Asked by: David Simmonds (Conservative - Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Home Office press release, 15 April 2026, on Asylum hotels close as government scales up use of large sites, what recent statistics her department has collated and now holds on (a) the number of asylum hotels and (b) the number of asylum seekers in each individual hotel.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
This Government is determined to restore order to the asylum system so that it operates swiftly, firmly and fairly. We have already reduced the number of asylum seekers in asylum hotels by 35% in the past year (to the end of March 2026) and overall asylum support costs by 15% in the last financial year (to the end of March 2025).
The number of hotels currently in use as asylum accommodation, fewer than 190, remains significantly below hotel usage at its peak under the previous government in summer 2023, when more than 400 hotels were in use.
The Home Office publishes statistics on a quarterly basis detailing the number of supported asylum seekers accommodated including numbers accommodated in hotels. These statistics can be found at Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK.
Asked by: David Simmonds (Conservative - Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what is the average number of asylum seekers accommodated in an asylum hotel in each year from 2020.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office publishes statistics on a quarterly basis detailing the number of supported asylum seekers accommodated including numbers accommodated in hotels. These statistics can be found in at Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK Asylum seekers in receipt of Home Office support detailed datasets, year ending March 2026.
Asked by: David Simmonds (Conservative - Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Home Secretary's speech on immigration, published on 5 March 2026, if she will publish the (a) evidential basis and (b) breakdown of the costs of the £10 billion estimate for the cost of low-skilled workers and their dependents that will qualify for settlement.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The methodology behind the figures cited in the Home Secretaries speech were published 5 March 2026, see here: Estimated lifetime net fiscal costs for care workers and their adult dependants - GOV.UK.
Proposals for introducing an earned settlement model, as set out in the Command Paper “A Fairer Pathway to Settlement” (CP1448), were subject to a public consultation, which opened on 20 November 2025 and closed on 12 February 2026.
The responses to the consultation are being reviewed and analysed. Implementation of the final earned settlement arrangements will be subject to economic and equality impact assessments, which will be published in due course.
Asked by: Tonia Antoniazzi (Labour - Gower)
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 the legal status of Southern Cameroons on the number of asylum applications from that region since 2021.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office has not made a specific assessment that the legal status of those from any part of Cameroon has driven changes in asylum intake since 2021. As with all nationalities, the number of asylum applications can fluctuate for a range of reasons, including wider political, security and humanitarian conditions, and global events.
All asylum claims from Cameroon are considered on their individual merits, in line with the Refugee Convention and the latest available country information.
We will not remove anyone to a country where they will face persecution or serious harm.
Data on the number of asylum claims, broken down by nationality, is published in table Asy_D01 of the ‘Asylum claims and initial decisions datasets’. The latest data relates to the year ending March 2026.
Asked by: David Simmonds (Conservative - Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the answer of 16 April 2026, to Question 125400, on Asylum: Finance, and the statement that the grant is not intended to meet full costs, whether an assessment has been made of what average proportion of the full costs are funded by the Asylum Dispersal Grant.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Asylum Dispersal Grant supports local authorities with a contribution to the costs and pressures of accommodating asylum seekers across all eligible accommodation types in their area. The grant is not intended to meet full costs, but to provide a contribution towards costs incurred by councils, consistent with affordability, value for money and the Local Government Funding Doctrine.
The Home Office does not hold a single estimate of the total costs incurred by councils in delivering the services outlined in the Asylum Dispersal Grant Funding Instruction, as costs vary significantly by local authority. Each local authority is free to determine how best to utilise the funding but for monitoring and evaluation purposes must be able to demonstrate that they have fulfilled the eligibility conditions in supporting Asylum Seekers in their area.
Asked by: David Simmonds (Conservative - Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the answer of 16 April 2026 to Question 125400, on Asylum: Finance, whether it is her Department's policy that some of the costs of asylum seekers should be met from council taxpayers.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Asylum Dispersal Grant supports local authorities with a contribution to the costs and pressures of accommodating asylum seekers across all eligible accommodation types in their area. The grant is not intended to meet full costs, but to provide a contribution towards costs incurred by councils, consistent with affordability, value for money and the Local Government Funding Doctrine.
