Borders and Asylum

Bradley Thomas Excerpts

Monday 1st September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Bradley Thomas (Bromsgrove) (Con)]

The Government appear to be conflating the terms “illegal immigrant” and “asylum seeker.” The UK has rightly in the past taken in asylum seekers, including Ukrainians fleeing persecution, but they are different from those who are crossing the channel illegally, the vast majority of whom are men aged 20 to 30 who appear to have no children or families crossing with them. I have three questions for the Home Secretary: does she agree with the Prime Minister’s comments that the UK has plenty of housing to accommodate illegal immigrants; will she rule out the use of houses of multiple occupation; and will she rule out the use of social housing for illegal immigrants?

[Yvette Cooper]

Given what the hon. Member said about crossings, I hope he will support the French pilot agreement, which means we can return to France people who make these dangerous or illegal journeys and in exchange have a legal process for people who apply properly, follow the rules and go through security checks. We have been clear that the way to tackle the chaos in the asylum system is to end asylum hotels, but to do so by reducing the overall number of people in the asylum accommodation system, and that includes sorting out the appeals chaos we inherited from the hon. Member’s party.