Millions more arrivals predicted if ‘safe, legal routes’ are offered

INTRODUCING uncapped ‘safe and legal routes’ for asylum seekers would result in ‘millions’ of migrants coming to Britain, officials have warned.

Home Office experts were asked to calculate the impact of opening up the UK’s asylum system to overseas applications – as proposed by Labour and refugee groups.

Official modelling concluded that ‘millions and millions’ of migrants from across the world would be drawn here by such a policy, the Daily Mail has learned. There would be massive demand from a pool of 100million people who have been displaced by conflict and disasters across the globe.

A Home Office source said: ‘We obviously couldn’t sustain these numbers of people coming in. It would be totally crackers and I can’t imagine the British people want to see millions of extra people coming to the UK.’

The Home Office is already struggling to cope with a backlog of 166,000 cases after new applications hit nearly 75,000 last year. A surge in arrivals would also place enormous pressure on housing and public services. It comes as new laws to tackle the small boats crisis are due to be unveiled next week.

The Mail reported yesterday how Rishi Sunak is aiming to capitalise on ‘momentum’ secured by the Brexit breakthrough. The measures, provisionally titled the Illegal Migration Bill, will set out a range of measures to combat Channel arrivals.