The Home Office does not hold a single estimate of the total costs incurred by councils in delivering the services outlined in the Asylum Dispersal Grant Funding Instruction, as costs vary significantly by local authority. Each local authority is free to determine how best to utilise the funding but for monitoring and evaluation purposes must be able to demonstrate that they have fulfilled the eligibility conditions in supporting Asylum Seekers in their area.
Asked by: David Simmonds (Conservative - Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the answer of 19 May 2026 to Question 441 on Asylum: Hillingdon, how much funding is being allocated to Hillingdon for 2026-27.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Cabinet Office publish annual grant funding data (Government Grants Data and Statistics) where you can find details of grant levels by local authority area broken down per year once available. The Home Office does not publish any additional information.
Asked by: Sarah Pochin (Reform UK - Runcorn and Helsby)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many phones were reported stolen in the North West in each of the last five years.
Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Home Office collects data on the number of theft offences reported to the police in England and Wales. It is not currently possible to identify from these data which crimes involved the theft of a mobile phone. The Office for National Statistics publish estimates of mobile phone theft for England and Wales, but these figures are not available for smaller geographic areas. The latest Office for National Statistics estimates can be found at:
Asked by: Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the causes of delays in the processing of applications for both leave to remain and indefinite leave to remain under the Turkish European Communities Association Agreement (ECAA); and what factors account for (1) the level of refusals relative to grants, (2) the size of the ECAA Work-in-Progress, and (3) the differences in processing performance between the ECAA and British National (Overseas) routes.
Answered by Lord Hanson of Flint - Minister of State (Home Office)
There is a 6-month service standard for the processing of applications to the ECAA route and customers are informed if their application will not be concluded in that timeframe.
To reduce the current Work-in-progress, additional resource has been assigned to this area and the Home Office expect to see increasing output and quicker turnarounds throughout the second half of 2026, as that takes effect.
Each ECAA application is considered on its individual facts prior to a final decision, on whether to refuse or grant leave, being served.
There has been a higher than forecast intake on the ECAA route over the last 12 months, and a high proportion of complex cases with large amounts of supporting evidence which must be reviewed as part of the decision-making process. This has impacted processing times and volumes of decisions which has resulted in a higher-than-expected Work-in-progress.
The processing performance of the ECAA and British National (Overseas) casework are individual to each route. There is no correlation between completion rates for British National (Overseas) Leave to Remain applications and ECAA Leave to Remain applications. Each immigration route has its own specific eligibility criteria that must be considered prior to a final decision being served.
Asked by: Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what communication they have had with applicants for both leave to remain and indefinite leave to remain under the Turkish European Communities Association Agreement (ECAA) who are currently waiting longer than nine months; and what is the predicted timescale to clear the ECAA backlog.
Answered by Lord Hanson of Flint - Minister of State (Home Office)
There is a 6-month service standard for the processing of applications to the ECAA route and customers are informed if their application will not be concluded in that timeframe.
To reduce the current Work-in-progress, additional resource has been assigned to this area and the Home Office expect to see increasing output and quicker turnarounds throughout the second half of 2026, as that takes effect.
Each ECAA application is considered on its individual facts prior to a final decision, on whether to refuse or grant leave, being served.
There has been a higher than forecast intake on the ECAA route over the last 12 months, and a high proportion of complex cases with large amounts of supporting evidence which must be reviewed as part of the decision-making process. This has impacted processing times and volumes of decisions which has resulted in a higher-than-expected Work-in-progress.
The processing performance of the ECAA and British National (Overseas) casework are individual to each route. There is no correlation between completion rates for British National (Overseas) Leave to Remain applications and ECAA Leave to Remain applications. Each immigration route has its own specific eligibility criteria that must be considered prior to a final decision being served.