To ask Her Majesty's Government what were the Home Office's annual targets for the removal of illegal migrants for each year since 2010; and how many people were removed because of inadequate documentation in each of those years.
Answered on
17 May 2018
My Department’s approach is set out in Sir Philip Rutnam’s letter to the Rt Hon Yvette Cooper MP, dated 14 May 2018 that my Rt Hon Friend the Minister of State for Immigration deposited in the House Library.
We are currently prioritising Caribbean Nationals. The Home Office has been checking records back to 2002 when electronic records began, looking at all removals and deportations of Caribbean nationals aged 45 plus. So far there have been 63 cases identified where Caribbean individuals could have entered the UK before 1973. This means of the total 8000 total deportation and administrative removal records that came up, so far there is a focus on 63, there is something in their record that indicates they could have entered before 1973. Of these, there are 32 Foreign National Offenders and 31 administrative removals.
We are now reviewing each of these cases carefully in more depth - including bringing paper files out of storage if necessary - to determine whether anyone who was protected under the 1971 Act was removed or deported unlawfully. This work will be independently assured. This does not mean that 63 people have been wrongfully removed or deported. It is the number of cases which merit further investigation.