Secondly, if they have any children with them, a school for them would be required. This isn’t very easy for them because the child would be under a lot of pressure- having to get used to the new environment etc.
Thirdly, a vast majority of asylum seekers and refugees don’t always tend to know how to speak English, simply because they would have fled from another country where English is not the first or second language. If you are going to live in the UK, it is essential and crucial that you are able to speak English because if you cant, your life will be a misery- you won’t be able to communicate with a lot of people like shop keepers, house agents and many more. Learning a whole new language would be quite a challenge, but with help from tutoring etc, they will not have a problem with speaking English at all.
Lastly, almost all asylum seekers are not allowed to work and are forced to relay on state support. They are entitled to vouchers worth £36.54 a week of which £10 is exchangeable for cash- this is 30% below the average income support. That’s not much at all and as a result, they have a limited amount of money to spend on food, they can’t really afford quality clothing and restaurants and leisure centres are no go areas for them because it would literally cost them a fortune.
Looking at all those different elements asylum seekers and refuges would have to consider, all just show how difficult their lives would be living in the UK. However, if they continue to live in the UK for more years, their lives will be much better.
People’s views on asylum seekers and refugees have totally changed over time. A long time ago, not many people used to accept refugees and asylum seekers into their country of which I find pretty humane. But nowadays, they are being accepted in many places around the world and made feel welcome and comfortable. For example, in the UK, most asylum seekers and refugees are offered courses like ESOL where they can learn English, they would also have an interpreter which is really good because it makes them feel part of the community, Also, some asylum seekers and refugees aren’t well educated so the local authorities give them the opportunity to do some training on basic skills e.g. women would do cooking and men photography and carpentry. All this just shows how people’s interpretations on both asylum seekers and refugees have changed because before, the local authorities wouldn’t dream of offering such facilities to them especially the fact that they are for free.
A lot of information is shared about asylum seekers and refugees which sometimes tend to rise to confusion and fear. This is all partly due to the media, which has a massive influence as to how other people view asylum seekers and refugees because most of the time its just other peoples own opinions.
Many people will argue whether asylum seekers should be allowed to stay in the UK, whereas others will totally disagree and say they shouldn’t be allowed to stay in the UK. There are many reasons as to why people would think in these different ways.
On the one hand, asylum seekers should definitely be allowed to stay in the UK. However, most people have the picture that asylum seekers are just flooding the UK and are illegal and bogus, but this isn’t true at all because firstly they are just like us and secondly, many of them are law -abiding citizens. A law abiding citizen is someone who always follows the law and never breaks it. If asylum seekers were to break the law or commit a crime etc, they would be put in detention and most likely deported. This is the main reason why asylum seekers are classed as law- abiding because if they did anything wrong they would be scared of being deported. This shows that there is no reason as to why asylum seekers shouldn’t be allowed to stay in the UK because most of them would do the right things.
Another reason is that they make a huge contribution to the British economy and culture. Some of them are highly educated and therefore have good jobs- doctor, dentist, engineer etc and those that aren’t well educated, start their own businesses where a lot of money is earned. About 1,200 medically qualified refugees/ asylum seekers are recorded on the British Medical Associations database. Those who come to the UK well educated would have done a lot of hard work in their country.
Asylum seekers are people who are just looking for a safe place to stay but many people look at them in the wrong way. Just because they may have had to flee from another country to the UK, doesn’t at all mean they carry deadly diseases or are people who looking for trouble which mean they shouldn’t be allowed to stay in the UK. This isn’t a good way for people to look at asylum seekers in and I personally find it unfair and disrespectful. Under law, anyone has the right to apply for asylum in any country which has signed the 1951 Convention and are still part of it. If the reason as to why people wouldn’t want asylum seekers staying in the UK is because they think they will stay here forever, isn’t true because most of them hope to return to their home country some point in the future.
Also, if asylum seekers are allowed to stay in the UK, it makes the UK a bit like a “mini world” because there will be all sorts of people from different backgrounds etc. This would be very good because then we can all learn different skills from other people and associate with people who aren’t from the same background as us. It also helps the young generation know more about the world around us. For example, if we didn’t allow people from like India we wouldn’t know much about the celebration of Eid and our lives would be pretty plain because we wouldn’t know a variety of different things.
Last but not least, another key point as to why asylum seekers should be allowed to stay in the UK is simply because everyone in the world deserves to be treated both equally and fairly no matter their race, belief or background. It wouldn’t really be fair if asylum seekers weren’t allowed to stay in the UK because that would be kind of breaking and disobeying their human rights. The main reason they come to the UK is for their safety and everyone has the right to live in a safe environment. Isn’t that right?
