The UK has a “hostile immigration environment” acutely felt by people who seek asylum. For queer folk, this means dealing with patronising interviews, bureaucratic disbelief, and narrow stereotypes about what it means to be gay. I’ve written more about this here: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
The real issue this highlights is decades of cutting legal aid, and creating a complicated, unfair and impossible to manage system, make people very vulnerable to anyone who tells them they can help, and can I have all your money please?
Another way asylum seekers are exploited.
The ECHR doesn't oblige the UK to have a ramshackle & underfunded asylum system that is possible to exploit, the UK does that all by itself. It does oblige its states to provide protection to LGBT people facing very real threats of persecution, which gets missed here:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
This reminds me of when Braverman claimed people were pretending to convert to Christianity to claim asylum. As then, it ignores that majority of people only feel safe being out when they reach a country of safety. It ignores the obstacles they face. 7/
www.opendemocracy.net/en/abdul-eze...
This reporting puts LGBTQIA+ as well as migrants' rights, groups at more risk of far-right attacks, undermines safe spaces for LGBTQIA+ individuals, and makes it harder for LGBTQIA+ people seeking asylum, who already face significant barriers, to be recognised, all based on a handful of anecdotes 4/
They never got compensation, an apology or publicity that their names were cleared. This seems likely to be more of the same. If you want people to be able to get reliable advice (not in skeezy women's bedrooms) then you need to fund a functioning legal aid system.
The utterly threadbare nature of this 'sting' and the complete lack of evidence that any fake asylum claims are being granted in volume does not seem to trouble the racist and populist politicians piling on. After the Mail sting people's careers were ruined before they were exonerated
LGBTQI+ claims can be very tricky, unless sexual orientation and abuse are well documented. I have acted in two LGBTQI+ claims where I was suspicious the client wasn't being truthful (not my job to police) and both were refused. Every reason to believe this fake claim would have been refused too.
So all the BBC have is one creepy woman, an initial general call with a lawyer and the suspicion the creepy woman got the journalist's number from a lawyer, but it might also have been from an LGBT group. There's no reason to believe the journalist's fake claim would have been granted.
There is a reference to initial info one lawyer gave them on the phone later on, but I'll remind you that lawyers can give general info out on the phone - that isn't the same as advancing a false claim. The lawyers from the similar Mail sting were cleared: www.legalfutures.co.uk/latest-news/...
The BBC article is here: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article.... They don't declare how many lawyers they contacted, but presumably they called around and got nothing interesting out of the immigration lawyers they called so went with their story about this one random woman.
This BBC undercover 'sting' alleging a sophisticated conspiracy of fraudulent immigration claims is complete rubbish. Their main story isn't about a lawyer, just 1 unethical creepy woman who brought a stranger into her bedroom to fleece him for a fake claim that would likely have been refused anyway
Or their definition of legal representation basically being a duty phone line or something.
I'm a bit concerned that the main reason for the new body seems to be to give Parliament more control over their procedures and administration (and yes recruitment), but a bit alarmed about the prospect of a new DfT appearing.
1. At last a few details on the proposed new immigration and asylum appeals body. Letter from Home Sec to chair of the Justice Committee. Full text here committees.parliament.uk/publications...
Labour is effectively pushing to make it impossible for mixed nationality families to have a stay-at-home parent.
Jenrick making things up again. His Dad was clearly never a gas fitter. Otherwise he certainly couldn't have afforded to have sent him to private school.
The news from the past few days is a stunning example of what happens when the state decides it wants to crush just one guy
This rescue kitten has been brought to my door (I co-run a local cat rescue group). A foster has been lined up immediately because I should think if you spend more than 5 seconds with him you’d keep him. He is suffering starvation issues but otherwise seems ok. VERY CUDDLY!
Great to see the brilliant McIntoshes in the Guardian, arguing for the right to funded legal representation for the Windrush Compensation Scheme. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025... Please sign their petition (link in the article) if you haven't already.
I think charities still use cheques. I opened a community organisation bank account recently and got a chequebook and paying in book. Weirdly paying in cash is actually harder for me because I don't live near a branch and you can photograph or even just post to branch a cheque but not cash.
The student newspaper.
This fell. To the student. Newspaper.
'The number of student-initiated PhD scholarships funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) is set to fall by 60 per cent when new doctoral training arrangements come into effect next year, new figures show.' 1/3
Alarming but predictable - Armed police threatened to arrest Kent protester for holding Palestinian flag www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...
1. We interrupt this programming for some LEGITIMATELY GOOD NEWS
Violent crime in Baltimore has PLUMMETED to historic lows
How did the city do it?
Baltimore adopted a comprehensive set of "woke" policies, treating violence as a public health issue
I am looking for UK immigration law practitioners to fill in a short survey about their engagement with legal academic work. There is also an option to take part in an interview at the end. Please do consider taking part and share with your networks:
app.onlinesurveys.jisc.ac.uk/s/northumbri...
Reverend Clive Foster speaking as the first Windrush Commissioner. He talks of encountering the scandal & those affected in his Nottingham church.
"One by one, people came quietly and anxiously ... people who suddenly feared being treated as strangers in the only country they had ever known"
At Hackney Town Hall, where the Office of the Windrush Commissioner is launching today
❗️BREAKING — The UK Ministry of Defence admits it is “currently training” Israeli military personnel in Britain.
The Labour government has until now refused to answer questions about this, which we covered last year.
👉 www.declassifieduk.org/amid-lebanon...
Quitting my lucrative job as an international fentanyl smuggler to pursue my true passion, vacuuming the hallways of a Holiday Inn Express