Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the answer of 15 January 2026 to Question 99931, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential impact of illegal number plates on national security, serious organised crime, terrorism and the effectiveness of ANPR systems.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
Vehicle registration marks are essential for identifying vehicles involved in crime. Individuals engaged in serious and organised crime, terrorism and other high‑harm offending often rely on the UK’s road network to facilitate their criminal activities.
We work closely with policing partners, the DVLA and other agencies to understand and mitigate risks posed by illegal or obscured number plates. The Home Office supports efforts to prevent their use and to strengthen ANPR effectiveness through investment and enforcement activity. ANPR remains a valuable tool to help the police tackle crime and keep the road safe. We keep the effectiveness of ANPR use under regular review, to ensure it remains a robust tool for identifying vehicles of interest and those engaged in criminal activities.
Comprehensive advice and guidance is available via the National Protective Security Authority (NPSA) and the National Counter Terrorism Security Office (NaCTSO), which includes signposting to a suite of Hostile Vehicle Mitigation (HVM) products and counter-measures. The specialist advice regarding HVM includes up-to-date technical resources and best practice advice regarding their deployment, and is available from these organisations.
Asked by: Rupert Lowe (Independent - Great Yarmouth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much her Department spent on (a) legal advice and (b) other support services for migrants who arrived in the UK illegally who are in accommodation by contract in 2025.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office does not hold the requested data on the provision of legal advice. Asylum seekers may be eligible for legal aid, which is administered by the Legal Aid Agency in the Ministry of Justice.
Regarding other services, the Asylum Accommodation and Support Contract (AASC) Statement of Requirements provides a detailed breakdown of all services that accommodation providers must deliver, along with the standards expected of them. The full document is available here:
The Home Office publishes information on asylum expenditure, including services such as AASC and AIRE, within its Annual Report and Accounts. These can be found on GOV.UK here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/ho-annual-reports-and-accounts
Asked by: Rupert Lowe (Independent - Great Yarmouth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what services were contracted and delivered on-site within hotels housing illegal migrants in 2025, including medical services, transport, catering, security, and welfare support.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office holds nine contracts for the provision of asylum accommodation and support services across the UK. Information related to these contracts, including the services delivered under them, is publicly available at the links below.
Hotel accommodation is managed directly by the contracted providers. Services delivered on-site typically include food and catering, laundry, security, and basic welfare support. These services are provided to ensure safe and suitable living conditions for asylum seekers and to help manage pressures on local authorities and public services while individuals await a decision on their claim.
Serco
AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract NW - Contracts Finder
AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract MEE - Contracts Finder
Mears
AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract NEYH - Contracts Finder
AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract Scotland - Contracts Finder
AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract NI - Contracts Finder
CRH
AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract Wales - Contracts Finder
AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract South - Contracts Finder
CTM
CCTM22A01 Provision of Bridging Accommodation and Travel Services Contract - Contracts Finder
Contract for the Provision of Asylum Accommodation and Travel Services - Contracts Finder
Asked by: Sarah Olney (Liberal Democrat - Richmond Park)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department uses artificial intelligence for decision making on immigration applications.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
Where appropriate, we use AI to improve productivity and effectiveness in our public services. All applications made under the Immigration Rules are considered and decided by trained human decision-makers.
Asked by: Gregory Campbell (Democratic Unionist Party - East Londonderry)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will hold discussions with the Foreign Affairs Minister in the Irish Republic on joint action to tackle international drug trafficking into the UK via the Irish Republic.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The UK and Ireland have a strong relationship which includes joint action against criminals targeting both the UK and Ireland.
In addition to these operational relationships, there is an annual security dialogue between the UK and Ireland to discuss key shared security issues faced. This includes discussions on international serious & organised crime, with the last one taking place in November 2025.
