House of Commons - Home Affairs - Additional Written Evidence

Select Committee on Home Affairs Additional Written Evidence

59. Thirteenth supplementary memorandum submitted by the Immigration and Nationality Directorate, Home Office

This note covers the additional information requested by the Committee during week 26-30 June 2006.

1. What exact instructions were given to the Presenting Officers' Unit about the level of representatives to be used in defending bail applications by FNPs?

Representation

Processes are already in place to ensure that all bail hearings for FNP cases are robustly defended unless otherwise instructed. We have strengthened and reissued our guidance to all presenting officers, a central co-ordinator has been appointed to track and assign the cases and an agreement has been reached with the Criminal Casework Team (CCT) and the task force that ensures all cases are easily identified. Only senior and experienced presenting officers appear for the Home Office in these cases. As an added measure, senior caseworkers and team leaders are being placed on standby to take over in any case where the assigned officer is unable at the last minute to attend for any reason, such as illness. We are also analysing bail summaries received and will be providing feedback to CCT and the task force on how they can be improved and made more effective.

No FNP bail hearings have been heard without the Home Office being represented.

Training and Support

All Presenting Officers receive training on bail legislation, hearings and processes during their induction training and do not appear before the AIT before this training.

— They then regularly present cases before AIT under the supervision of an experienced mentor until sufficiently experienced.

— Consolidation training on bails is given after three months.

— A separate stand-alone module on bail is available for staff requiring refresher training.

— In addition all Presenting Officers are supported by Senior Caseworkers who provide advice and support.

2. How many (and what proportion) of asylum decisions are served in person at reporting centres?

Service of the asylum decision in person at a reporting centre is a feature of the end-to-end process for non-detained cases under the New Asylum Model. Asylum Teams operating that process are currently dealing with around 10% of all new asylum claims. We expect such teams to be dealing with all new non-detained cases by March 2007.

3. Non-asylum casework: additional information on (i) Management Structure (how work is divided up and levels of responsibility); (ii) Quality Control responsibilities and (iii) Caseloads

(i) Management Structure of non -asylum casework teams

General Group deals with applications for further Leave to Remain in the United Kingdom; referred entry clearance applications; applications made under EC law and applications for travel documents. Generally this work can be broken down between charged and non-charged applications.

In Croydon there are four groups dealing with postal applications and in Sheffield there are two groups. In addition General Group have four Public Enquiry Offices (Croydon, Liverpool, Birmingham and Glasgow that offer premium same day service).

Each group is led by a G7 Assistant Director and supported by a G7 Chief Caseworker. Within each group the structure is usually an HEO Team Leader with 8-20 caseworkers at EO and AO grade. Several teams report to an SEO supervisor and all groups are supported by a Senior Caseworker.

Nationality Group process nationality applications; oversee citizenship ceremonies run by the local authorities and issue right of abode documents.

There are six casework teams devoted to nationality work. Each is headed by an HEO Team leader supported by two EO line managers. There is one HEO senior caseworker supporting two casework teams.

The basic grade caseworker is at AO level. There are up to 18 AO caseworkers (presently an average of 14) in each team supported by an EO caseworkers.

Levels of decision taking are covered by Nationality Staff Instructions. Generally speaking decisions that do not require the exercise of discretion are taken at AO level. Discretion is exercised by at least EO level and sensitive and high profile cases elevate to HEO/SEO/Grade7 level. The Grade 7 Chief Caseworker will decide when to consult ministers over exceptional cases.

Applications are allocated according to the workload described above. Certain problematic types of casework are treated as "specialisms" and allocated to caseworkers with particular expertise in those areas. This ensures consistency of treatment and quality and assists in tackling certain areas of abuse.

Work Permits UK process work permits; associated leave to remain applications for these workers and their families and the worker registration scheme (WRS). They also manage a number of specific schemes to attract high and low skilled workers; business categories; highly skilled migrant programme (HSMP); and the seasonal agricultural workers scheme (SAWS).

