The British Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, addressed a key election issue yesterday when he unveiled new technology to stem the trafficking of illegal immigrants, as official figures showed the number of asylum applications rose last month.
At the same time, the Health Secretary, Mr Alan Milburn, announced a radical streamlining of the National Health Service. Mr Straw pledged to step up the number of asylum-seekers who are removed from Britain after being refused refugee status. The government was criticised for failing to meet its 12,000 target last year, but Mr Straw said the number of asylum-seekers returned by immigration officers will be 30,000.
Mr Straw criticised Conservative plans to detain every single asylum-seeker in secure camps as "impractical, inhumane and expensive".
He said new electronic fingerprinting technology at ports, airports and other centres across Britain have already led to 89 arrests and 44 convictions of bogus applicants.
The Home Office also announced yesterday that there was a provisional 2 per cent drop in asylum applications. The figure up to the end of March was 74,850 and the backlog of undecided claims was the lowest in the decade. Figures also revealed the number of asylum applications rose slightly in March, compared with February, but it was still 13 per cent lower than for the same period last year.
At the same time, a revolutionary shake-up of the NHS was being announced yesterday, with the promise that a third of health authorities would disappear in 2004.
The Health Secretary, Mr Milburn, said the massive changes would save more than £100 million and switch the "centre of gravity" in the health service from Whitehall to frontline staff. The changes are needed because the existing structure of the NHS cannot deliver government reforms, he said.