Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether he plans to (a) review and (b) increase the number of staff recruited to his Department's Family and Human Rights Unit in the context of trends in the proportion of people relying on their rights under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights in applications for family visas.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
Yes, we have both recruited new staff and redeployed existing staff to this area of work.
Asked by: Dan Jarvis (Labour - Barnsley Central)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a ban on public sector bodies paying a ransom to criminal groups in exchange for decryption.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
Cyber crime is a significant threat to the security and prosperity of the UK. The most recent Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) estimated that there were 984,000 ‘computer misuse’ offences against individuals in England and Wales in the year ending December 2023. The Government recognises ransomware as the most significant national security cyber threat.
The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) discourages paying ransoms, noting that such payments rarely ensure data recovery. The UK Government neither pays ransoms nor condones the payment of ransoms to criminals, always advising against such substantial concessions to hostage-takers or extortionists.
At the Counter Ransomware Initiative (CRI) summit in Washington last year, we led a joint statement signed by 46 countries and Interpol, which pledged that “relevant institutions under the authority of our national government” should not be used to pay a ransomware demand. This was the first international statement of its kind. Our joint statement was a major milestone in achieving international consensus around the non-payment of ransoms.
Asked by: Baroness Royall of Blaisdon (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many Afghans currently in the UK and awaiting implementation of the family reunion scheme for those who supported British personnel in Afghanistan have wives and children in Pakistan who are in danger of being returned to Afghanistan.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Government remains committed to providing protection for vulnerable and at-risk people fleeing Afghanistan. This includes eligible immediate family members of those being resettled under both the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (ARAP) and the Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme (ACRS).
Data on the number of Afghans in the UK who are awaiting a route for separated families to be reunited is unavailable at this time.
Public data on the number of Afghans in Pakistan who are eligible to join family members already resettled under both the ARAP and ACRS is unavailable. However; the latest published statistics, summarised at Afghan Resettlement Programme: operational data - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk), show that, at the end of December 2023, 14,423 people have been relocated to the UK under the ARAP so far, and a further 10,520 have been relocated under ACRS.
The Government is aiming to bring eligible persons (EPs) to the UK from Pakistan and other third countries as soon as reasonably practicable and has so far relocated over 3000 people since October.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps his Department is taking to ensure the border between the UK and Republic of Ireland is secure against the passage malign foreign actors.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
We continue a high level of cooperation on border security with Ireland; working closely together to identify and tackle those who seek to abuse arrangements from entering the Common Travel Area.
Schedule 3 to the Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act 2019 allows a Counter-Terrorism Police Officer to stop, question and, when necessary, detain and search, individuals and goods travelling through UK ports and the “border area” for the purpose of determining whether the person (or the goods) appears to be someone who is, or has been, engaged in hostile activity.
In Northern Ireland, a place is within the “border area” if it is no more than one mile from the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland or it is the first place at which a train travelling from the Republic of Ireland stops to let passengers off.
Individuals who seek to abuse the Common Travel Area arrangements are liable to be detained, and if unlawfully entering the UK, removed.
Asked by: Ben Lake (Plaid Cymru - Ceredigion)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether his Department is taking steps to support (a) businesses and (b) other organisations whose numbers are used by (i) nuisance callers and (ii) criminals in number spoofing scams.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
A central pillar of the Government’s Fraud Strategy is blocking individuals and groups from attempting to impersonate other organisations and institutional bodies. As part of this work, the Government has introduced a new measure to the Criminal Justice Bill to strengthen law enforcement capabilities to tackle scam text messages. The Bill will create a new offence for supplying or possessing “SIM farm” devices (which allow criminals to send scam texts to thousands of individuals and businesses at the same time), without good reason or undertaking adequate due diligence.
In addition, the Government and Industry have signed the Telecommunications Fraud Sector Charter, a voluntary agreement to improve counter-fraud efforts. As a result of the Charter, the sector has introduced firewalls that detect and stop scam texts from reaching customers. Since January 2022, the firewalls have stopped 960 million scam text messages.
Law enforcement are also working tirelessly to tackle criminal number spoofing operations at source. Last year, Operation Elaborate led by the Metropolitan police took down iSpoof, a website that was used to make 10 million spoof calls impersonating individuals and businesses. The international joint action led to 142 arrests and the main administrator of the website was sentenced to 13 years and 4 months of imprisonment.
In April this year, in another successful joint operation codenamed Stargrew, the Met took down LabHost; a major criminal website, which fraudsters used to create over 40,000 fake phishing websites impersonating businesses. So far the operation has led to 37 arrests, and over 25,000 victims in the UK have been contacted.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will make it his policy to exempt people who arrived in the UK before 1 January 2024 from the new earnings threshold for skilled worker visa applications.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The Government position was originally set out on 8 December 2023. Updated details are available here: homeofficemedia.blog.gov.uk/2024/02/01/reducing-net-migration-factsheet-december-2023/.
Those already in the Skilled Worker route before the Immigration Rules changes are exempt from the new median salary levels when they change sponsor, extend, or settle. We would, however, expect their pay to progress at the same rate as resident workers; therefore, they will be subject to the updated 25th percentiles using the latest pay data when they next make an application to change employment, extend their stay, or settle. This is in line with normal practice.
Anyone switching into the Skilled Worker category after 4 April will be subject to the new salary requirement. This includes those in the UK switching from other immigration routes.
Asked by: Tim Farron (Liberal Democrat - Westmorland and Lonsdale)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will publish a response to the proposal of 18 April 2024 by the EU Commission to open negotiations to facilitate youth mobility visas between the EU and the UK.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The UK notes the publication by the European Commission on 18 April 2024 setting out a proposal to EU Member States and seeking their agreement to negotiate a UK/EU wide Youth Mobility Scheme (YMS). This is currently a matter for the EU and its Member States and the UK has not been formally approached.
Asked by: Navendu Mishra (Labour - Stockport)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many and what proportion of applicants refused asylum did not appeal that decision in the last 12 months.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The requested information cannot be accurately extracted from our internal systems. To provide this information would require a manual trawl of asylum refusal decisions and to do so would incur disproportionate cost.
It might be helpful to explain that data on asylum outcomes is published as part of the Immigration Statistics at Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). Tab Asy_D02 of the Asylum and Resettlement tables contains data on asylum refusal decisions. Data on appeal volumes is published by HM Courts and Tribunals Service on a quarterly basis. The latest publication can be found at Tribunals statistics quarterly: October to December 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). Table FIA_1 of the Main Tables section shows asylum and protection appeal volumes data to 31 December 2023.
Asked by: Philippa Whitford (Scottish National Party - Central Ayrshire)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of (a) the increase in (i) visa and (ii) Immigration Health Surcharge fees and (b) the removal of the ability of taught masters students to bring dependants on trends in the level of demand for graduate visas.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The Home Office produced Impact Assessments (IA) alongside the visa and Immigration Health Surcharge (IHS) fee changes and the package of Student route reforms, including the change to dependant eligibility.
The Migration Advisory Committee are undertaking a review of the Graduate route. We will consider any evidence put forward by the MAC very closely.
Asked by: Keir Mather (Labour - Selby and Ainsty)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when he plans to raise the minimum income threshold for the spouse/partner visa to (a) £34,500 and (b) £38,700.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The first increase to the MIR took effect from 11 April 2024 when it was raised to £29,000. The dates for further increases to £34,500 and £38,700 will be announced in due course.