Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether his Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of introducing time limits on asylum cases for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

The Home Office takes our duty of care towards children and young people extremely seriously and we prioritise applications from children and young people.

The Home Office does not currently have a target time for processing applications for asylum, but is committed to ensuring claims are considered without unnecessary delay. We have already made progress in prioritising claims with acute vulnerability and those in receipt of the greatest level of support, including Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children.

Introducing a service standard for asylum claims is a complex consideration which needs to be balanced between the requirements of operational efficiency, the needs of service users and the integrity of asylum control measures, including the implementation of the Illegal Migration Act. A project to review these considerations, along with scope and potential implementation timescales, will be undertaken. Once the project is completed, a final decision will be taken on any potential asylum claim service standards.