Meg Hillier
Main Page: Meg Hillier (Labour (Co-op) - Hackney South and Shoreditch)Department Debates - View all Meg Hillier's debates with the Home Office
(11 years, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mrs May
I will respond to my hon. Friend in relation to the individual case that he has raised, but he starts off by saying that too many decisions by the UK Border Agency are wrong. One of the problems for UKBA is that very often entry clearance officers take decision on the basis of the information in front of them, which may perfectly well be the right decision on the basis of that information, then further information is provided before an appeal is heard. That is an issue that we need to look at.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
Further to the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), I have many constituents who have submitted an in-time application and have not even received an acknowledgement from the UK Border Agency. When my office chases up some months later, it turns out that they have not even been input into the UKBA computer system. Perhaps the Home Secretary can tell us whether this is an attempt by the Home Office to massage figures about the number of applicants and the speed with which it is dealing with them.
Mrs May
No such attempt is being made in relation to what the hon. Lady says. She will have heard the answer that I gave. I acknowledged that there are problems in some areas of the operation of the UK Border Agency. That is why we are looking at the UK Border Agency, and why work is being done to improve the processes within it to ensure that we have a system that provides an efficient and effective response to those who are applying.