Immigration: Asylum Claims

Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, the quality of the system was vastly improved after the 2014 report, which I talked about in my first Answer. In addition, the training of people dealing with LGBT asylum claims in detention or seeking their removal has been done in conjunction with both Stonewall and UKLGIG to absolutely ensure humane treatment of LGBT people in asylum.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

Can I ask the noble Baroness about the Home Office guidance issued in 2017? I have seen reports suggesting that gay asylum seekers could be returned to Afghanistan if they pretended they were straight. Surely this cannot be the case. We must work to a much higher standard, and the question of personal safety should be paramount in decisions given by the authorities.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

What the noble Lord says seems to be a contradiction in terms, because an LGBT person would presumably be seeking asylum because they feared persecution on return to a country that persecuted LGBT people. I would largely dispute the point, but I will double check because the noble Lord asked the question.