UK to curtail asylum seekers’ automatic right to accommodation

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Home secretary Shabana Mahmood is to end asylum seekers’ automatic right to accommodation and financial support in the government’s latest attempt to curtail clandestine migration.

She will also quadruple to 20 years from the current five the time that asylum seekers typically have to wait after being approved for refugee status before they are granted permanent settlement in the UK.

The plans will form part of a package due to be announced on Monday that Mahmood said would be the “most significant” shake-up of the UK’s system of asylum protection “in modern times”.

Mahmood, who took over as home secretary in September, has unveiled a series of measures in a bid to counter accusations that the government is failing to tackle clandestine migration to Britain, particularly in small boats.

There were a record 111,084 asylum claims in the UK in the year to June 2025, 14 per cent more than the previous year, according to the Home Office. The record rise has helped fuel support for the populist Reform party, which is topping the opinion polls.

On Friday, Mahmood said that asylum protection would only temporarily be afforded to some people who fled dangerous countries and that they could be forced to return if the Home Office determined that their homeland was safe again.

She said the plans were based on measures introduced in 2021 by Denmark that were credited with driving down the number of people seeking refugee protection in the Nordic country.

It emerged on Saturday evening that under the proposals temporary refugee protection will last only 30 months before a review to consider whether the person’s home country has become safe again.

People will be able to switch to faster settlement routes on condition they undertake some kind of work or study. But they will need to pay the often high fees associated with being granted those visas.

The Home Office said on Saturday that “for too long” the UK had offered housing and support that exceeded its international obligations and created a “powerful pull factor” for people to cross Europe and reach the UK.

The UK receives the fifth highest number of asylum claims in Europe, behind Germany, Spain, France and Italy, according to the EU.

Mahmood said: “This country has a proud tradition of welcoming those fleeing danger, but our generosity is drawing illegal migrants across the Channel.”

The Home Office said it would revoke rules introduced in 2005 under EU law that required the government to provide housing and support to asylum seekers who would otherwise be destitute.

The new measures will deny benefits and housing support to any person in the asylum system who has the right to work but is not doing so. The department will also withhold payments to anyone who fails to comply with an instruction to leave the UK, engages in criminality, causes disruption in their accommodation or works illegally.

The change will make a difference mostly to two relatively small groups: those who claimed asylum after arriving in the UK on a visa giving them the right to work, and those granted the right to work after waiting more than 12 months for an asylum decision.

A Home Office official indicated about 8,500 people of the roughly 106,000 people currently in asylum accommodation have visas with a right to work.

The department signalled that it would continue to fulfil its duties under the Children’s Act, which oblige it not to make families with children destitute.

Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council charity, called the plans “harsh and unnecessary” and said they would force people into destitution and sleeping rough. He added that making the “very tough system” more punitive would not act as a deterrent.

Chris Philp, the Conservative shadow home secretary, criticised the Labour government’s record on asylum and said they were incapable of delivering change.

“Whilst some of these new measures are welcome, they stop well short of what is really required and some are just yet more gimmicks,” he said.