Asked by: Kate Osamor (Independent - Edmonton)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to reduce the backlog of (a) asylum, (b) EU Settlement Scheme and (c) indefinite leave to remain applications.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Asylum Operations have, over the last two years increased the number of decision makers and support staff. There are recruitment strategies in place to maintain staffing at the required levels to allow us to manage asylum intake and reduce the overall time to make initial asylum decisions. These include rolling recruitment campaigns, a staff retention strategy to ensure it retains its highly skilled asylum decision makers, and the further expansion of digital processes to increase case working flexibility. Asylum Operations has also been exploring further options to get the system moving again following the outbreak of COVID-19 earlier in the year with steps being taken to improve efficiency, focusing on process improvements, better quality decisions and transformation. Asylum Operations has also developed a recovery plan focused on returning interviews and decisions back to pre-COVID-19 levels as soon as possible. We are also seeking to secure temporary resources to assist from within the Home Office and other government departments, along with other potential options. We are fully committed to ensuring that our operational teams have the resources they need to run an efficient and effective migration system. In addition to the new technology and processes, we have over 1,500 UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) European Casework staff in post to process applications, along with 250 staff handling calls and emails in the Settlement Resolution Centre, helping people apply. Visas & Citizenship are flexing resources to manage caseloads and therefore currently do not require additional recruitment to assist with indefinite leave to remain applications. |
Asked by: Kate Osamor (Independent - Edmonton)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department plans to recruit additional staff to help tackle the backlog of (a) asylum, (b) EU Settlement Scheme and (c) indefinite leave to remain applications.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Asylum Operations have, over the last two years increased the number of decision makers and support staff. There are recruitment strategies in place to maintain staffing at the required levels to allow us to manage asylum intake and reduce the overall time to make initial asylum decisions. These include rolling recruitment campaigns, a staff retention strategy to ensure it retains its highly skilled asylum decision makers, and the further expansion of digital processes to increase case working flexibility. Asylum Operations has also been exploring further options to get the system moving again following the outbreak of COVID-19 earlier in the year with steps being taken to improve efficiency, focusing on process improvements, better quality decisions and transformation. Asylum Operations has also developed a recovery plan focused on returning interviews and decisions back to pre-COVID-19 levels as soon as possible. We are also seeking to secure temporary resources to assist from within the Home Office and other government departments, along with other potential options. We are fully committed to ensuring that our operational teams have the resources they need to run an efficient and effective migration system. In addition to the new technology and processes, we have over 1,500 UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) European Casework staff in post to process applications, along with 250 staff handling calls and emails in the Settlement Resolution Centre, helping people apply. Visas & Citizenship are flexing resources to manage caseloads and therefore currently do not require additional recruitment to assist with indefinite leave to remain applications. |
Asked by: Baroness Cox (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the report by the Lift the Ban coalition Lift the Ban: Why giving people seeking asylum the right to work is common sense, published on 30 July, what assessment they have made of the potential economic benefit of giving asylum seekers the right to work in the UK.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
Asylum seekers can work in the UK if their claim has been outstanding for 12 months, through no fault of their own. Those allowed to work are restricted to jobs on the Shortage Occupation List, which is published by the Home Office and based on expert advice from the Migration Advisory Committee.
It is important to distinguish between those who need protection and those seeking to work here, who can apply for a work visa under the Immigration Rules. Our wider policy could be undermined if migrants bypassed work visa Rules by lodging unfounded asylum claims here.
The Home Office is currently reviewing policy on right to work.
As part of the plans to speed up Asylum decision making, over the last 18 months, UK Visas and Immigration have increased the number of Asylum decision makers and support staff as part of a rolling recruitment campaign and mobilised a transformation programme that seeks to simplify, streamline and digitise processes.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what percentage of e-mails received by the Home Office Coronavirus Immigration Help Centre in August were answered within the usual reply period of five working days.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
Asylum seekers can work in the UK if their claim has been outstanding for 12 months, through no fault of their own. Those allowed to work are restricted to jobs on the Shortage Occupation List, which is published by the Home Office and based on expert advice from the Migration Advisory Committee.
