Home Secretary visits Doncaster to outline £40,000 for failed asylum seekers plan
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has visited Doncaster to outline details of a trial scheme where families of failed asylum seekers will be offered up to £40,000 to leave the UK.
She visited Parklands Sports and Social Club in Wheatley to talk about reforming the UK’s immigration system.
Last week she said the government would seek to forcibly remove failed asylum seekers if they do not accept "incentive payments" of up to £10,000 per person, capped at four per family, within seven days.
The scheme is expected to target about 150 families living in taxpayer-funded accommodation, and the Home Office estimates it could save £20m if successful.
However, both the Conservatives and Reform UK have said the payments would incentivise people to come to the UK illegally.
The government already runs a voluntary returns programme, under which asylum seekers who choose to leave the UK can receive up to £3,000 in financial support.
Mahmood said housing a family of three in asylum accommodation costs up to £158,000 per year.
The home secretary said the UK government wanted to offer an "increased incentive payment" that will represent a "significant saving to the taxpayer", in an echo of reforms introduced in Denmark.
Mahmood said the government was consulting on how to remove families with children who refuse to leave voluntarily "in a way that is humane and effective".
She argued that not removing families had created "a perverse incentive" to cross the Channel with children.
In 2025, there were 82,100 applications for asylum in the UK, relating to 100,600 individuals. Of those, 58% of those applications were refused.
There were 28,004 voluntary returns in the year to December 2025, an increase of 5% on the previous 12-month period.
Last week Ms Mahmood also announced that asylum seekers who break the law, or work illegally, will be thrown out of government-funded accommodation and lose their support payments.
Doncaster Central Labour MP Sally Jameson said: “It was an absolute pleasure to welcome our Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood to Doncaster to hear about the work she is doing in the Home Office from tackling crime to reforming our immigration and asylum system and much more.”
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