Before 1914 it was possible to travel between a number of countries without a passport. British subjects were free to move to and from countries that were part of the British Empire and British Commonwealth of Nations long after they gain full sovereignty. Scots were automatically French citizens for 500 years up until 1907.
The British Nationality Act 1948 allowed the 800 million British subjects in the British Empire to live and work in the United Kingdom without needing a visa. Commonwealth citizens were not subject to immigration control until 1962.
The Aliens Act 1905 was the first major piece of modern immigration legislation and set up an inspectorate at ports of entry to the UK. Its officers had the power to refuse entry to aliens who were considered ‘undesirable
The 1951 refugees’ convention was signed three years after the UK passed the British Nationality Act 1948. Back in the 1950s, easy international travel was a luxury for the few so uncontrollable borders and mass economic migration from afar was not foreseen. Welfare states were in their infancy.
Many people can now save up to travel far away by air, sea and land. This leads to a screening problem caused by economic migrants lying about their backgrounds.
This gives countries an incentive to evade their obligations raising standards of proof under the 1951 Convention, resulting in ‘more refoulement of refugees to their place of persecution’.
See The Economics of International Refugee Law, Ryan Bubb, Michael Kremer, and David I. Levine Journal of Legal Studies (June 2011) for more discussion.
Their suggestion that developed countries pay poor countries to take refugees from persecution just shows how bare the policy cupboard appears to be. The transfer of refugee claimants from wealthy states to poorer states could ameliorate the screening problem by inducing self-selection among refugee claimants. Fewer economic migrants will apply for refugee states if they have to go to another poor country.
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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