Illegal Migration Debate

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Department: Home Office

Illegal Migration

Kim Johnson Excerpts
Monday 5th June 2023

(11 months, 1 week ago)

Commons Chamber
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Suella Braverman Portrait Suella Braverman
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As I said to the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi), the hon. Gentleman really needs to listen more carefully to what the Prime Minister promised in his statement. We are on track to deliver on reducing the backlog of initial decisions and the legacy backlog. Those are decisions that have been waiting in the system up until July or June last year. Those are the backlogs that we are working on, and we are making good progress on eliminating it.

Kim Johnson Portrait Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab)
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The Home Secretary’s statement on the boats mentions the need to acquire two further prison boats, but the Prime Minister is refusing to say where those will be located. Have there been any relevant discussions with local authorities, and does the Home Secretary plan to recruit more staff to fix the broken immigration system and its 172,000 backlog?

Suella Braverman Portrait Suella Braverman
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Our new sites will be rolled out following and in conjunction with close consultation with the relevant authorities—local authorities, health authorities and education authorities—so that the occupants receive the appropriate care. We have doubled the number of caseworkers in our asylum case working team, which is why we are making progress on bearing down on our backlog.