The latest migration statistics show the UK Border Agency is still not fit for purpose; where there are failings, the home secretary must be held to account.
Jill Rutter writes on migration issues and formerly worked at the Refugee Council and the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR)
The Home Office and the Office for National Statistics released their quarterly immigration statistics yesterday, a three-monthly ritual of claim and counter-claim for those involved in the debate about immigration.
While the home secretary, Theresa May, might draw solace from a fall in net migration – down from 242,000 to 183,000 – the statistics show continued incompetence on the part of the UK Border Agency.
Significantly, the statistics were released on the same day as a report (pdf) on student migration from the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration. This, too, highlighted UK Border Agency failings. But this is no new trend, with numerous official reports highlighting weaknesses in this executive agency of the Home Office.
The quarterly immigration statistics show a small fall in work visa, student and family migration. Some 4 per cent fewer work visas were issued abroad in the year to September 30th, 2012, compared with the previous 12 months.
Grants of student visas have fallen even further, down 26 per cent from the previous year, although most of the drop has been in the further education and independent college sector.
However, ONS population estimates suggest steady migration flows from eastern Europe with the Polish-born population who are resident in the UK increasing by 9.5 per cent over the previous year. This is not surprising, given the strength of Sterling compared with other European currencies, and high levels of unemployment both in eastern Europe and other potential countries of migration within the EU.
Interestingly, population data does not point to any large-scale exodus from the PIGS countries – Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain – with population estimates for these countries fairly steady over the last year.
Dig down a little deeper, however, and a more worrying picture emerges from the statistics.
Asylum applications have increased a little in the year to September 30th, 2012 – up 8 per cent to 20,838 applications in the year to September 30th, although it is important to note this is a small fraction of the numbers coming in the early years of this century. (There were nearly 86,000 asylum applications in 2002).
Not unexpectedly, there has been increased numbers of applications from Syria and Libya, with 1,204 applications from the latter country in the year to September 30th, 2012.
Some 64 per cent of initial asylum applications were refused in the year to September 30th, 2012, yet more than a quarter (26 per cent) of these refusals were overturned at appeal. For Eritrean appellants, 48 per cent of them had their appeals upheld, and for Somalis this figure was 53 per cent. Some 34 per cent of Zimbabweans, 37 per cent of Sri Lankans and 30 per cent of Iranians had their appeals upheld.
Overall, this means UKBA is getting it wrong in one out of four asylum cases; among some national groups a such as Somalis, a far higher proportion of initial decisions appear to be wrong. Poor quality decision-making by asylum caseworkers can have a devastating effect on the individuals concerned. It also costs the taxpayer dearly, as asylum appeals are expensive.
The asylum system is not the only area of the UK Border Agency’s work that has come under the spotlight this week. The Chief Inspector’s report (pdf) on student migration highlights a failure by the UK Border Agency to follow up on notifications it received about students who have failed to turn up to classes. In May 2012 there was a backlog of 153,000 such notifications.
Although the UK Border Agency has followed up on some of these, the Chief Inspector’s report notes there are still:
“…insufficient resources to manage notifications.”
The Chief Inspector’s report is the latest in a stream of criticism of UKBA, with other reports from his office; from the home affairs committee; the public accounts committee; the Parliamentary Ombudsman; and the National Audit Office – and not forgetting last year’s high profile border control fiasco.
Six years after home secretary John Reid labeled the immigration and asylum division of the Home Office “not fit for purpose”, the UK Border Agency still seems unfit for purpose. This is despite its work moving to an executive agency of the Home Office and numerous restructures.
Public hostility to immigration remains high in the UK and a major issue that plays into this are the operational failures of the UK Border Agency. These incompetencies also lessen trust in the government to police the borders.
If we are to become more comfortable with immigration, the government needs both to address the failings of the UK Border Agency and to debate its resourcing. If we want a high quality border agency, we will need to pay for it, yet there is little consensus or even debate about how much public spending should be spent on immigration control.
Ultimately, long-term improvement to the quality of the UK Border Agency s requires greater and sustained ministerial leadership, rather than symbolic firefighting when things go wrong. And where there are failings, the home secretary must be held to account.
