Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average waiting time was for a Standard Visitor visa application to be processed for applicants from Mumbai in the latest period for which data is available; whether her Department is taking steps to reduce the waiting time for those applicants; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Home Office does not publish data on the individual processing times by location. It does publish data of its performance against its service level agreement, which can be found on the GOV.UK webpage: Migration transparency data - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Resources are focussed on reducing the current processing times and will continue to prioritise urgent compelling or compassionate cases across all workstreams.
UKVI encourages all customers to apply in good time ahead of intended travel dates, and customers can also make use of UKVI’s optional priority visa services for visit visas in certain locations.
The Home Office is also continuing to invest in a programme of transformation and business improvement initiatives which will speed up and simplify decision making, reduce the time people spend in the system and decrease the number of people who are awaiting an interview or decision.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what progress her Department has made on processing the visa applications for family members of the constituent of the hon. Member for Harrow West, reference GT52722; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kevin Foster
We do not comment publicly on individual cases.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her policy to allow Ukrainian refugees who travelled to the UK through the Ukraine Family Scheme following the Russian invasion to transfer to the Homes for Ukraine scheme so they can access a wider range of support from local authorities; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Ukraine Family Scheme was set up to ensure family members were able to reunite with family fleeing Ukraine ahead of the development of the Homes for Ukraine scheme. It is based on family visa routes which existed before the Ukraine conflict, where public services are funded out of council budgets and the same principle is applied here. The UK-based family member is expected to provide support and accommodation for those coming to join them, who in turn benefit from the wider integration advantages in joining an existing family network.
Ukrainian nationals coming to the UK under the Ukraine Family Scheme are given access to work, benefits and public services as laid down in Appendix Ukraine to the Immigration Rules, details of which can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/immigration-rules/immigration-rules-appendix-ukraine-scheme
Homes for Ukraine on the other hand is a unique scheme set up specifically to support those escaping the conflict in Ukraine who are not able to rely on UK based family support. The Government is providing additional funding to local authorities which includes resource to enable them to carry out sponsorship-specific functions such as safeguarding checks and property checks, administering payments, as well as providing support such as English language training to help their integration into communities.
We continue to keep the UK Government’s support under review and will adapt and develop the visa routes in place to ensure they keep pace with the situation in Ukraine and the needs of those who have sought sanctuary here.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many passport applications processed by her Department missed the 10-week processing target since 1 January 2022; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kevin Foster
Since April 2021, people have been advised to allow up to ten weeks when applying for their British passport as more than 5 million people delayed applying due to the pandemic. The vast majority of all passport applications continue to be dealt with well within 10 weeks
HM Passport Office has increased its staffing numbers by 650 since April 2021 and is in the process of recruiting a further 550. This has helped to ensure that passport applications continue to be processed in higher numbers than ever before, with the processing of almost two million applications being completed across March and April 2022.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what (a) number of enquiries were received in her Department's dedicated inbox for hon. Members and (b) proportion of those were responded to within 20 working days in each of the last three months; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Department works to a target of responding to 95% of Hon. Members written correspondence within 20 working days.
Performance has been impacted by a significant increase in the volume of correspondence received, including the unprecedented amount of correspondence about the situation in Afghanistan and more recently in Ukraine.
The Department continues to prioritise enquiries related to Ukraine and recognises it has not been able to meet service standard in other cases. An action plan has been implemented to clear backlogs and drive-up performance.
The Department continues to recruit additional resources and has recently been loaned staff from non-operational areas to assist in clearing the backlogs. A detailed recovery plan to support a return to an acceptable service standard is being prepared.
Data about intake and performance in answering Hon. Members correspondence are published quarterly with the latest Quarter available at: Customer service operations data: Q4 2021 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what (a) number of recorded incidents there have been of errors on naturalisation certificates and (b) the average time for a corrected certificate to be issued was in each of the last six months; what steps she is taking to help prevent certificates containing errors being issued in future; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Home Office does not publish data in relation to the amendment of details on naturalisation certificates or the time taken for amended certificates to be issued. A request to amend a naturalisation certificate is not counted as a new application and current IT systems do not provide the specific data.
We have robust quality assurance measures in place and are continuously reviewing our processes to ensure we provide a high-quality service to our customers.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to increase the number of appointments available for people applying for a passport using the (a) online premium service and (b) one week fast track service; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kevin Foster
HMPO are looking at a range of interventions to increase our capacity for providing urgent service appointments as soon as possible.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the number of people scammed by fraudulent (a) texts, (b) emails and (c) calls in each year since 2010; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Damian Hinds
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when her Department will publish its next quarterly progress report on the implementation of recommendations from phase 1 of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry, to follow the previous report of September 2021; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
The Government intends to publish the next progress report on the implementation of the recommendations from the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase One report in April.
Asked by: Gareth Thomas (Labour (Co-op) - Harrow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when she plans to respond to the letter dated 9 September 2021, and follow-up letters of 8 November 2021 and 15 March 2022, from the hon. Member for Harrow West on behalf of his constituent Soraya Jan; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
The Minister for Afghan Resettlement wrote to all members on 13 September 2021 informing that we could not pursue cases concerning Afghan people in country in the usual ways, in view of the very difficult circumstances in Afghanistan. The Minister advised members to signpost individuals to gov.uk to check for the latest information about the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (ARAP) and the Afghan Citizens’ Resettlement Scheme (ACRS), rather than to seek to pursue cases on their behalf.
Unfortunately, the MP Account Management Team has not received the follow-up letters of 8 November 2021 and 15 March 2022.