Work Permits (UK) is headed by a Deputy Director. The work streams; general work permits, highly skilled migrant programme (HSMP); workers registration scheme (WRS); Business Categories Unit (BCU) and leave to remain applications (IED LTR) are led by four G7 Assistant Directors. These Assistant Directors are supported by 10 SEO's who manage 3-5 teams each.

Each team is formed by around 22 people at AA—EO grades and is managed by an HEO Team Leader. The teams are formed of approximately 3-4 EO's, 12-14 AO's and up to five AA's. Each EO manages 4-6 administrative staff.

EO-G6 managers within Work Permits UK have combined general management and technical responsibilities.

(ii) Quality Controls

A Deputy Director has overall responsibility for Quality within General Group, WP(UK) and Nationality.

MM are looking at ways in which staff can be developed to continuously improve and increase the quality of making casework decisions and a development framework has been introduced that allows caseworkers at all grades to identify their key skills and knowledge and critically assess where they need to increase their learning and development. A copy can be provided if required.

General Group Teams of Chief and Senior Caseworkers are in place on casework teams to advise on borderline decisions, the application of the immigration rules, the production of written guidance and to upskill caseworkers. Cases are routinely sampled to ensure accurate decisions.

Senior caseworkers sample cases routinely to ensure accurate decisions and feed the results back to senior managers.

Deputy Chief Caseworkers and Chief Caseworkers have been designated to provide advice on specific immigration issues and act as an intermediary between policy and casework teams. This ensures consistency in the feedback of information to staff, and develops areas of expertise outside of policy units.

Within General Group, 100% of each new caseworker's work is sampled. Sampling is incrementally reduced as caseworkers become more experienced. When there are changes to the Immigration Rules, targeted checks are conducted on affected cases during the first month of introduction. Specific targeted sampling is also undertaken from time to time. Public Enquiry Offices utilise similar quality assessment processes.

Nationality Dedicated Quality and Correspondence Team managed by SEO Deputy Chief Caseworker reporting to Chief Caseworker.

Team comprises three HEO Senior Caseworkers and Two EO Caseworkers supported by AOs and AAs.

A sample check of decisions is carried out on a balanced score card which uses the same basis as that used by Work Permits and General Group.

Quality and Correspondence Team also deal with complaints and consider requests to reopen refused applications and requests to amend certificates as well as MPs' correspondence. This gives further opportunity for monitoring trends and endorsing casework quality.

WP (UK) have an independent quality team, established in April 2005, to carry out additional checks, which complement the quality checks already done by business teams. A proportion of cases are selected on a random basis by for a quality check, prior to despatch of the proposed decision to the applicant.

The team carries out approximately 1,200 checks each month across the four areas of the business. The team provides daily feedback on the checks by producing a stencil for each check.

They also produce monthly statistical information and comprehensive quarterly reports highlighting the main areas requiring improvements and provide trend analysis. The information is used to inform the business of areas for improvement in processes, organisation and IT support. This in turn feeds into operational policy and training needs.

The Quality Team is led by a G7 who also has responsibility for Compliance and Reviews within WP (UK). The rest of the team consists of an SEO with overall responsibility for taking forward areas for improvement with managers across the business, three HEO managers, 18 EOs undertaking different streams of work including carrying out quality checks, Ministerial Correspondence. The team is supported by eight AOs.

(iii) Caseloads

Time taken to consider an application depends on the experience of the caseworker and the complexity of the case. Workloads differ in respect of different streams of work. Consideration time also includes calling for supporting documentation and ancillary functions such minuting files, computer systems and producing letters.

In General Group in the major streams of work the average number of decisions made are as follows:

Charged Postal LTR

Decisions per day: 5.2 (equates to one hour 24 minutes per case)

European Applications

Decisions per day: 7.1 (equates to one hour one minute per case)

Public Enquiry Office

Decisions per day: 4.2 (equates to one hour 42 minutes per case)

In Nationality workload is based on 8.5 decisions per caseworker day.

In Work Permits workload is based on different streams of work as follows: