CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
1. The Immigration and Nationality Directorate's
practice of treating asylum applications, support and enforcement
as largely separate, uncoordinated operations has proved inefficient.
It has increased the administrative workload, delayed the removal
of unsuccessful applicants and created a growing backlog.
2. The Directorate does not know the actual
number of failed asylum applicants awaiting removal, and lacks
basic information on the whereabouts of people to enable it to
effect removal. Based on data for failed
applications and known removals at May 2004, up to 283,500 failed
applicants could remain in the United Kingdom, although the Directorate
only had details of 155,000 failed applications on its databases.
3. The gap has narrowed between the number
of newly unsuccessful applications and removals effected, but
largely because of falling applications rather than more effective
removal action. The number of removals
(including dependants) in 2004-05 was 14,250 and was lower than
the 17,855 (including dependants) achieved in 2003-04.
4. The Directorate has focussed on its target
of matching numbers of removals and newly unsuccessful applications
by December 2005, but has done little to target the significant
and ageing backlog of removals. Even without
any new unsuccessful applications, it would take between 10 and
18 years to tackle the backlog based on the Directorate's current
removal rate. In practice, cases become increasingly difficult
to remove the longer failed applicants remain in the country due
to a lack of data on their whereabouts, and because many will
have settled into their local community and made a life for themselves
and their dependants.
5. The Directorate needs to undertake a fundamental
review of its approach to removals, building on progress it has
already made and on the following specific proposals.
Asylum removals strategy
a. Integrate the different asylum functions into
a single operation.
b. Set targets for tackling the backlog of failed
asylum seekers.
c Develop the necessary software for its database
to identify cases that have overstayed their permitted period.
Returning different categories of failed asylum
seekers
d. Segment the population of failed asylum seekers
and develop appropriate removals strategies and targets for each
group. Segmentation could reflect, for example, age, country of
origin, criminal record (if any), availability of travel documents
and date of arrival in the United Kingdom.
e. Update its cost-benefit analysis for making
greater use of detention to effect removal, drawing on the approaches
of countries such as Germany, the Netherlands and Australia and
using more current costings, such as those estimated in the C&AG's
Report.
f. Evaluate quickly the effectiveness of monitoring,
tagging and voice recognition software as a means of keeping in
contact with failed applicants to reduce the risk of absconding,
and use the data to enhance the future removals strategy.
g. Establish whether the Appearance Assistance
Programme used in the United States could be adapted for successful
use in the United Kingdom. Under the scheme a community sponsor
takes responsibility for the person, with intensive supervision,
personal telephone reporting and home visits.
h. Conclude and evaluate quickly its pilot to
allocate a single caseworker from start to finish for each application,
and roll out best practice identified promptly.
Voluntary removals
i. Improve the effectiveness of communications
with failed applicants, for example by specifying clearly the
action the individual should take to leave the country and by
when.
j. Increase awareness of voluntary removal schemes
amongst applicants by active promotion of such schemes from the
time the application is received, building on the successful approaches
of countries such as the Netherlands. Voluntary removals are more
cost effective and more likely to lead to successful repatriation
than enforced removals.
Speeding up enforcement
k. Make greater use of arrest for removal at
reporting centres as an alternative to the practice of arrest
in the community which costs more and has a lower success rate.
l. Review periodically the lessons to be learned
from removal cases which fail or are delayed significantly at
the last minute, and use the lessons to inform future practice.
m. Seek explanations for variations in enforcement
offices' performance in terms of cost and operational effectiveness,
and disseminate and enforce best practice quickly.
n. Reduce overhead levels in areas such as Human
Resources and redeploy resources released to front line removals
activity.
o. Use management information systems put in
place in April 2005 to cost and monitor the Directorate's effectiveness,
including how staff deploy their time. Use the data obtained to
inform future operational strategy, and in particular to cost
strategies for tackling the backlog of removals so an appropriate
case for resources can be made.
p. Arrest failed applicants who are at the point
of being evicted from National Asylum Support Services accommodation.
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