Asked by: James MacCleary (Liberal Democrat - Lewes)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department has made an assessment on the impact of the changes to immigration rules on those currently in the visa renewal process.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
In relation to the 2026 Spring Rules change, the Home Office has updated our identity requirements. The change to Rule 34(5)(a) will reduce the need for applicants to keep having to attend a Visa and Citizenship Application Service (VCAS) centre every time they make an immigration application for further permission to stay in the UK. This change will enable applicants who have previously enrolled their biometrics under controlled conditions, such as at a VCAS centre, and who are making a new in-country immigration application, to have their identity reused. The change to facilitate the re-use of digital identity neither creates new powers nor extends identity reuse to applicants overseas but will have required one-off implementation costs to the public sector. While unquantified, these implementation costs are likely to be offset by ongoing efficiency savings from modernising, digitising and streamlining application processes, which improve the customer experience whilst maintaining public safety.
In respect of wider Spring Rules changes, the Home Office has produced two impact assessments and two economic notes for the four Immigration Rules changes which met the threshold for requiring one. These are published alongside the Exploratory Memorandum and Statement of Changes on the GOV.UK website: Statement of changes to the Immigration Rules: HC 1691, 5 March 2026 - GOV.UK.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of recent trends in (a) visa extensions and (b) visa switches on her Department’s net migration targets.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Home Office publishes a variety of analysis considering the impact of the visa system on net migration. Home Office Impact Assessments and wider analysis can be found here: Migration analysis at the Home Office - GOV.UK.
Asked by: James Cleverly (Conservative - Braintree)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has made of potential merits of making English language training compulsory for asylum seekers who do not have English language proficiency.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government has set out its commitment to supporting successful integration, as highlighted in the Immigration White Paper. Being able to communicate effectively in English is essential for accessing public services, participating in civic life, securing employment, and building strong connections within local communities. Without sufficient language skills, individuals may face barriers to integration and increased risk of social isolation.
Asked by: Lord Bird (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Child Poverty Strategy, published on 5 December 2025, what discussions the Home Office have had with the Department for Education about the guidance to local authorities on statutory duties under section 17 of the Children Act 1989; and what steps they have taken to ensure that safeguarding and the best interests of children are considered in that guidance.
Answered by Lord Hanson of Flint - Minister of State (Home Office)
Section 17 of the Children Act 1989 establishes the general duty of local authorities in England to safeguard and promote the welfare of children within their area who are in need and, so far as is consistent with that duty, to promote the upbringing of such children by their families.
I can confirm that the Home Office is working with the Department for Education alongside other government departments and the NRPF network to produce guidance to assist local authorities in their duties to those with No Recourse to Public Funds as part of the Child Poverty Strategy.
The duty Section 17 of the Children Act 1989 duty does not apply to the Home Office. Instead, Section 55 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009 places a duty on the Home Office to make arrangements for ensuring that immigration, asylum, nationality and general customs functions are discharged having regard to the need to safeguard and promote the welfare of children in the UK.
The statutory guidance, called ‘Every Child Matters’, issued under Section 55 (3), sets out the key arrangements for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children as they apply both generally to public bodies who deal with children in the UK (Part 1) and specifically to the Home Office (Part 2).
Mar. 31 2026
Source Page: Neighbourhood Policing Programme, as at 28 February 2026Mar. 31 2026
Source Page: Home Office workforce diversity statistics: 2024 to 2025Mar. 31 2026
Source Page: Home Office workforce diversity statistics: 2024 to 2025Mar. 31 2026
Source Page: Government response to non-crime hate incidents final reportAsked by: Gregory Stafford (Conservative - Farnham and Bordon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether any services provided by Yoti are currently used in Home Office identity verification, border control, or age assurance systems.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
Details of central government contracts above £12,000 for procurements commenced before 24 February 2025 are published on Contracts Finder. Contracts procured under the Procurement Act 2023, which came into force on 24 February 2025, are published on the Central Digital Platform Find a Tender service.
Asked by: James McMurdock (Independent - South Basildon and East Thurrock)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to her Department’s press release entitled New UK–Nigeria partnership to speed up removals, what formal agreements underpin the new UK–Nigeria migration partnership announced on 19 March 2026; and whether copies will be published.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
On 18 March 2026, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood signed a UK-Nigeria Migration Partnership Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Nigerian Interior Minister, the Hon. Dr Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo.
Under the terms of the MOU, the Home Office will be able to facilitate returns using a UK Letter travel document. This will ensure that we are able to swiftly conduct the return of those that no longer have a right to be in the UK. Home Office officials will work closely with the Nigerian authorities to monitor implementation.
MOUs are not legally binding but are routine mechanisms used to manage activity between the UK and foreign governments.
The Home Office publishes statistics on returns from the UK in the Immigration System Statistics Quarterly Release.
Foreign national offender (FNO) returns from the UK to Nigeria are published in Table Ret_D04 of the Returns detailed datasets with the most recent figures covering the period up to the end of December 2025.
The Home Office does not publish statistics on visa overstayer returns for any nationality. In addition, Nigeria does not appear in the nationality breakdown for failed asylum seeker (asylum related) returns as only the highest 10 nationalities are published.
These publication limitations apply only to those specific return categories and do not affect the published data on foreign national offender returns to Nigeria.