69. New Report: How UK Asylum Process Fails Non-Religious Refugees with Dr Lucy Potter

"Home Office officials do not understand what apostasy is — and this affects how non-religious asylum seekers are recognised, questioned, and believed."

Dr Lucy Potter returns to Humanism Now to share the findings of her landmark new report on non-religious asylum claims in the UK, produced in collaboration with Humanists UK. Drawing on three years of in-depth qualitative research, the report is the first study to analyse Home Office decision-making policies for those seeking asylum on the basis of leaving religion or non-religious identity.

Things we discuss

✔︎ Why the Home Office misunderstands apostasy
✔︎ Cultural bias in credibility assessments 
✔︎ How interpretation errors can undermine asylum claims
✔︎ Policy recommendations for fairer decision-making

Read the report

Available from Humanists UK (https://humanists.uk) from 24 March 2026.

Attend the report launch

📍 Online
📆 Tuesday 24 March, 1.00–2.30pm GMT
➡️ Register here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/report-launch-non-religious-apostasy-asylum-claims-in-the-uk-tickets-1982976511125/

Event Speakers:

• Dr Lucy Potter, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of York
  https://humanismnow.buzzsprout.com/2246305/episodes/14031059/
• Lizzie Collinge MP,  Chair, All-Party Parliamentary Humanist Group
  https://humanismnow.buzzsprout.com/2246305/episodes/17588288/
• Andrew Copson, Chief Executive, Humanists UK
  https://humanismnow.buzzsprout.com/2246305/episodes/17849032/
• Jamie Bell, Solicitor, Public Law and Immigration, Duncan Lewis

Connect with Dr Lucy Potter

• University of York profile: https://www.york.ac.uk/sociology/people/lucy-potter/
• ESRC Postdoctoral Fellowship profile: https://wrdtp.ac.uk/postdoctoral-fellows/

Transcript

Welcome Back Dr Lucy Potter

James Hogson 0:01

Welcome back to Humanism Now, a podcast about secular ethics, curiosity, and compassionate change. I'm your host, James Hodgson. Today it's a pleasure to welcome back to the podcast Dr. Lucy Potter. You may remember Lucy, who was on one of our very first episodes back in November 2023. Since that time, she's completed her PhD from the University of Sheffield and is now a postdoctoral fellow at the University of York in the UK. It's a pleasure to welcome Lucy back to the show, as during her first interview, she was discussing her ongoing research that was contributing towards her PhD. And now I'm delighted to say Lucy's back to join us to provide a very important update about what she's been up to since. So Lucy Potter, welcome back to Humanism Now.

Dr Lucy Potter 0:46

Thank you, James. Thank you for having me.

James Hogson 0:48

So a lot has changed since our first interview. Congratulations, first of all, on your doctorate and your new role. And I understand you have some findings to share with us from your research. So please, what have you been working on that would be of interest to our listeners?

Researching UK Non-Religious Asylum Claims

Dr Lucy Potter 1:01

Hey, thank you, James. Thanks so much for the introduction. So I have been busy at York and I have now authored a report about non-religious asylum claims in the UK. And I've worked on this in collaboration with Humanist UK, who I worked with in my doctoral research. And the report has come from my doctoral research, which was a three-year in-depth qualitative project on the lived experiences of non-religious refugees and their asylum claims in the UK. And I have explored their experiences with a broader analysis of home office asylum decision-making policies.

Turning A PhD Into Policy Change

James Hogson 1:40

So that's wonderful. So this report is a direct result of the research that you were undertaking back in 2023 when we first spoke. Sounds like a huge commitment. So again, congratulations on completing it. So could you explain how this report is adding to the findings from your doctoral research? What is the additional themes that you've looked into here?

Dr Lucy Potter 2:05

So with my with anyone's doctoral research, it tends to get released in a thesis which is very long, very bulky, and not accessible for the general public to understand. So when I started my research fellowship at York, so I'm funded by the ESRC and they like research that has a leading impact.

James Hogson 2:28

Would you like to explain who the ESRC are, please?

Dr Lucy Potter 2:31

Yes. So the ESRC are the Economic and Social Research Council. And yeah, they fund my research fellowship for a year, and it's focused on consolidating my PhD research through things like publications. But also a big role of that is creating outputs that may have impact in the real world. And so they gave me generous funding to produce this report, which has the findings of my doctoral research, but in more of an empirical lens with some clear policy recommendations directed at the Home Office to hopefully improve decision making for asylum claims on the non-religious in the future.

James Hogson 3:20

And so what are some of the main findings in this report?

