As Europe opens it doors to fleeing Ukrainians, Britain adopts a ‘do-it-yourself’ asylum plan

Enter a new program detailed Monday in which Britain’s conservative government has effectively decided to outsource refugee care to the public — offering about $455 per month to local sponsors who take Ukrainians in rent-free. Even now — and unlike the European Union, where Ukrainians were granted free entry — Britain will still require a visa for those running from the Russian siege. A surge of British generosity ensued — with 43,800 sponsors rushing to register within the first five hours. But community-based refugee programs in Britain have been notoriously plagued by bureaucracy and other woes, and the British opposition on Monday decried the government’s plan for Ukrainians as a “DIY” asylum program.

The British government said it will do its best to streamline the process now. But speaking to the BBC last week, Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab made one thing clear: The government is not prepared to “just open the door.”

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The lagging response is underscoring the extent to which Prime Minister Boris Johnson has clung to the anti-immigrant and anti-European sentiments that defined his winning Brexit campaign, which led to Britain’s departure from the European Union in 2020. Britons wanted their country back, and that’s what the Brexiteers delivered. So even in the face of a historic refugee crisis unfolding across the English Channel, Johnson’s reaction has been to keep the Ukrainian exodus into Europe at arm’s length from home.

There’s evidence to suggest his government’s halting response — one that puts vetting and procedure ahead of speedy assistance — is not in step with the British public. Polls show 3 in 4 Britons back refuge for those fleeing war, and about the same number want the government to do more to help those fleeing the Russian invasion.

Some observers see Johnson’s foot-dragging as the product of a decade of conservative British politics that can be summed up by a famous quote from his fellow conservative predecessor, Theresa May. In a 2012 interview with the Telegraph, May — then head of Britain’s Home Office — vowed to create “a really hostile environment for illegal migration.”

The “hostile environment” policy has “influenced the way that everybody in government thinks, from top minsters to the bottom of the border agency,” Tony Travers, a British politics expert at the London School of Economics, told me. “But they are suddenly being faced with the public having a completely different view of asylum seeking in this situation, and they are having a very hard time adjusting because they’ve spent 20 years trying to keep immigrants out.”

Johnson’s government has widened London’s post-Brexit chasm with Europe — particularly with France. As Britain-bound Ukrainians bottlenecked at France’s English Channel port city of Calais, allegedly caught in a bureaucratic nightmare to cross the channel, French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin accused the British government of a “lack of humanity.”

French President Emmanuel Macron had traded barbs with Johnson over British proposals to turn asylum seekers crossing the English Channel back to France after 27 migrants drowned last November. Last week, Macron bluntly accused Johnson’s government of talking big, but doing little to aid Ukrainian refugees.

Speaking of London’s move to simplify the visa process for Ukrainians through online applications, Macron told reporters that he welcomed “the British shift, which shows there was a problem, despite what was being said at the time.” He added, “Despite all the grand statements … the British government continued to apply current rules that meant they did not welcome Ukrainian refugees who wanted to reach British soil, saying they have to travel hundreds of kilometers in order to apply for a visa.”

“It’s a glimmer of pragmatism that they’re starting to align themselves with their own statements, which is a step in the right direction, although much remains to be done,” Macron said.

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Britain has said its visa program that allows Ukrainians to join family in Britain could bring in up to 200,000 people — a number that would take more than a year to reach at the current pace of about 400 per day. Citing security, the British government has sought to thoroughly vet applicants — resulting in a process that some have described as “humiliating.”

Its new effort, outlined in detail Monday by Housing Secretary Michael Gove, will allow in Ukrainians without family in Britain. Under that program, local volunteers will “nominate” Ukrainians they agree to house for at least six months in exchange for a stipend. Ukrainians will not be officially designated as refugees and will lack certain protections. But they will receive a temporary right to remain and work for three years.

Their numbers will not be officially capped, Gove said. But practically, participation may be limited. As the Guardian reported, a similar British program aimed largely at Syrians was cumbersome and bogged down by bureaucracy, with only about 700 individuals taking part since 2015.

Gove portrayed the request for the British people to open not only their hearts, but their homes, as a national project “to help those fleeing persecution find peace, healing and the prospect of a brighter future.” Actor Benedict Cumberbatch has publicly offered to take part in the new Ukraine program. So too did Johnson’s transport secretary. Johnson himself, a spokesman suggested, might not — due to “security” challenges.

Britons who already have Ukrainians in mind to sponsor can name them in their applications. But the government said charities, universities and community groups would have a “big role” to play in linking refugees with British sponsors who don’t know specific Ukrainians but still want to help.

Nevertheless, doubts remained about how quickly that could happen.

The government “can’t seriously be asking Ukrainian families who are fleeing Vladimir Putin, who have left their homes with nothing, to get on to Instagram and advertise themselves in the hope a British family might notice them? Is this genuinely the extent of this scheme?” Lisa Nandy, a senior official from the opposition Labour Party, told parliament.

Gove said Monday that 1,500 people across Britain had signed up in the first hour, a number that snowballed despite complaints on social media that the government website had repeatedly crashed.

But even once the government determines which homes are safe for Ukrainians — and which Ukrainians are safe to enter Britain — more questions abound. What happens, for instance, if British sponsors ask their Ukrainian guests — who will have permission to remain for three years — to leave after the minimum pledge to house them for six months? Who will house them? Where will they go?

“After weeks of dither and delay [the British government’s] plan to protect people fleeing the war in Ukraine fails to match the need of the moment and the compassion of the public,” Tim Naor Hilton, chief executive of Refugee Action, wrote in a statement. “It is a massive downgrade from the UK’s previous support for refugees — and it may even put them at risk.”

He added: “Community sponsorship is an important part of any refugee protection system and a wonderful way for people to show their support — but it can only ever be a drop in the ocean of what is needed.”