Trinh Tru - Safe and legal routes will only succeed if the public believes they are working
Trinh Tru has written extensively on public perceptions on migration and refuge, with a particular lens looking at Government policies and public confidence, using Ipsos UK and Global insights. She recently wrote for the Metro here.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has announced plans for new “capped, safe and legal” routes for refugees later this year.
The government's aim is clear: to provide a structured way for people fleeing war and persecution to reach the UK, reduce dangerous Channel crossings, and rebuild confidence in an asylum system that many people believe is fundamentally broken.
On paper, the logic is straightforward. But the political success of these routes will depend less on the policy design itself than on whether the public actually perceives a change on the ground. If safe routes are understood as a genuine alternative to dangerous journeys, they may help restore trust. If they are seen simply as creating additional arrivals while small boat crossings persist, the political fallout could be severe.
Most people in Britain continue to support the principle of offering protection to those fleeing war and persecution. Ipsos research this year found that 73% of the public agree that people escaping conflict should be able to find safety in another country, including the UK. This humanitarian instinct, however, exists alongside deep anxieties about how the system is managed.
Almost half of the public say Britain should close its borders to refugees altogether, and six in ten believe many people claiming asylum are not genuine refugees. The appetite for increasing overall numbers is also remarkably low, even in the face of acute global crises. For example, when we recently asked the public how the government should respond to the displacement caused by the current conflict in Iran and Lebanon, just 8% said the UK should accept more refugees. Instead, people are far more likely to favour measures such as humanitarian aid and diplomatic solutions.
The picture is therefore more complicated than a binary of “Britain is welcoming” or “Britain is hostile.” Many people support the idea of protection while simultaneously demanding reassurance that the rules are clear, the process is fair, and the numbers are manageable.
That is the tightrope the government is now walking. The argument for the new approach, which includes a Canada-style community sponsorship model, is that a more structured system can replace ad-hoc schemes and dangerous journeys with managed pathways. From a humanitarian perspective, helping refugees settle into local communities through sponsorship improves integration and everyday life. From a political perspective, the assumption is that a system that appears orderly and capped will command greater public confidence.
As I highlighted earlier this month at the UN conference on resettlement and complementary pathways, global data shows that resettlement actually offers exactly what the public says it wants. There is more, rather than less, public support for legal pathways when they exhibit the characteristics people demand: planned intake, clear criteria, government-set quotas, and proper support for integration from day one. The public worries deeply about whether claims are genuine and how new arrivals will integrate, so a system that addresses these fears head-on is vital.
This new policy faces a significant communication hurdle, though. People do not always distinguish between refugees, asylum seekers, and economic migrants, even though these categories have very different legal meanings. Because these definitions often blur in the public mind, there is a real risk that this new policy could simply be misunderstood as an increase in overall migration, rather than a managed humanitarian route.
Public attitudes are rarely shaped by government announcements alone. People judge systems through what they see, hear, and experience. Even after net migration fell sharply recently, almost half of Britons still believed it had increased. Views on asylum are similarly influenced not by official definitions, but by a broader sense of whether migration is under control.
This is the ultimate test these new routes will face. Small boat crossings currently dominate the public’s understanding of the asylum system; they are highly visible and have become the ultimate test of whether the border is secure. Safe and legal routes will inevitably be judged in this wider context. If their introduction coincides with a visible reduction in dangerous crossings, they will likely be embraced as part of a more effective, humane approach. But if crossings continue, people may view the new routes not as a solution, but as just another part of an unresolved challenge.
The reality facing the government is not that the British public has turned its back on refugee protection. Nor is it that safe and legal routes lack support. Rather, the task is to build on the public's conditional, pragmatic support by proving that the new system directly addresses their concerns about control and fairness.
Safe and legal routes offer a potential step change as a humane alternative to dangerous irregular journeys.
But for these routes to succeed, they have to work in practice, not just in principle. The asylum debate is too often framed as a stark choice between compassion and control. Our data shows that the public actually wants both. The government's true challenge is proving to people that we can finally achieve them together.
