Q: How many illegal migrants in UK? A: No idea, admit officials!
Home Office hasn’t even checked since 2005
the civil servants who enforce immigration rules have no idea how many illegal migrants are living in Britain, MPs said yesterday.
the home Office has not assessed the total number living here without permission for 15 years – a period in which there has been an unprecedented influx.
It has no grasp of the damage done by illegal immigration or of the criminals associated with it, and it has only a ‘disturbingly weak’ understanding of the effects of its own efforts to stop illegal immigration or deport people with no right to be in the country, MPs said.
Last year, officials released 62 per cent of detainees it had intended to remove from the UK – up from 56 per cent in 2018.
the findings from the Commons public accounts committee – the public spending watchdog – come amid growing concern about the failure of home Secretary Priti Patel and her officials to stop the arrival across the Channel of illegal immigrants in small boats.
MPs said the home Office was unprepared for the end of co- operation on immigration with eU nations after Brexit, and this could boost illegal immigration and make it harder to deport those who shouldn’t be in Britain.
Referring to the increasing numbers of immigration detainees released instead of being returned to their country of origin, the committee, chaired by Labour MP Meg hillier, said: ‘the department does not really understand why this figure is so high or what it can do ensure these returns are completed as planned.
‘the department does not make decisions based on evidence, it instead risks making them on anecdote, assumption and prejudice.’
the MPs added: ‘the department believes this rise reflects abuse of asylum claims... but it did not provide any systematic analysis to support this.
‘Given the strong passions on all sides of the immigration debate, a Government department making unsupported claims of this kind risks inflaming prejudices against legitimate immigrants and bona fide asylum seekers.’
the committee also said of the home Office: ‘Worryingly, it has no idea of what impact it has achieved for the £400million spent each year by its immigration enforcement directorate.
‘there are major holes in the department’s understanding of the size and scale of illegal immigration and the extent and nature of any resulting harm.’ Its findings undermine confidence in the home Office as it prepares to supervise the Government’s new points-based immigration system, which will only allow well- qualified, high- skilled people from abroad to move to the UK.
Former home Office officials have suggested at least a million illegal immigrants are in Britain.
the committee said the home Office’s failure to carry out assessments could allow exaggerated estimates from others to ‘inflame hostility towards immigrants’.
the MPs said the home Office gave the impression that it made decisions based on preconceptions, lack of curiosity and ‘even prejudice’, and warned it had to do more to change the behaviour from civil servants that led to the Windrush scandal in 2018, when the Government was forced to apologise after deportation threats were made to the children of Commonwealth citizens.
there remained ‘a risk of harm and distress to innocent people who are here perfectly legally,’ the committee said.
the MPs’ report added: ‘the significant lack of diversity at senior levels of the department means it does not access a sufficiently wide range of perspectives when establishing rules and assessing the human impact of its decisions.
Professional judgment cannot be relied upon if an organisation has blind spots, and the Windrush scandal demonstrated the damage such a culture creates.’
Alp Mehmet, of the Migration
Watch UK think-tank – which has produced consistently accurate estimates of legal and illegal immigration over the past two decades – said: ‘this is a scathing report that pinpoints the failings of the home Office – its failure to make available more data on the effectiveness of enforcement, about the scale of illegal immigration and on what the department itself believes to be increasing abuse of the asylum system. It is in everyone’s interests that immigration decisions are based on accurate evidence. Clearly, the committee does not think this is happening.’
‘Major holes in understanding’
AS the Home office focuses on the desperate hordes crossing the Channel in rickety boats, it is shocking to learn that the hapless department has no clue about how many illegal immigrants are already in Britain.
Civil servants haven’t so much as estimated the scale of the problem for 15 years.
Yet while they blithely shrug their shoulders, experts say a million live here under the radar, putting strain on schools, the NHS, benefits and social cohesion.
The public has every right to feel betrayed by such failure and complacency.
our Home Secretary must restore sanity to our chaotic borders.