It is important to distinguish between those who need protection and those seeking to work here, who can apply for a work visa under the Immigration Rules. Our wider policy could be undermined if migrants bypassed work visa Rules by lodging unfounded asylum claims here.
The Home Office is currently reviewing policy on right to work.
As part of the plans to speed up Asylum decision making, over the last 18 months, UK Visas and Immigration have increased the number of Asylum decision makers and support staff as part of a rolling recruitment campaign and mobilised a transformation programme that seeks to simplify, streamline and digitise processes.
Asked by: Neil Coyle (Labour - Bermondsey and Old Southwark)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the cost to the public purse of the time taken for decisions to be made on asylum seekers applications before being eligible to find employment.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office has not made an estimate of this cost.
Asylum seekers can work in the UK if their claim has been outstanding for 12 months, through no fault of their own. Those allowed to work are restricted to jobs on the Shortage Occupation List, which is published by the Home Office and based on expert advice from the Migration Advisory Committee.
It is important to distinguish between those who need protection and those seeking to work here, who can apply for a work visa under the Immigration Rules. Our wider policy could be undermined if migrants bypassed work visa Rules by lodging unfounded asylum claims here.
As part of the plans to speed up Asylum decision making, over the last 18 months, UK Visas and Immigration have increased the number of Asylum decision makers and support staff as part of a rolling recruitment campaign and mobilised a transformation programme that seeks to simplify, streamline and digitise processes.
Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the cost to the public paper of providing support to asylum seekers who are unable to work because their case has not yet been heard.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office has not made an estimate of this cost.
Asylum seekers can work in the UK if their claim has been outstanding for 12 months, through no fault of their own. Those allowed to work are restricted to jobs on the Shortage Occupation List, which is published by the Home Office and based on expert advice from the Migration Advisory Committee.
It is important to distinguish between those who need protection and those seeking to work here, who can apply for a work visa under the Immigration Rules. Our wider policy could be undermined if migrants bypassed work visa Rules by lodging unfounded asylum claims here.
As part of the plans to speed up Asylum decision making, over the last 18 months, UK Visas and Immigration have increased the number of Asylum decision makers and support staff as part of a rolling recruitment campaign and mobilised a transformation programme that seeks to simplify, streamline and digitise processes.
Asked by: Lord Hylton (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that child refugees in (1) Greece, (2) France, and (3) other European countries, who have relatives in the UK can reunite with their families in the UK.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
This Government is committed to the principle of family reunion and to supporting vulnerable children. The UK will continue to be bound by the Dublin Regulation provisions during the transition period, allowing us to continue to transfer family reunion cases to the UK throughout 2020, and we will continue to process all family reunion requests that have been submitted but not completed under Dublin before the end of the transition period.
The UK has presented a genuine and sincere offer to the EU on a future reciprocal arrangement for the family reunion of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children together with a draft legal text.
Protecting vulnerable children remains a key priority for the Government. In 2019 alone, the UK received more asylum applications from unaccompanied children than any country in the EU and accounted for approximately 20% of all reported asylum claims from unaccompanied children in the UK and the 27 EU Member States.
In 2016, the UK committed to a one-off relocation of 480 unaccompanied children from France, Greece and Italy to the UK under section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016.?On the 21st May we announced that 478 children had transferred under the scheme. The UK welcomes the pledges made by other countries to support Greece and stand ready to offer advice and guidance to those developing their own schemes.
The UK provides a safe and legal route to bring families of refugees together through its refugee family reunion policy. This route will not be affected when we leave the EU. In the year ending March 2020, over 7,400 Refugee Family Reunion visas were issued to partners and children of those previously granted asylum or humanitarian protection in the UK.
Additionally, Appendix FM to the Immigration Rules provides for family members wishing to enter or remain in the UK on the basis of their relationship with a family member who is a British citizen or settled in the UK, and those who are post-flight family of a person granted protection in the UK.
