There’s no easy answer when it comes to asylum seekers – but the UK can do better than this

There’s no easy answer to the issue of asylum seekers and refugees arriving in the UK on small boats, but criminalising thousands of vulnerable people and further ruining already damaged lives cannot be the best the UK can do. The bill also says that “if you come to the UK illegally you will be denied access to the UK’s modern slavery system.” This punishes the victim, not the perpetrator, and falls far short of the UK’s commitment to addressing modern slavery abuses. Not content with some of the most inflammatory language ever used in the UK parliament during the introduction of the small boats bill, and the recent letter sent to Conservative members, we are now told that the home secretary, Suella Braverman, has ignored advice from her own civil servants and the UN in regard to bills legality. But it is seemingly in the government’s interest to hammer this illegal mantra home, so there must be a pragmatic, fair solution where men, women and children do not risk their lives in these hazardous conditions and give a king’s ransom to people smugglers to facilitate these dangerous crossings.