All that’s been said above just show the fact asylum seekers should certainly be allowed to stay in the UK, it would be very cruel if they weren’t.
On the other hand, asylum seekers shouldn’t be allowed to stay in the UK and I am now going to say why this is:
An awful lot of money is spent on them of which isn’t really efficient because it can be spent other things like better hospitals and schools. In a year, approximately £1 million is currently being spent on 120 asylum seekers who have been refused to have permission to stay in the country, but are still living. Some of them haven’t yet been deported years after their applications to remain in Britain were rejected and until they are, the council is supporting them. I find this a bit unfair on the council because it puts it under a lot of unnecessary stress- having to find a home for them, provide them with adequate food etc.
Many asylum seekers go down to Croydon, unaccompanied by an adult, when under the age of 18. The council therefore has to look after them until they turn 18 and after that, they earn no money which leads them into forcing tax payers to pay more. The amount of money which is pent on looking after these children has tripled in the past two years- from £250, 00 in 2007 to being about £1 million in 2009. I yet again find this unfair on both the council and the tax payers because these children should just be sent to an orphanage or children’s home, instead of going down to Croydon, The reason as to why I say this is because in Croydon, the council has to look after them and that isn’t technically their duty- but they have no other choice, so if they are sent to an orphanage, that would be a bit better because firstly, orphanages are built to look after children and therefore the children can associate with other children and secondly, the tax payers would have to pay more.
In addition, allowing asylum seekers to stay in the UK has a massive impact on public services.
It has a major effect on schools and causes the education status in schools to slowly decrease sometimes. I say this because some asylum seekers’ children require a lot of educational attention- they may not be able to read or write. However the main problem is when they are sent to high performing schools, because since they won’t be that good therefore won’t achieve high grades like their fellow students; it will affect the school grades in general and they will start to gradually go down. This is mainly because English is not their first language so a lot of money is spent on employing support staff who can help them reach an acceptable level.
Another effect asylum seekers have on public services is that many of them come to the UK in desperate need of medical help. This has an impact on hospitals- they are unable to help as many people as usual because they would have to put the most severe patients down first. As a result, many people would be left for days maybe even weeks without being treated because they may not be counted as a severer patient and this would cause their problem to get worse over time. For example, if an asylum seeker has ammonia and other person (who isn’t asylum) has a mild head ache, the asylum seeker would be treated first because their problem is more deadly compared to a mild head ache.
Lastly, there are many asylum seekers who would have experienced war, violence and drugs and this would have an effect on our communities. Some of the asylum seekers might bring the bad behaviour into our communities and use them upon others. This wouldn’t be good at all, but would probably have an influence on youngsters- they may see it as a cool/ grown up thing to do and start doing it themselves. This might increase the amount of crimes in our communities. Nevertheless, not all asylum seekers are like this!
The reasons I’ve shown above, all go to show and prove that asylum seekers shouldn’t be allowed to stay in the UK- most of them cause chaos, trouble and stress. No one should have to suffer their problems and so the easiest way to prevent this, is to simply not allow asylum seekers to stay in the UK.
Overall, I personally come to conclude that asylum seekers should be allowed to stay in the UK. I’ve looked into both sides of the argument and find that not allowing them to stay in the UK is just horrible. Asylum seekers are just the same as anyone else and therefore should be allowed to stay wherever they want, without being forced away or badly judged by others. I think by not allowing them asylum seekers to stay in the UK is totally disrespecting their human rights because there isn’t a specific place where only asylum seekers should stay- they should be able to stay wherever they can get help. If asylum seekers stay in the UK, it allows them and others to mix with a range of other people from different groups. I think some people should start to appreciate the fact that we are all different and therefore come from different backgrounds which should be respected. If everyone had the same background, our world would be very boring.
My bibliography
During my essay preparation, I was very careful with the types of sources of information I used. There were so many different sources available on the internet and therefore I was very critical and only chose the most reliable ones and immediately cancelled out those that weren’t very reliable/ trustworthy.
My little technique as to how I checked whether a source was trustworthy or not was looking out for these things:
Was it a World Trusted site- if it was then that assured me I could probably trust it. However, that wasn’t the only way I knew I could trust a particular source because there were some other sources which weren’t World Trusted but had other key elements. For example, where the information was found- like was it from a good book used in schools/ colleges etc.
Not everything on the internet can be trusted because it is all so unregulated such that anyone, with any opinion, can post anything they want, no matter how inaccurate it is.
The sources of information I used are as follows:
