CAMPAIGNERS are mobilising against Home Secretary Priti Patel’s “cruel” and “unworkable” plans to overhaul the asylum system.  

The plans, which would see refugees who arrive via “illegal” routes denied the right to settle permanently in Britain even if they are granted asylum, have been widely condemned as “inhumane” and a potential breach of international law since they were announced this week.   

Choose Love, a charity that delivers aid to refugee camps across Europe, has set up a campaign to oppose the plans, including a petition that has already surpassed its target of 5,000 signatures. 

Choose Love director of advocacy Natasha Tsangarides said that she was “horrified” by the plans. “If left unchanged, this plan will destroy lives,” she warned.

“It is for this reason we are urging the public to sign our petition and put pressure on the government to rework their plan to one that is centred around dignity and upholds human rights.”

The charity also described Ms Patel’s proposals as “misleading.” 

Critics point out that her claim that the asylum system is “overwhelmed” is at odds with a decline in applications for asylum, which fell by 18 per cent last year. 

Only refugees who arrive to Britain via proposed resettlement schemes will now be entitled to indefinite leave to remain. 

Refugee Council chief executive Enver Solomon said that this rule would create a “two-tier system,” with some refugees “unfairly punished” for how they reached Britain. 

“The reality is that, when faced with upheaval, ordinary people are forced to take extraordinary measures and do not have a choice about how they seek safety,” he said.

Reinforcing that point, refugees in Britain spoke out today about how they did not have the opportunity to consider legal routes when fleeing their home countries. 

Refugee Kolbassia Haoussou, who co-founded Survivors Speak Out, a support network for victims of torture, said that he would have been immediately deported from Britain under the new rules, having arrived across the Channel in 2005. 

“In a refugee camp, you can have that legal process,” he said. “But in my case, when I was fleeing torture, in that moment of persecution, I didn’t think anything other than just ‘flee.’ Because any delay I create, I am putting my life in danger, so I just have to go.”

Lawyer Mohamad Alo, who arrived in this country from Syria with his wife and three children in 2011, said: “I didn’t even have time to return to my own house, but went straight to the airport.”

Sign the petition at mstar.link/ChooseLovePetition.