New Home Office staff handling hard asylum cases, say insiders

2 years ago 34

Migrant astatine  ManstonImage source, Getty Images

Image caption,

More than 40,000 migrants person crossed the English Channel successful tiny boats this year

By Sima Kotecha

UK Editor, BBC Newsnight

The Home Office is blighted by delays successful dealing with asylum claims, arsenic inexperienced and low-paid unit are hired to grip applications, respective insiders person told BBC Two's Newsnight.

Staff said this was slowing down decisions, starring to long, costly edifice stays for asylum seekers.

Nearly 130,000 radical are waiting for a decision, latest authoritative figures for June 2022 show.

The Home Office said it was boosting the fig of claims processed.

It comes arsenic Home Secretary Suella Braverman is acceptable to look earlier the Home Affairs Select Committee later, wherever she volition reply questions from MPs connected asylum and immigration.

Three radical who enactment successful the section person spoken to Newsnight to pass astir the interaction connected Home Office decisions being made astir asylum seekers.

One idiosyncratic with respective years of acquisition moving successful the section said: "To marque and constitute decisions is much hard than radical think.

"They're hiring ample numbers of inexperienced unit who request to beryllium trained to bash this and that takes time, truthful the backlog grows.

"And it's young unit facing these harrowing stories and earning debased wages - truthful what's the inducement to stay?

"There isn't one… truthful they permission and past they prosecute idiosyncratic other and truthful it continues."

According to the latest Home Office figures, by the extremity of June this twelvemonth 127,026 asylum applications were inactive to beryllium decided upon. That is astir 4 times times the fig of cases that were awaiting a determination by the extremity of June 2018, erstwhile 33,035 asylum applications were successful the backlog.

Another Home Office worker said they were moving "long and gruelling" hours.

"People enactment hopeless hours each day. They're hiring much decision-makers but immoderate haven't worked successful this country before, truthful it's taking them longer to larn and that slows it each down," they said.

"It takes a portion to get them up to velocity and my interest is that the incorrect decisions could beryllium made affecting the lives of susceptible people."

The "low civilian service" wage people for the relation tin besides "turn [staff] off" the relation too, according to immoderate with cognition of however the Home Office works.

The Institute for Government deliberation vessel said determination were hundreds much caseworkers successful the Home Office moving connected asylum applications than determination were a decennary agone - but they were making less decisions.

It said successful 2021/22, determination were 614 caseworkers who made an mean of 5 asylum decisions per period per unit member, compared to 380 caseworkers with a productivity complaint of 13.7 decisions successful 2011/12.

There are much than 37,000 asylum seekers presently surviving successful UK hotels, costing the payer astir £7m pounds per day. The velocity astatine which the backlog is dealt with dictates the duration of enactment successful hotels and the outgo to the taxpayer.

Image source, Getty Images

Image caption,

Home Secretary Suella Braverman is acceptable to look questions from MPs later

The Home Office said it was a "short word solution" portion it was moving hard with section authorities to find suitable accommodation for them.

It added it was doing what it could to code the situation, and had "increased asylum caseworkers by 80% to much than 1,000". It said "a palmy aviator strategy to boost the fig of claims processed is present being rolled retired crossed the country".

Meanwhile connected Tuesday, the Home Office said it had cleared the Manston migrant processing centre successful Kent, a holding tract for radical who get successful the UK connected tiny boats.

A antheral who was staying astatine Manston died successful infirmary after becoming unwell connected Saturday, and an probe has been launched into his death.

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