Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what criteria her Department will use to designate a country as safe.

The asylum and returns policy statement sets out the intention to deal swiftly with unmeritorious protection claims that are made by nationals of manifestly safe countries in an attempt to frustrate their removal. In this context, an unmeritorious claim is one which is so lacking in merit that it can be appropriately considered following a single interview.

This policy does not relate to any designation of a specific country as manifestly safe, but rather a holistic assessment of whether there is a basis on which a prolonged assessment of a claim is required, for example through an additional interview. This is distinct from existing legislative provisions (under s94 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002) which allow all or part of a country to be designated as safe, for the purposes of assessing whether a claim should be certified as clearly unfounded.