Credibility Tests And Cultural Bias

Interpreters And Lost Meanings

Report Launch Details And Speakers

Dr Lucy Potter 3:23

So I'll just briefly discuss three findings and then we welcome people to come to the report where I talk about around seven of them. So the main finding that I found during my research is that Home Officials do not quite understand what apostasy is. So apostasy is a term that explains the process of leaving your religion. And in a global context, there are legal repercussions in some countries that will punish journeys to apostasy, as well as laws like blasphemy that stop non-religious expression. What I found is that apostasy is most commonly framed as religious conversion in the Home Office policies. And most of the guidance and the training that the Home Office receives will be around religious conversion or how to question cases where it's persecution about religion and religious minorities. So for the non-religious, they're often misunderstood in these processes. And the refugees that I interviewed as part of the research said themselves that they felt misunderstood and inadequately recognized during their asylum interview. And this materialized in particular ways. One of them was that they were posed leading questions at times during maybe their screening interview, where they were asked, What is your religion? instead of kind of leaving it more open and asking, you know, what is their religion or belief. And in the asylum interview itself, they're often expected to tell their journeys in ways similar to a religious conversion. So, like religious deconversion, where it's understood as a linear stage processes and clearer logical journeys to leaving religion. But this didn't often reflect the lived experiences of people who leave religion in contexts where there is apostasy and blasphemy laws. So, for example, they might be silenced for a while before they were able to articulate their beliefs. And so the second finding was that there's then bias in the credibility assessments. So the credibility assessment is considered the most decisive stage in the asylum claims process. And a wide range of other academic literature looks at the asylum system, suggests that the assessment of credibility is often coming from a very localized understanding of what the decision maker thinks would be a genuine or believable story of persecution. And so in this research, I found that interview questions at times reflected a culturally specific misconceptions about how non-religious identity is formed and expressed. And so, for example, some of the refugees that I spoke with and the advocates that have supported apostates in their claims said that they were asked about their dietary preferences, whether they've changed, whether they eat pork now, whether they drink alcohol. They were then asked about their lifestyle. Were they publicly out as an atheist in the UK? But all that kind of overlooks how apostasy is for people that come from these contexts of uh apostasy and blasphemy laws that don't feel confident or comfortable to ever publicly declare themselves as so. But I think this comes in as a fundamental problem then in the asylum interview when they do have to declare their beliefs, but they don't only have to declare them, they have to prove them and articulate them for to someone who is might not have had that experience themselves. And then the final finding that I want to shed light on is then the issues of interpretation. Asylum claimants will always be given the option of having an interpreter for their case and in the interview. However, there are key terms about non-religion, so such as atheist, non-believer, an apostate, or even the term religion or non-religion itself, doesn't map neatly across language or cultural context. So in some cases, an interpretation can change the meanings of the terms, and this affects how someone's oral testimony is understood and recorded, and any inaccuracies can then later affect a claimant's credibility. And so these are the three findings, main findings, but I'll also talk more in the report launch about the issues with training and having to prove a belief more generally.

James Hogson 8:01

That's excellent. Some really interesting findings there. And I assume they also come with recommendations that you'll be sharing both in the report and as you mentioned, at the launch of the report, which is coming up soon. So, what can you tell us about that event and how can listeners get involved?

Dr Lucy Potter 8:21

So the report is going to be on Tuesday, the 24th of March. It's online, it's free of charge, and it's taking place from one in the afternoon till half two. We'll be leading that webinar in collaboration with Humanist UK. And so we'll be joined with opening remarks from Lizzie Collins, an MP and Secretariat of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Humanists, as well as reflections of the report's significance from Andrew Cobson, Chief Executive of Humanist UK. And we also have a new speaker announced, and that'll be Jamie Bell, who is a solicitor with experiences of supporting apostasy asylum claims. And if you're interested in hearing more and want to ask questions, there will be space for a QA. And I think that this report and the launch will be of interest to anyone who's interested in non-religious identities and worldviews, uh, especially interested in those identities outside of the dominant Euro American context, as well as all people that are interested in upholding human rights, freedom of religion or belief, and interested about asylum as well. Yeah, encourage anyone who's interested in hearing more to come to the launch.

James Hogson 9:38

And we will certainly share links to that event and everything in the show notes. If anyone is interested but cannot make that time exactly, will it be available on demand?

Where To Read The Report

Dr Lucy Potter 9:50

Yes. So I am going to record it and then disseminate it. This may be as a YouTube episode, but all that will become clear after the launch event.

James Hogson 10:01

Fantastic. Well, congratulations, Lucy. It all sounds fascinating. Really looking forward to hearing the full information and your findings in the launch event and of course in the full report. Where can people find the report if they would like to read a full copy?

Next Research On Resettlement

Dr Lucy Potter 10:17

It's going to be released by Humanist UK on their website the day of the launch event. So that's the 24th of March. And then it'll be publicly available. Also are very open for people emailing me. I can send it there as well. And if anybody can't make it to the launch event but wants to chat about this in more detail, I'm also happy to be contacted.

James Hogson 10:39

And this is a culmination, as you say, of many years of work. So I guess it begs the question: what are you working on now and what's next for you?

Support The Show And Follow

Dr Lucy Potter 10:46

Oh, good question. So, as part of my fellowship at York, I am developing my next research proposal. And this will all depend on funding and opportunities that arise. But I hope to work on my next project about non-religious refugees and their resettlement practices. So you might have heard the asylum reforms that are proposed by the Labour government and how they will be shortening the time it takes for refugees to get indefinite leave to remain. And they will be reassessing claims on a shorter basis as well. So I'm really interested to look at how this will affect the belonging of non-religious refugees who have left both their religion and their country of origin. And I'll be interested in exploring how they gain community in a new society and keep exploring how humanist belief systems can provide a way of support for refugees.

James Hogson 11:47

Sounds fascinating, and I'm sure you'll do an excellent job. And when you do, please do return for a third time. Dr. Lucy Potter, thank you so much for joining us once again on Humanism Now.

Humanise Live 11:56

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