Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will provide the details of the last three (a) dates when and (b) locations where she last met with (i) individuals who arrived in the UK on small boats and (ii) charitable or non-governmental organisations who provide support services to asylum seekers.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
All meetings held by the Home Secretary in her Ministerial capacity are routinely released in quarterly Departmental transparency returns. The latest transparency returns can be found here: Home Office: ministerial gifts, hospitality, travel and meetings - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the impact on the processing time for applications of the decision to extend the standard processing time for family visa applications made outside the UK from 12 to 24 weeks.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The Home Office had been prioritising Ukraine Visa Schemes applications in response to the humanitarian crisis caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The bulk of resource has now returned to the route, along with an additional investment of new staff.
We are keeping the service standard level under review.
Information on family visa processing times for applications made outside of the UK can be found here: Visa decision waiting times: applications outside the UK GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Information on family visa processing times for applications made inside of the UK can be found here: Visa decision waiting times: applications inside the UK - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the impact on the processing times for applications of the decision to suspend the (a) priority and (b) super-priority services for visa applications on the processing times for applications.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
From mid-March 2022, UKVI temporarily suspended Priority visa services for new family overseas visa applications, in order to temporarily deploy resource to process applications made in response to the humanitarian crisis arising from the invasion of Ukraine.
On 09 January 2023, UKVI re-introduced Priority visa services for customers with an outstanding family overseas visa application.
On 20 February 2023 UKVI re-introduced Priority visa services for customers with a new overseas family visa application.
The Super Priority Visa service is not available for overseas Family visa applications. It was not available prior to the suspension of Priority Visa services.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the potential merits reinstating the (a) priority and (b) super priority services for family visa applications
Answered by Robert Jenrick
From mid-March 2022, UKVI temporarily suspended Priority visa services for new family overseas visa applications, in order to temporarily deploy resource to process applications made in response to the humanitarian crisis arising from the invasion of Ukraine.
On 09 January 2023, UKVI re-introduced Priority visa services for customers with an outstanding family overseas visa application.
On 20 February 2023 UKVI re-introduced Priority visa services for customers with a new overseas family visa application.
The Super Priority Visa service is not available for overseas Family visa applications. It was not available prior to the suspension of Priority Visa services.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to return the processing time for family visa applications made outside the UK from 24 to 12 weeks
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The Home Office had been prioritising Ukraine Visa Schemes applications in response to the humanitarian crisis caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The bulk of resource has now returned to the route, along with an additional investment of new staff.
We are keeping the service standard level under review.
Information on family visa processing times for applications made outside of the UK can be found here: Visa decision waiting times: applications outside the UK GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Information on family visa processing times for applications made inside of the UK can be found here: Visa decision waiting times: applications inside the UK - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what criteria will be used to assess when to end the temporary suspension of the (a) priority and (b) super-priority services for new visitor visa applications
Answered by Robert Jenrick
There are currently no suspensions for priority and super priority visit visa services across the globe.
UKVI will always seek to offer optional priority services where the security and logistical circumstances allow.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the effect of the Government’s immigration policies on Scotland’s (a) population and (b) labour shortages.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Our points-based system – with a wide range of eligible occupations spanning many economic sectors - works for the whole of the UK by welcoming people to fill skills gaps, support our public services and boost our economy.
As noted in the Migration Advisory Committee annual report, immigration policy cannot be a complete solution to population movements within the UK or labour shortages. The Scottish Government has policy levers to address these issues more effectively.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to protect people from online scams.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
Online fraud is a pernicious crime that can cause devastating financial and emotional harm to victims. The Government has been working with partners in the public and private sectors to keep the public safe and bring these fraudsters to justice.
The National Cyber Security Centre are leading the way combatting online scams through their Suspicious Email Reporting Service which allows members of the public to forward any suspicious emails and potential phishing scams more effectively and easily to law enforcement. Since its inception in April 2020, it has already led to over 15 million reports and the removal of over 105,000 scams across 192,000 URLs (as of October 2022).
We have also introduced the Online Safety Bill, an ambitious and forward-looking piece of legislation that will tackle online harms including fraud and fraudulent advertising. DCMS is leading further work on an Online Advertising Programme. This will consider further regulation of online advertising, including for fraud. In March 2022, DCMS published their consultation which has now closed, and the Government will publish its response in due course.
We have been working with industry on a voluntary basis. On 21st October 2021, the newly relaunched Joint Fraud Taskforce published three voluntary charters to combat fraud in the accountancy, retail banking and telecommunications sectors. We have seen progress with one UK mobile operator reporting a 97% decline in scam texts over a nine-month period.
We continue to encourage the public to report fraud to Action fraud and to forward any suspicious emails to report@phishing.gov.uk and suspicious texts to 7726, free of charge.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she has taken to ensure that immigration rules are not a barrier to international trainee GPs remaining in UK general practice after completing training.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The Home Office have already delivered a range of measures to support the health and care sector. The Home Office launched the Health & Care visa in 2020, which makes it easier, cheaper, and quicker for health workers – including GPs - to come to the UK to work compared to other immigration routes.
International medical graduates may use the time between the end of their training and the end of their visa to apply for work and are eligible for the skilled worker route. The sector and its membership bodies are best placed to help match these individuals with those vacant positions, so should focus on identifying even more effective methods to improve this mechanism.
We strongly encourage more GP surgeries to become Home Office approved sponsors, as this is the best way for the sector to retain international medical graduates as GPs, providing them with the ability to continue to renew their visa while living in the UK and to qualify for permanent settlement in due course.
Sponsorship is straightforward and business-friendly, the majority of sponsors on our register are SMEs, much like GP surgeries are likely to be. The Government is working to increase the number of GP Practices registered as Home Office sponsors.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the service delivery standards are for the companies contracted by her Department to deliver passports to applicants; and what recent assessment she has made of whether those standards have been met.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The service delivery standards and recent performance against these are as per below:
Fed Ex | ||
SLA Description | Target | Performance June 2022 |
24-hour delivery (Urgent services) | 99.75% | 99.83% |
48-hour delivery (Standard service) | 99.75% | 99.76% |
DHL UK | ||
SLA Description | Target | Performance June 2022 |
Attempted delivery within 2 working days after collection, for addresses in mainland UK. | 99.75% | 99.93% |
Attempted delivery within 3 working days after collection, for addresses in all other UK locations. | 99.5% | 99.96% |
DHL Global Forwarding (International) | |||
SLA description | Target | Performance May 2022 | |
Dispatched packages that delivery/redelivery was attempted to the correct address and within the timeframe agreed. | 99.75% | 99.96% | |