Asylum and Immigration

(asked on 3rd November 2020) - View Source

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department plans to recruit additional staff to help tackle the backlog of (a) asylum, (b) EU Settlement Scheme and (c) indefinite leave to remain applications.


Answered by
Chris Philp Portrait
Chris Philp
Minister of State (Home Office)
This question was answered on 13th November 2020

Asylum Operations have, over the last two years increased the number of decision makers and support staff. There are recruitment strategies in place to maintain staffing at the required levels to allow us to manage asylum intake and reduce the overall time to make initial asylum decisions. These include rolling recruitment campaigns, a staff retention strategy to ensure it retains its highly skilled asylum decision makers, and the further expansion of digital processes to increase case working flexibility. Asylum Operations has also been exploring further options to get the system moving again following the outbreak of COVID-19 earlier in the year with steps being taken to improve efficiency, focusing on process improvements, better quality decisions and transformation. Asylum Operations has also developed a recovery plan focused on returning interviews and decisions back to pre-COVID-19 levels as soon as possible. We are also seeking to secure temporary resources to assist from within the Home Office and other government departments, along with other potential options. We are fully committed to ensuring that our operational teams have the resources they need to run an efficient and effective migration system. In addition to the new technology and processes, we have over 1,500 UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) European Casework staff in post to process applications, along with 250 staff handling calls and emails in the Settlement Resolution Centre, helping people apply. Visas & Citizenship are flexing resources to manage caseloads and therefore currently do not require additional recruitment to assist with indefinite leave to remain applications.

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