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32 Responses to “Latest migration statistics show the UK Border Agency is still not fit for purpose”
patyc
if I go to the petrol station, hire a taxi or go to macdonalds, it’s obvious that immigration is of unskilled people doing jobs that our army of unemplyed could do. they probably came in on student visas or pretending to be high skilled. unless we get this under control people will just be against immigration as a kneejerk
Newsbot9
Ah yes, it’s “obvious” that you stereotype immigrants as all low skill scroungers. Don’t worry, you’re wrong – your Tories are turning away six-figure earners trying to employ hundreds of people here, in at least two cases I know of people who were accepted into America on the very rare O1 “superstar” visa’s!
The numbers overstaying on student visas are tiny, but keep cracking down on them, which has a major knock-on effect on the funding available for British students, since they cross-subsiside them. But hey, no skin off your nose if the Redbrick universities close…
Content Writer
There is an undue focus purely on the numbers by the UK Government.
Government is boasting on its ability to reduce the immigration for the first time in several years, however all they’ve mentioned is the number of net migration not the quality of immigrants who are actually leaving the UK.
As an international student in UK till July 2012, I came across if not thousands at least hundreds of illegal immigrants at several points in time & everytime I had a chance, I considered it to be my duty to give information to UKBA as well as to Crime Stoppers about such illegal immigrants. I have been personally giving them these tip offs since Dec 2010 (that is when I got to know about ways to report illegal immigration).
However, till today, I have not come across a single such person who was reported by me to have been removed from the UK, they’re illegal immigrants with visas expired several years ago & there are in the UK for cash in hand jobs & other such jobs.They don’t pay taxes and simply send all the cash they earn (after their expenses) to their native countries through private money transfer services (Money Laundering stuff)
Such worms are eating up the economy of the UK, but because UKBA & the UK Government are least bothered to buckle up & start working hard on catching these fraudsters (even though all the information including their addresses were given to them by people like me), it is we, the genuine students who are suffering.
Speaking particularly about my knowledge & immigrants whom I have known ever since I was in the UK, it is genuine students / professionals etc who left the UK as they were unable to get visas to work after their studies or companies were simply not hiring them as they were told that even if they were interviewed their application would be put on hold unless they have interviewed UK / EU candidates for the vacant position, & only if still they have any vacancy would they consider the immigrants.
So finally these genuine students / professionals / migrants have now left the country, but illegal immigrants are still thriving in the London.
Alone at Wembley Central tube station, on a weekday evening around 6 pm if immigration team decides to crack down illegal immigrants, they could actually get hold of several hundreds of illegal immigrants if not thousands, but they aren’t doing it, there could be two reasons for this, they are lazy enough & not bothered, or they are simply being bribed by such communities to stay away from their (illegal immigrants’) areas.
and those charged with governance and those responsible to figure this out, seems to have been highly incompetent in fulfilling their duties.
For this reason, due to continuous failure of & UK Govt on being able to crack down illegal immigrants, they have now taken the easy route, simply strict the policies, stop issuing visas, close work entry routes to non – EU immigrants under several categories, but they’re not understanding the simple point, this would only be short term & would actually encourage more illegal immigrant activity within the UK.
Not only that, once these genuine immigrants who were actually either willing to contribute to the economy through means of genuine employment or were already contributing to the overall economy through their employment, are all out of the UK, the tax system & benefit system would see a death-spiral because there would be less people to earn through genuine employment & hence less people to actually pay taxes & so less people would be able to get their benefits or the benefits would be sharply reduced in the longer run (as they are already in the process of happening),this is where the death spiral begins, less jobs / less incomes / less taxes / more benefit claims, goes on unless the economy crashes.
Home Secretary’s & David Cameron’s urge to achieve short term targets are actually costing billions to the economy in the longer run, at the same time, international students are being put off from coming to the UK to study as they now see no more prospects of even finding a short term work experience to enhance their CV before they return to their home country.
Talking of myself, a bit of introduction…
I was an international student in the UK who arrived in the UK in Aug 2010. I came to the UK to study ACCA and got done with all my exams in first attempt along with BSc in Applied accounting- Oxford Brookes and left UK in July 2012 as I was unable to secure employment due to immigration changes. I appeared for interview at several blue chip companies and Big 4 Accounting firms etc., but everywhere after being successful in interview I was told my application was on hold due to immigration reasons, & they would get back to me if they have vacancies after having interviewed UK / EU candidates, unfortunately, I never heard from them till the date (although they dont know I have left UK so they could still email me if I am selected)
gee
solo makinde
adophe miliband
if you can drive a taxi, rape children and you’re a terrorist then you’re welcome to live here with your massive family.
if you are of any discernible benefit to the UK you can fuck off back to where you came from
UK immigration policy