The first migrants have moved into the Bibby Stockholm barge in Portland Port. The barge arrived on the Dorset coast in mid-July and could reach its capacity of 500 men by the end of the week. Migrant-led charity Migrant Voice has described the government’s use of barges to house asylum seekers as a “gimmick”, whilst Labour described it as a “consequence of Conservative failure” to manage the asylum system. Report by Jonesia. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:03 Because of the crisis we have in the channel,
00:24 we have to provide accommodation.
00:26 And we have to stop spending six million pounds a night
00:29 of taxpayers' money on hotels, which to some extent
00:32 are luxurious.
00:33 What we need is more basic accommodation
00:35 to stop the pull factor.
00:37 The prime minister has made it clear
00:38 he wants to reduce the backlogs, and we're doing that.
00:41 It's been down a third, I think, since the beginning of December.
00:44 So we're doing well.
00:45 We've got lots of extra case officers working on these.
00:48 Each case is individual, and we're getting there.
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00:54 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:57 Well, for us, it's really another PR stunt,
01:10 another gimmick by the government,
01:12 who is not serious about addressing the real issues,
01:15 who is not serious about coming up with a solution.
01:18 Most of the people-- actually, majority
01:20 of the people who are coming to UK to seek asylum,
01:22 will get a positive decision on their asylum.
01:24 We know the majority of them are coming
01:26 from countries like Afghanistan, like Iran, like Eritrea, Sudan.
01:31 We know they're coming from war-torn countries,
01:33 and we know eventually they will get refugee status.
01:36 Process people's application fast, or let them work and pay
01:39 for their accommodation.
01:40 We did not need--
01:42 we don't need to put people in barges, or in tents,
01:44 or indeed in hotels.
01:45 [MUSIC PLAYING]
01:48 [MUSIC PLAYING]
01:52 [MUSIC PLAYING]
01:53 What Labour would do is get on top of the asylum backlog.
01:58 It's currently at 173,000 people.
02:03 We would get on top of that backlog,
02:06 and then what we would do is have a situation where
02:09 we are using the long-standing asylum accommodation that's
02:13 been used for many, many years, and not
02:16 end up with having to use the barge, the hotels,
02:20 or indeed the bases.
02:22 Their use is a consequence of Conservative government failure
02:25 to manage our asylum system.
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