Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many staff there were in the UK Border Force and its predecessor in (a) 2009-10, (b) 2010-11, (c) 2011-12, (d) 2012-13, (e) 2013-14, (f) 2014-15 and (g) 2015-16; and what the UK Border Force's planned total staff complement is for 2016-17.

The Border Force workforce is drawn from two precursor organisations: Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC) and the Immigration Service. Border Force was established in its current form in March 2012 and since that time the workforce has ranged from approximately 7800 – 8100 in full-time equivalents.

The detailed breakdown requested is as follows (all figures are full-time equivalents):

March 2010 4506 – UKBA

4639 – HMRC (transferred to UKBA 1^st April 2010)

March 2011 8269 – UKBA

March 2012 7846 – Border Force

March 2013 8123 – Border Force

March 2014 8044 – Border Force

March 2015 8153 – Border Force

Workforce numbers for FY16/17 have not yet been finalised.