This project entailed a programme of research which sought to examine three aspects of this policy approach. First, the political and policy rationale of the policy, explored through a discourse analysis of political speeches, reports, parliamentary documents and debate transcripts, media and press releases. A corpus of 449 texts was gathered covering the period 2002-2016. Then 21 interviews with politicians and policy makers were undertaken. Second, an exploration of the economic rationale for the policy -how much does it cost to the public purse, what would alternative policy scenarios cost, and how much are third sector organisations spending on people who are supposed to be adequately supported by the state. Data for the costing for third sector spend was assembled from the Charity Commission database. Third, 30 interviews with people who have been through the asylum system, undertaken by refugee community researchers, explored everyday life on asylum support.Most people who are awaiting a decision on their asylum application in the UK at the time of this project were not permitted to enter the labour market. In the absence of labour market access, they were then dependent on welfare support payments. This policy was justified by politicians on the basis that welfare and work act as pull factors for economic migrants who seek to abuse the asylum system by making spurious claims. This project entailed a programme of research which sought to examine three aspects of this policy approach. First, the political and policy rationale of the policy, explored through a discourse analysis of political speeches, reports, media and press releases, and interviews with politicians and policy makers. Second, an exploration of the economic rationale for the policy -how much does it cost to the public purse, what would alternative policy scenarios cost, and how much are third sector organisations spending on people who are supposed to be adequately supported by the state. Third, interviews with people who have been through the asylum system, undertaken by refugee community researchers, which explored everyday life on asylum support. The project ran 2015-19 (incorporating one year of maternity leave for the PI 2017-18).

1. Gathering of a corpus of texts on asylum and the right to work using Nexis; Hansard; the archive of British political speeches; Home Office press releases farmed from the Home Office website; grey literature gathered through NGO and UN networks. The database of texts of includes all of the records of the debates in the Houses of Commons and Lords which covered the issue of asylum seekers and the right to work; records of parliamentary committee meetings and reports where the issue arose (e.g. the Home Affairs Select Committee); newspaper articles from all major UK national newspapers; political speeches made by party leaders and cabinet ministers; think tank reports; European Union (EU) Commission and Parliament reports; third sector reports; and campaigning materials produced in the period. In total, 449 texts covering the period 2002–2015 were gathered and imported into NVivo qualitative data analysis software. The texts were then coded to identify the full range of arguments made—for and against—giving asylum seekers the right to work. When coded, this provided a database through which I was able to identify the range of arguments made, by who, and in what contexts, for the period since what was effectively a work ban came in. 2. Research interviews with politicians (Home Secretaries, Immigration Ministers), policy makers who have worked on asylum in the Home Office since 2002, and NGOs with expertise in this field, in trying to shift policy on welfare and working rights for people who are awaiting a decision on their asylum application. 22 interviews were undertaken and participants were selected using a purposive sampling method informed by the textual analysis earlier in the project. 3. Creation of a database of organisations that support people in the asylum system using the Charity Commission database. Financial information on voluntary organisations is based on their annual accounts submitted to the Charity Commission. The “asylum support” charities is applied to all charities who list their beneficiaries as ‘asylum seekers’ / ‘refugees’ AND whose activities include: ‘make grants to individuals’ / ‘provide other finance’ / ‘provide housing’. Financial data for the entire sample of 199 of these organisations was obtained by entering data from the Charity Commission Register. Before use, the data is cleaned to remove significant errors, and undergoes a series of checks to ensure validity. These checks include: • comparison of income, expenditure and workforce data between this year and last year to look for particularly large increases and decreases, and • construction of various ratios between financial variables (for example between income and expenditure) to look for anomalies. In-depth analysis is performed on a sample of 20 small / medium / large / major charities that are required to submit detailed annual accounts to the Charity Commission. Financial and operational data for these organisations was obtained by entering data from the charities accounts and annual report. The data is cleared to remove information which would enable the charities to be individually identified in the analysis and reporting. 4. Research interviews with people in the asylum system. This was undertaken by refugee comity researchers who were trained in qualitative interviewing methods. 30 people were interviewed in one dispersal city across three major refugee language groups (Amharic, Farsi, Arabic). A snowball sampling method was used, starting from contact made at an asylum drop in centre. Researchers aimed for at least 3 women in their sample of 10.