UK has failed on migration — Woolas

BRITISH governments have continually failed to do enough to manage immigration.

Immigration Minister Phil Woolas, the MP for Oldham East, said no one had failed to fund asylum removals properly.

Speaking at a debate in London with the Dutch Justice Minister, Ernst Hirsch Ballin, he said the UK was 10 years behind the Netherlands on policies such as new migrants bringing in spouses.

Mr Woolas said: “Our failure to resource the asylum processes has caused untold human misery and division within our communities.

“My attitude to this issue is that I am going to clear the backlog because it is the right thing to do morally for asylum seekers and the right thing to do for the country as a whole.

“We are making the biggest changes to immigration for years. We are now fit for purpose.”

Mr Woolas said that until governments got control of managing immigration, it was impossible to help new arrivals integrate into British society.

He continued: “If you cannot have border controls that allow you to count people in and out of the country, if you can’t have that proper system, and carry the confidence of the public with you, you cannot help the immigrant to integrate in to society.”

Shadow home secretary Dominic Grieve said Mr Woolas was conducting a 24-hour spin operation.