Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether illegal immigrants who have travelled to the United Kingdom from another EU member state and who seek asylum in the United Kingdom are refused entry and routinely returned to the EU member state from which they travelled.

The Dublin Regulation is an important tool for maintaining the distinction between international protection and economic or other migration, reflecting the accepted principle of international law that those seeking international protection should seek asylum in the first safe country they reach.

If we have evidence that an asylum seeker is the responsibility of another European country we can, and will, seek to return them there under the Dublin Regulation. Similarly, if we have evidence that the person claiming asylum in the UK has already been granted international protection by another European country we will also seek to remove them to the country that granted protection. Over 12,000 migrants have been returned from the UK to another EU country since 2003.