Lawyers are queasy about the home secretary’s plans to enable lay tribunals to determine asylum appeals. The government has not even stipulated what qualifications they will need
It is nearly a year since the government announced plans for lay tribunals to hear asylum appeals to clear the immigration case backlog and speed up removals. On Tuesday, home secretary Shabana Mahmood unveiled the legislative vehicle to make the controversial reform a reality.
Mahmood presented the Immigration and Asylum Bill to parliament – a day after journalists were briefed that the new body would be called the Independent Immigration Appeals Authority (IIAA), and that members of the public would be trained to determine asylum appeals involving human rights and foreign offenders.
As expected, and trailed in the King’s speech in May, the bill also contains measures to amend the interpretation of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (see box below).
In a press release, the Home Office said progress had been made to tackle the asylum backlog, and judicial sitting days in the First-tier Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber are being increased. ‘But the scale of the current caseload cannot be sustainably managed within the existing system. Despite the dedicated work of the tribunal and the judiciary, fundamental reform is now needed to stop the appeals system becoming a barrier to removal.’
The IIAA will begin hearing appeals late next year, prioritising cases ‘in the public interest’ such as those involving human rights claims and ‘high-harm’ foreign offenders. It will be staffed by ‘professionally trained and independently appointed adjudicators – much like magistrates – who will have a broad range of skills and backgrounds’.
But even before the bill was published, signs began to emerge that Mahmood faces a struggle to get the law through parliament. Several members of the House of Lords, including Labour’s Baroness Chakrabarti (Shami Chakrabarti) and crossbencher Baroness Butler-Sloss (Elizabeth Butler-Sloss), a former Court of Appeal judge, asked pointed questions about the training and selection of the proposed adjudicators.
ECHR update ‘does not move the dial much’
Just over five pages of the Immigration and Asylum Bill are devoted to changes in the application of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. They follow May’s ‘Chisinau declaration’ by ministers of the 46 Council of Europe member states pledging to update the interpretation of articles 3 and 8 of the convention to make it easier to deport unsuccessful asylum seekers and foreign criminals.
The main change proposed in the bill is to restrict the definition of ‘family’ in Article 8 to the ‘core cohabiting family’. A child who does not normally cohabit does not qualify unless there is evidence of ‘a genuine and subsisting parental relationship’, the measure states.
The government said this change would prevent illegal migrants, including dangerous foreign criminals, from abusing the system by relying on distant family relationships to prevent removal. It cited the example of ‘a domestic abuser from Poland with a string of convictions for violence’ being allowed to stay on the basis he was a ‘father figure’ to his nephew.
Another measure would amend the public interest provisions of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 to state: ‘It is in the public interest, and in particular in the interests of the prevention of disorder or crime, that persons who seek to enter or remain in the United Kingdom (a) have not been convicted of a criminal offence (in the UK or elsewhere), (b) have co-operated with immigration authorities and processes, and (c) are otherwise of good character.’
This will ‘make clear that deporting foreign national offenders is in the public interest and should only be blocked in the most exceptional circumstances’, the government said.
Introducing the changes, the home secretary stated that membership of the ECHR ‘is firmly in our national interest, especially at a time of geopolitical instability. But reform is needed to prevent human rights laws being exploited by those with no right to be in the UK’.
Critics of the current human rights regime questioned whether the proposed changes go far enough. ‘Some tinkering at the margins’, was the verdict of Alexander Horne, visiting professor at Durham University. ‘Looking more closely, particularly at the clauses relating to foreign national offenders, it is hard to see that the government will move the dial much.’
Michael Cross
All would be revealed when the bill is published, Home Office minister Lord Hanson of Flint (David Hanson) told the chamber. Except it wasn’t. The bill states that the new body’s professional standards officer, chief appeals officer and senior adjudicator must be legal professionals – but says nothing about what qualifications professional adjudicators must possess.
The government should also brace for an almighty fight outside parliament. In its response, the Immigration Law Practitioners Association (ILPA) described the proposals as an attack on justice and the rule of law.
The bill states that the home secretary will appoint the IIAA’s chief executive, who will in turn appoint the adjudicators. ILPA said: ‘Given that the Home Office is a party to every appeal, this creates a serious risk of perceived or actual bias. For this reason, ILPA considers that recruitment to the new body must be overseen by the Ministry of Justice and the Judicial Appointments Commission, not by the Home Office.’
The Home Office maintains that while decisions will be fully independent, the new body will be ‘integrated into the immigration system to ensure cases flow through quickly to removal where appeals are unsuccessful, to scale up removals of those with no right to be here’.
'Judicial oversight is not an obstacle to an effective immigration system, but rather what makes the system safe and legitimate'
Immigration Law Practitioners Association
ILPA believes this stated policy intention is incompatible with judicial independence: ‘The Restoring Order and Control paper, published in November 2025, sets out two explicit objectives – reducing arrivals and increasing removals. ILPA notes with grave concern that a body designed to be integrated into a system with those stated objectives and structured to accelerate the flow of cases toward removal raises serious questions about the institutional independence of its decision-making.’
Independent judicial oversight matters, says ILPA, because ‘the consequences of error are irreversible’. Judicial oversight ‘is not an obstacle to an effective immigration system, but rather what makes the system safe and legitimate’.
Mahmood said the appeals tribunal was ‘overwhelmed’ and that in consequence ‘people are gaming the system, lodging vexatious appeals to frustrate their removal’. But ILPA says it has yet to see any evidence that the current appeals process is being abused. The avenue is available only to those with protection or human rights claims and people whose removal could mean a return to persecution, torture or being permanently separated from their families.
What the evidence does show, ILPA alleges, is that the poor quality of Home Office decision-making is one of the primary drivers of delay. The association cites a 2025 National Audit Office report, which stated that decision quality remained a ‘challenge’.
'Immigration law is very complex, and it is unclear how this new appeals body would grapple with complex cases or with ensuring that processes are fair for everyone'
Mark Evans, president of the Law Society
Another cause of delay is a ‘severe shortage’ of legal aid provision, argues ILPA. The government increased immigration legal aid fees last December, but the uplifts applied only to new cases and were not backdated.
Given fees had not risen since 1996 and were slashed by 10% in 2011, ILPA says the increase ‘does not address the underlying deficit of at least 57% in legal aid provision, nor provide long-term sustainability. Without this, advice deserts will persist, the number of unrepresented appellants will continue to rise, and the bill will not achieve its stated policy aims’.
The Law Society, meanwhile, has urged the government to scrap the proposed shakeup, noting that previous appeals systems that relied on adjudicators without legal qualifications were ultimately abandoned because they were not fit for purpose.
President Mark Evans said: ‘Immigration law is very complex, and it is unclear how this new appeals body would grapple with complex cases or with ensuring that processes are fair for everyone. There is a risk that poor appeal decisions would simply be challenged elsewhere.
‘The government should be building an asylum system that is fair and fit for purpose. To do so, it should focus on tackling the true causes of delay. This means stabilising asylum policy, raising the quality of Home Office initial decisions, improving efficiency in the current tribunal system and funding legal aid properly.’
The consequences of error are ‘irreversible’, Evans also stressed.
