Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) single adult males and (b) single adult females were in reciept of support under the provisions of section 4 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 in December 2015.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The Home office publishes statistics on those supported under section 4 at the end of each quarter in the quarterly Immigration Statistics release.
Of the 3,821 main applicants and dependants that were supported under section 4 as at the end of December 2015, 1,948 were single adults. Where the gender of the main applicant is recorded, 1,544 of these were males and 335 were females.
The data relating to single adults is a subset of figures published in Table as_18_q, in volume 4 of the latest Immigration Statistics release, available at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-statistics-october-to-december-2015
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, for how long the Semaphore system was subject to a national power outage between 12 and 17 June 2015.
Answered by James Brokenshire
For reasons of national security we do not comment on operational issues relating to border security systems.
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people on the Warnings Index her Department knows to have entered the UK since 6 May 2010.
Answered by James Brokenshire
It is longstanding policy not to disclose details of records which may be held in relation to individuals’ arrival in the United Kingdom as to do so would not be in the interests of national security.
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many times the Semaphore eBorders system has been affected by a national power outage since 6 May 2010; and when each of those power outages (a) started and (b) ended.
Answered by James Brokenshire
For reasons of national security we do not comment on operational issues relating to border security systems.
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what plans she has to publish asylum support statistics by gender as part of the Government's quarterly immigration statistics.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The information published in the quarterly Immigration Statistics is kept under review, taking into account the needs of users, burdens on suppliers and producers, in line with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics. There are currently no plans to publish data relating to asylum support statistics by gender.
Statistics on asylum seekers in receipt of Section 95, Section 4 or Section 98 support are available in Tables as_16_q, as_17_q and as_18_q of the quarterly Immigration Statistics release, available here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-statistics-october-to-december-2015
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) single adult men, (b) single adult women, (c) families and (d) single-parent families were in receipt of support under section 95 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 at the end of 2015.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The Home Office publishes statistics on those supported under section 95, as at the end of each quarter, in the quarterly Immigration Statistics release.
Of the 34,363 main applicants that were supported under section 95 as at the end of December 2015, 12,561 were single adults. Where the gender of the main applicant is recorded, 9,987 were males and 2,135 were females.
There were 6,456 families supported under section 95 as at the end of December 2015. It is not possible to identify single parent families from the published statistics.
The figures provided are published in table as_17_q, in volume 4 of the Immigration Statistics asylum data tables. The data provided by gender are a subset of published figures. The latest release, Immigration Statistics September to December 2015, is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-statistics-october-to-december-2015
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her policy to consider the final report of the Home Affairs Committee's planned inquiry into asylum accommodation before she makes her decision on whether to extend Compass asylum accommodation to 2019.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The Home Secretary will consider the Home Affairs Committee’s report on their planned inquiry into asylum accommodation when it is published.
The timing of any decision to extend the COMPASS contracts is subject to ongoing discussions with providers and is commercially sensitive. In deciding whether to extend the contract the Home Office will take a number of things into account, including the performance of the contracts and the value for money that they offer to the taxpayer.
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, who on the Government's warnings index is known to have travelled to which destinations during the Semaphore eBorders system national power outage in June 2015.
Answered by James Brokenshire
Home Office systems are used for the purposes of border and national security and the detection and prevention of crime. It is longstanding policy not to discuss the specific data held on these systems, the source of the data or how it is used for national security reasons.
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what progress her Department has made on developing the planned annual asylum strategy; and when she expects that strategy to be published.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The asylum strategy will outline how we will focus our efforts on the most vulnerable refugees, and how we will take a tougher approach to those whose asylum claim is unfounded or could reasonably have been made in another country. This will include looking again at the end-to-end asylum process from upstream to in-country.
We will publish the strategy annually, as set out in the Home Secretary’s party conference speech. There are no plans to run a formal consultation but officials are engaging with a range of partners in preparing the strategy.
Asked by: Keir Starmer (Labour - Holborn and St Pancras)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she plans that the Government's proposed annual asylum strategy will include third-country asylum application processing arrangements for people who have attempted to claim asylum in the UK at port or in-country.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The asylum strategy will outline how we will focus our efforts on the most vulnerable refugees, and how we will take a tougher approach to those whose asylum claim is unfounded or could reasonably have been made in another country. This will include looking again at the end-to-end asylum process from upstream to in-country.
We will publish the strategy annually, as set out in the Home Secretary’s party conference speech. There are no plans to run a formal consultation but officials are engaging with a range of partners in preparing the strategy.