No 10 ‘delaying migrant age checks’
Patel claims Government is dragging feet on measures to test asylum seekers who claim to be children
‘We must implement every law available to stop adults from claiming asylum on the basis of a false age’
PRITI PATEL has urged the Government to stop delaying measures that would prevent adult migrants from claiming to be children to boost their chances of gaining asylum.
The former home secretary is also understood to feel that when in office she faced major resistance to the plans for scientific age assessments from civil servants who claimed they were “too difficult” and “too controversial” to implement.
It follows the conviction on Monday of an Afghan double killer Lawangeen Abdulrahimzai, who sneaked into Britain posing as a 14-year-old schoolboy before going on to murder an aspiring Royal Marine. Subsequent checks, more than two years after he entered the UK, established he was five years older than he claimed.
In an article for The Daily Telegraph, Ms Patel said the measures – including scientific age checks on the child claimants – were part of the Nationality and Borders Act introduced during her tenure at the Home Office but had yet to be implemented by the Government despite being last April.
“We must implement every law available to us now to stop adults from claiming asylum on the basis of a false age,” she said. “They don’t just exploit our laws, but often children too, in the process of conducting this fraud.”
It is understood the Ministry of Justice is being blamed for holding up the secondary legislation required to bring in the new scientific assessments such given royal assent as X-rays and dental checks on migrants suspected of lying about their age. When it was being drawn up, it is understood Ms Patel felt there was significant pushback from civil servants amid concerns that the scientific tests were opposed by the medical establishment even though similar checks have been introduced across Europe.
Ms Patel said: “The Government must crack on with implementation because every day we delay we lose momentum.”
A Government source said: “We fully support the introduction of scientific age assessments and are working to do that as soon as possible.” Immigration officials did not accept Abdulrahimzai’s claimed age of 14 when he arrived on a ferry from France but, under the rules, had to give him the benefit of the doubt and allow him to be treated as a child until a more thorough test of his age could be carried out by social workers.
Sources said Abdulrahimzai dragged out the process by failing to attend interviews and delaying the submission of evidence to support his asylum claim.
It is understood the specialist test was only carried out in February 2022, more than two years after his arrival in England and just a month before he murdered Thomas Roberts. It judged his age to be 21, five years older than he was claiming and showing he had been an adult when he arrived.