Britain’s interior minister on Sunday defended plans to drastically reduce protections for refugees and end automatic benefits for asylum seekers, insisting that irregular migration was « tearing our country apart ». The measures, modelled on Denmark’s strict asylum system, aim to stop thousands of migrants from arriving in England from northern France on small boats — crossings that are fuelling support for the anti-immigrant Reform UK party. But the proposals were criticised as « harsh and unnecessary » by the Refugee Council charity and are likely to be opposed by left-wing lawmakers within Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s embattled Labour government. Story by Charlotte Lam and details by FRANCE 24 correspondent in London, Bénédicte Paviot.
