Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many asylum-seeking children who had recently arrived in the UK without parents or carers were missing from Home Office accommodation in (a) Sussex, (b) London and (c) England as of 13 February 2023.

There are no plans to routinely release data pertaining to missing unaccompanied asylum seeking children (UASC) at this time.

As of the 22nd February, 196 UASC were missing.

When a young person goes missing the 'missing persons protocol' is followed and led by our directly engaged social workers.

The MARS (Missing After Reasonable Steps) protocol is followed for any looked after child who goes missing from a care setting, including the UASC hotels. When used correctly, similar protocols within police forces have safely reduced the number of missing episodes from placements by 36%.