Letter: Figures are not made up

I make no correlation between the people crossing the Channel on small boats and the doctors, dentists etc. languishing in the asylum backlog.

These are legitimate asylum seekers, not people forced to risk their lives on small boats, who are languishing in the bureaucratic nightmare that is currently the system for claiming asylum. There are currently 160,000 people, these professionals amongst them, awaiting an initial decision on their asylum claim.

My point is that this should be sorted out so that these valuable people can get to work.

I take exception to Alan’s suggestion that my figures are made up. My source was an article in the Observer on April 9 – ‘Trained medics who could ease NHS crisis stuck in asylum limbo’ – which can easily be found on the Guardian website, by googling ‘Doctors, dentists, asylum, Observer’ if he cares to look.

There are many facts here worth reading and far too many for me to elucidate here.

John Scholey

Clifford Road, S11