Open Letter to: Refugee Council, Refugee Arrivals Project, Refugee Action & other voluntary groups
The Immigration & Asylum Act 1999 imposed vouchers, forced dispersal and increasingly detention (imprisonment) of asylum seekers. The Home Office set up the National Asylum Support Service (NASS) giving £8m for two years to the Refugee Council and others to implement NASS policies – a form of privatisation. This new "Poor Law" costs more to administer than the benefits it denies asylum seekers; thousands of women, children and men are forced to live without cash and well below the poverty line. It has inflamed racism and opens the way to depriving everyone – single mothers, people with disabilities, homeless and older people - of cash benefits.
