To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her policy to set a target time for processing outstanding claims for asylum made before the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 came into force on 28 June 2022; how many such claims are pending; what the earliest submission date is for those pending claims; if she will make it her policy to expedite older claims by date of submission; and if she will make a statement.
Answered on
20 September 2022
The Home Office does not currently have a target time for processing applications for asylum, but are committed to ensuring that asylum claims are considered without unnecessary delay.
Asylum Operations are working to reintroduce a service standard for the processing of asylum applications. It is our intention to reintroduce a service standard aligning with the recommendation from the recent Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration’s (ICIBI) published report - An inspection of asylum casework (November 2021).
We have already made progress in prioritising claims with acute vulnerability and those in receipt of the greatest level of support, including Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children. Additionally, we are prioritising older claims and those where an individual has already received a decision, but a reconsideration is required.
Information regarding how many initial asylum claims are pending and the earliest submission date is published as part of the Government’s transparency agenda, the latest release of which can be found at table Asy_04 of the Asylum Migration Data June 2022: List of tables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).