To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in each of the last five years, how many asylum applications have been made by people who entered the UK on a student visa; what are the top 10 countries of nationality of those people; and what assessment they have made of those figures.
Answered on
9 December 2015
Over the last five years there have been 17,387 cases of individuals who have entered on a student visa and subsequently also went on to claim asylum. Details by year and those of the top ten nationalities are listed below.
2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | TOTALS | |
Total Claims | 1,901 | 4,350 | 4,695 | 3,743 | 2,698 | 17,387 |
TOP 10 Nationalities | ||||||
Pakistan | 385 | 1,313 | 1,471 | 1,265 | 892 | 5,326 |
Sri Lanka | 744 | 1,137 | 1,171 | 715 | 395 | 4,162 |
Iran | 244 | 464 | 307 | 148 | 77 | 1,240 |
India | 26 | 244 | 320 | 294 | 266 | 1150 |
Bangladesh | 31 | 167 | 318 | 264 | 291 | 1,071 |
Syria | 24 | 256 | 251 | 134 | 90 | 755 |
China | 25 | 95 | 162 | 160 | 92 | 534 |
Nigeria | 12 | 94 | 142 | 136 | 107 | 491 |
Libya | 114 | 73 | 57 | 86 | 109 | 439 |
Burma (Myanmar) | 98 | 42 | 14 | 13 | 10 | 177 |
All Other | 198 | 465 | 482 | 528 | 369 | 2,042 |
TOTALS | 1,901 | 4,350 | 4,695 | 3,743 | 2,698 | 17,387 |
The Home Office constantly analyses patterns of migration to identify trends and possible abuses of the immigration system. In October of 2014 we began a pilot to target abuse of the visa immigration system in cases where people claimed asylum within one year of obtaining a visa for the UK. This encompasses all visa types and not just student visas. Evaluation of this pilot ahead of any decision for further roll out is ongoing.