In January 2026, the UK formally invited Ireland to join the North Sea Channel Maritime Information Group. This group facilitates the cooperation and exchanging of information about maritime border security topics, including information around the movement of drugs. Existing members include Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many foreign nationals have been excluded from the UK since 2010, broken down by type of grounds for refusal.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office publishes data on entry clearance visas in the ‘Immigration system statistics quarterly release - GOV.UK’. Data on visa applications are published in table ‘Vis_D01’ whilst data on outcomes of visa applications are published in table ‘Vis_D02’ of the detailed entry clearance visas dataset. Information on how to use the dataset can be found in the ‘Notes’ page of the workbook. The latest data is from January 2005 up to the end of September 2025. Please note that data on refusals by reason is not available from published statistics.
Asked by: Andrew Rosindell (Reform UK - Romford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she plans to phase out the use of crustaceans in scientific experimentation.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Government is committed to non-animal alternatives in science and has published a strategy which sets out our long-term vision for a world where the use of animals in science is eliminated in all but exceptional circumstances. The strategy is available at:
The strategy does not preclude the development of alternatives to the use of animal species not currently covered by the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 (ASPA) protections, including decapod crustaceans.
The Animal Welfare (Sentience) Act 2022 recognised decapod crustaceans as sentient beings. The Government remains committed to an evidence-based and proportionate approach to setting welfare standards for decapod crustaceans, both for those caught for human consumption and those used in scientific research.
The Home Office is carefully considering next steps, in collaboration with other relevant departments, on whether decapod crustaceans should be brought within the scope of ASPA.
Asked by: Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat - Surrey Heath)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the reliability of ANPR data in (a) preventing and (b) detecting (i) road traffic and (ii) wider criminal offences.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
ANPR is a valuable tool to help the police tackle crime and keep the road safe. We keep the effectiveness of police and law enforcement use of ANPR under regular review, to ensure it remains a robust tool for identifying vehicles of interest to the police and drivers who break the law. Reads in the National ANPR Service are usually accompanied by a close-up image of the number plate (plate patch) and an overview image of the vehicle to enable users to corroborate the data.
Asked by: Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat - Surrey Heath)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how inaccuracies in vehicle databases are accounted for when ANPR data is used in policing decisions.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
ANPR is a valuable tool to help the police tackle crime and keep the road safe. We keep the effectiveness of police and law enforcement use of ANPR under regular review, to ensure it remains a robust tool for identifying vehicles of interest to the police and drivers who break the law. Reads in the National ANPR Service are usually accompanied by a close-up image of the number plate (plate patch) and an overview image of the vehicle to enable users to corroborate the data.
Asked by: Rupert Lowe (Independent - Great Yarmouth)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many and what proportion of her Department's asylum accommodation contract terms and schedules relating to services and unit costs were redacted; and on what grounds those redactions were made.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office’s asylum contracts are publicly available on Contracts Finder. Copies of the contracts, including redactions, are available at the below links.
Commercially sensitive information (including pricing details) and information related to performance management of services (including service credits) are redacted to allow the Home Office to obtain maximum value during the lifetime of its contracts.
The Home Office has no current plans to publish any further information related to its asylum contracts, other than the information already publicly available.
Information on the requested contracts is available below:
Serco - AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract NW - Contracts Finder, AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract MEE - Contracts Finder
Mears - AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract NEYH - Contracts Finder, AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract Scotland - Contracts Finder, AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract NI - Contracts Finder
CRH - AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract Wales - Contracts Finder, AASC - Asylum Accommodation & Support Services Contract South - Contracts Finder
CTM -CCTM22A01 Provision of Bridging Accommodation and Travel Services Contract - Contracts Finder, Contract for the Provision of Asylum Accommodation and Travel Services - Contracts Finder
PFS - Support Payment Card - Contracts Finder
Migrant Help - AIRE - Advice Issue Reporting and Elligibility - Contracts Finder
Mitie Limited - Provision of Security Services at Home Office Contingency Accommodation - Contracts Finder
British Refugee Council - Independent Unaccompanied Asylum-seeking Children (UASCs) Support Service - Contracts Finder
thebigword Group Limited - Language Services - Translation & Interpretation - Contracts Finder
VF Services (UK) Limited - Contract for the provision of Home Office and Asylum Interviews - Contracts Finder