum system

Exploring approaches for efficient, accurate and compassionate decision making.

Building back confidence in the asylum system: Exploring approaches to efficient, accurate and compassionate decision making (PDF), sets out a number of concrete proposals to support efforts to improve asylum decision making. The recommendations start with some immediate steps that can be taken to reduce the backlog while looking towards the resilience of the system in the long-term.

In 2024, the British Red Cross supported over 40,000 people through our refugee support services across the UK, including thousands of people who are applying for asylum. We see the humanitarian impact of slow and inaccurate asylum decision making, with people living in limbo unable to rebuild their lives in the UK or be returned. Through our services, the Red Cross also sees the inefficiency and unnecessary expense of the asylum system, with people accommodated in hotels for years at significant cost to the taxpayer.

This document gives recommendations for efficient, accurate and compassionate asylum decision making to build back public confidence in the system and reduce costs. These recommendations are informed by Red Cross policy analysis and research, consultation with legal experts and people with lived experience of seeking asylum in the UK, as well as insight from its refugee support services across the UK.

Download the briefing (PDF)

Our recommendations

Policy makers should:

1. Learn from the past by conducting assessments of previous decision-making policy

The Home Office should conduct and publish evaluations of previous initiatives to improve the efficiency and quality of asylum decision making to demonstrate how that evidence is informing future policy.

2. Amend the inadmissibility guidance and split standard of proof to allow for efficient decision making and not cause unnecessary delays

The current inadmissibility process in section 16 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 makes it harder to determine an asylum claim quickly as it builds in a significant wait before the merits of a claim are considered.

3. Pilot an enhanced screening model for certain cohorts to speed up decision making

Moving from a standardised refugee status determination for almost everyone claiming asylum in the UK towards more targeted and differentiated processes can contribute to decongesting the UK’s asylum system.

4. The Home Office should be transparent as to how it is prioritising asylum claims, reintroduce the six-month service standard and proactively communicate how long someone can expect to wait for a decision

Alongside reintroducing the six-month service standard for processing time, the Home Office should introduce regular, accessible communication with applicants as they go through the asylum process.

5. People with lived experience of seeking asylum should be involved in improving asylum decision making

People who have been through the asylum system have rich insight into how the system works in practice and can support the government to anticipate challenges in asylum decision making policy. Learning and insights from the expertise of this group will challenge and strengthen asylum decision making policy.

6. Asylum seekers should have access to free, quality legal representation

A critical risk to address in the decision-making process is the lack of legal representation. Long-term, there is a need to provide free, quality legal representation for all asylum seekers, including those undergoing enhanced screening.

7. The decision-making process needs to mitigate the risk of destitution and exploitation among people seeking asylum and refugees

People whose asylum claims have been withdrawn and newly recognised refugees are at significant risk of destitution. Amending the withdrawal guidance for caseworkers and permanently extending the move on period alongside policy and practice initiatives to support new refugees to move on quickly will reduce destitution in this cohort and save money.