Detention on the Bibby Stockholm will cease in January 2025, as the government has announced that it will not renew the lease.

Refugee charities have welcomed the news, but  campaign groups like the Quaker Asylum and Refugee Network (QARN) are hoping for further reforms.

QARN would  like to see the UK creating safe routes, so that people do not have to risk their lives in small boats. Working constructively with other countries to assist refugees, especially in Europe, should be another objective.

QARN says that when people who have come through the asylum process receive Discretionary Leave to Remain, they should not be expected to wait for ten years until they can be settled in UK, nor should they be expected to pay exorbitant fees for their application to remain in the UK, or a health surcharge. They should be allowed to work, so that they can contribute to the economy and to their community. The many thousands of individuals caught in this punitive system constitute an additional hidden backlog which urgently needs to be addressed.

QARN believes that the whole asylum system needs to be overhauled and new systems created that centre the voices of those with personal experience.

Compassion and justice should be the central principles of immigration policy. This means welcoming refugees and upholding international law, celebrating when people are given sanctuary and can rebuild their shattered lives.  Refugees’ skills can help communities to thrive. Yet, in a society with huge concentrations of wealth, people have been fed the line that if we treat asylum seekers humanely, it must be at the expense of lower income UK citizens. This is just not true. People and their human rights come first; there is plenty to go around if fairly shared, QARN concludes.