Asylum seekers in Scotland – what’s the background to the SERCO contract issues?

Despite all the fuss about migration levels, the numbers applying for asylum in the UK are at historically low levels. They ran at over 100,000 annually in the early noughties, then fell to around 30,000 per year and are back near that level again after another short peak linked to the migrant crisis in the…

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Housing associations can help keep refugees off the streets

Up to 90% of Syrian and other asylum seekers who make it to Britain face homelessness. Social landlords can offer advice, support – and homes. When the plight of Syrian refugees made September’s headlines, housing organisations rushed to offer rehousing across Britain. But can they contribute to the government’s resettlement scheme and, if not, how…

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The chequered history of housing asylum seekers

Ever since numbers of asylum seekers began to shoot upwards in the late 1990s, government support has had two conflicting objectives: complying with international obligations to care for the victims, while at the same time deterring as many asylum seekers as possible from coming here. More recently we could add a third: cutting the costs…

Democracy under attack

Democracy under attack is the title of a new book which looks at the role of the media in driving social policy.  It accuses journalists of distortion, dumbing down, hunting in packs and several other sins.  Nothing remarkable about that, you might think, except that the author is a journalist – Malcolm Dean, until 2006…