Asked by: Lord Hylton (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans, if any, they have to offer unaccompanied child refugees currently in (1) Greece, (2) France, and (3) other European countries, the option to live in the UK.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
This Government is committed to the principle of family reunion and to supporting vulnerable children. The UK will continue to be bound by the Dublin Regulation provisions during the transition period, allowing us to continue to transfer family reunion cases to the UK throughout 2020, and we will continue to process all family reunion requests that have been submitted but not completed under Dublin before the end of the transition period.
The UK has presented a genuine and sincere offer to the EU on a future reciprocal arrangement for the family reunion of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children together with a draft legal text.
Protecting vulnerable children remains a key priority for the Government. In 2019 alone, the UK received more asylum applications from unaccompanied children than any country in the EU and accounted for approximately 20% of all reported asylum claims from unaccompanied children in the UK and the 27 EU Member States.
In 2016, the UK committed to a one-off relocation of 480 unaccompanied children from France, Greece and Italy to the UK under section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016.?On the 21st May we announced that 478 children had transferred under the scheme. The UK welcomes the pledges made by other countries to support Greece and stand ready to offer advice and guidance to those developing their own schemes.
The UK provides a safe and legal route to bring families of refugees together through its refugee family reunion policy. This route will not be affected when we leave the EU. In the year ending March 2020, over 7,400 Refugee Family Reunion visas were issued to partners and children of those previously granted asylum or humanitarian protection in the UK.
Additionally, Appendix FM to the Immigration Rules provides for family members wishing to enter or remain in the UK on the basis of their relationship with a family member who is a British citizen or settled in the UK, and those who are post-flight family of a person granted protection in the UK.
Asked by: Lord Hylton (Crossbench - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of (1) the number of child refugees attempting illegal crossings to the UK from mainland Europe, and (2) the impact that providing safe and legal routes would have on this number.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
This Government is committed to the principle of family reunion and to supporting vulnerable children. The UK will continue to be bound by the Dublin Regulation provisions during the transition period, allowing us to continue to transfer family reunion cases to the UK throughout 2020, and we will continue to process all family reunion requests that have been submitted but not completed under Dublin before the end of the transition period.
The UK has presented a genuine and sincere offer to the EU on a future reciprocal arrangement for the family reunion of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children together with a draft legal text.
Protecting vulnerable children remains a key priority for the Government. In 2019 alone, the UK received more asylum applications from unaccompanied children than any country in the EU and accounted for approximately 20% of all reported asylum claims from unaccompanied children in the UK and the 27 EU Member States.
In 2016, the UK committed to a one-off relocation of 480 unaccompanied children from France, Greece and Italy to the UK under section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016.?On the 21st May we announced that 478 children had transferred under the scheme. The UK welcomes the pledges made by other countries to support Greece and stand ready to offer advice and guidance to those developing their own schemes.
The UK provides a safe and legal route to bring families of refugees together through its refugee family reunion policy. This route will not be affected when we leave the EU. In the year ending March 2020, over 7,400 Refugee Family Reunion visas were issued to partners and children of those previously granted asylum or humanitarian protection in the UK.
Additionally, Appendix FM to the Immigration Rules provides for family members wishing to enter or remain in the UK on the basis of their relationship with a family member who is a British citizen or settled in the UK, and those who are post-flight family of a person granted protection in the UK.
Asked by: Anneliese Dodds (Labour (Co-op) - Oxford East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the date was of receipt by her Department of the oldest outstanding further submission relating to an asylum claim.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Our records indicate that the oldest outstanding Further Submission relating to an asylum claim was received on 18 October 2005.
UK Visas and Immigration has undertaken exercises to review the oldest Further Submissions cases. Where more complex issues arise, it can take time to progress the decision on a case, but we keep all cases under regular review, and they are decided as soon as it is possible to do so.
The Home Office does not routinely publish information on the timing of further submissions. However, the Home Office does publish information on the number of main asylum applications awaiting an initial decision and this can be found in table ASY_04 of the published Immigration statistics www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-year-ending-march-2020/list-of-tables#asylum-and-resettlement