Thousands of asylum seekers with children will have to live
on £73.90 a week from August as a result of cuts of up to 30% in their support
payments, the UK Home Office has announced.
The cuts which would affect more than 27,800 destitute
asylum seekers, were being made because the current payment system resulted in
families with children in particular receiving “significantly more cash than is
necessary” to meet their essential living needs.
The Refugee Council described the cuts as “utterly
appalling” for families who were not allowed to work and said they would plunge
children further into poverty: “We suspect the only place that families can
live on this amount of money is in the imagination of government ministers,”
the council’s policy officer, Judith Dennis, said. “It’s utterly appalling that
the government has chosen to exacerbate the suffering of people who are already
living in desperate situations.’
A single parent with two children claiming asylum fall from
£149.86 a week to £110.85, for a couple with one child from £125.48 to £110.85,
and for a couple with two children from £178.44 to £147.80. A single parent
with one child will receive £73.90, down from £96.90.
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