Shabana Mahmood is a really horrible person whose policies are cruel. She’s one of the worst people in the Labour administration and should be fired immediately.

Asylum seekers in the UK are generally not allowed to work while they are waiting on a decision on their claim. If they have been waiting for more than a year, then they can apply for permission to work.

As a result, they are reliant on the Home Office for housing and support as they cannot work to pay for accommodation.

Marley Morris, associate director at the IPPR, said there are “better ways of bring down” costs of asylum such as “speeding up asylum processing and appeals, reforming the existing asylum contracts”.