ABSTRACT
The United Kingdom (UK) is one of the signatories of both the 1951 United Nations Convention and the 1967 Protocol relating to the status of refugees; this declaration has not only an explicit but also an implicit understanding that refugees/asylum seekers originate from dangerous and hostile environments. This neoliberal critic and many of its connotations underpins readers argument, although they mainly seek to detail successive governments immigration policy. The repercussions of this support underpinned future migration policy and contributed to both public disdain for immigration and then to Brexit. Austerity began of course under the last Labour government, but with regard to migration policy it did not really start to make a difference until 2010. In a UK context then vulnerability is all but ensured by government policy but as noted for a period this was to some extent different for EU workers, who were ‘wanted’.
