Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether visa application centres in countries neighbouring Sudan will be able to provide the visas dispatched to the Sudanese embassy and visa application centre in Khartoum following their closures due to the outbreak of war.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Where our records confirm that a customer’s passport is being held in the Visa Application Centre (VAC) in Khartoum, UK Visas and Immigration have contacted all those customers that have been issued or refused visa applications in our VAC in Khartoum and offering them a letter confirming that their passport is securely stored and attaching a digital copy of their passport, that may help support their travel out of Sudan and into a third country.
Where the passport is held in Nairobi or Pretoria and a named individual (either the applicant or a designated 3rd party) is identified to return the passport to outside of Sudan, the passport can be sent (to the named individual) by courier or for collection from another visa application centre. For customers that have been able to exit Sudan, processes are in place to re-direct printing of their visa and endorsement on a Form for affixing a visa (FAV) to another VAC location of their choice for collection.
UK Visas and Immigration are currently operating within their global customer service standards across all of the main legal migration routes for customers who make an entry clearance application from overseas. If exceptional compelling and compassionate circumstances are raised, these will be considered in the usual way.
Details of current performance against these customer service standards are updated regularly and can be found at:
Visa decision waiting times: applications outside the UK - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).
Customers are able to contact the UK Visas and Immigration contact centre, telephone: 0300 790 6268, Monday to Thursday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:45pm and Friday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:30pm.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what process is in place for dispatching visas to people who have been successful in applying for Entry Clearance who were in Sudan but have had to flee due to the outbreak of war.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Where our records confirm that a customer’s passport is being held in the Visa Application Centre (VAC) in Khartoum, UK Visas and Immigration have contacted all those customers that have been issued or refused visa applications in our VAC in Khartoum and offering them a letter confirming that their passport is securely stored and attaching a digital copy of their passport, that may help support their travel out of Sudan and into a third country.
Where the passport is held in Nairobi or Pretoria and a named individual (either the applicant or a designated 3rd party) is identified to return the passport to outside of Sudan, the passport can be sent (to the named individual) by courier or for collection from another visa application centre. For customers that have been able to exit Sudan, processes are in place to re-direct printing of their visa and endorsement on a Form for affixing a visa (FAV) to another VAC location of their choice for collection.
UK Visas and Immigration are currently operating within their global customer service standards across all of the main legal migration routes for customers who make an entry clearance application from overseas. If exceptional compelling and compassionate circumstances are raised, these will be considered in the usual way.
Details of current performance against these customer service standards are updated regularly and can be found at:
Visa decision waiting times: applications outside the UK - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).
Customers are able to contact the UK Visas and Immigration contact centre, telephone: 0300 790 6268, Monday to Thursday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:45pm and Friday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:30pm.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department will take to process applications for individuals waiting for a decision on entry clearance from Sudan following the closures of the visa application centres.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Where our records confirm that a customer’s passport is being held in the Visa Application Centre (VAC) in Khartoum, UK Visas and Immigration have contacted all those customers that have been issued or refused visa applications in our VAC in Khartoum and offering them a letter confirming that their passport is securely stored and attaching a digital copy of their passport, that may help support their travel out of Sudan and into a third country.
Where the passport is held in Nairobi or Pretoria and a named individual (either the applicant or a designated 3rd party) is identified to return the passport to outside of Sudan, the passport can be sent (to the named individual) by courier or for collection from another visa application centre. For customers that have been able to exit Sudan, processes are in place to re-direct printing of their visa and endorsement on a Form for affixing a visa (FAV) to another VAC location of their choice for collection.
UK Visas and Immigration are currently operating within their global customer service standards across all of the main legal migration routes for customers who make an entry clearance application from overseas. If exceptional compelling and compassionate circumstances are raised, these will be considered in the usual way.
Details of current performance against these customer service standards are updated regularly and can be found at:
Visa decision waiting times: applications outside the UK - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).
Customers are able to contact the UK Visas and Immigration contact centre, telephone: 0300 790 6268, Monday to Thursday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:45pm and Friday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:30pm.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what process is in place for individuals asking for information on a family member’s application for entry.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Where our records confirm that a customer’s passport is being held in the Visa Application Centre (VAC) in Khartoum, UK Visas and Immigration have contacted all those customers that have been issued or refused visa applications in our VAC in Khartoum and offering them a letter confirming that their passport is securely stored and attaching a digital copy of their passport, that may help support their travel out of Sudan and into a third country.
Where the passport is held in Nairobi or Pretoria and a named individual (either the applicant or a designated 3rd party) is identified to return the passport to outside of Sudan, the passport can be sent (to the named individual) by courier or for collection from another visa application centre. For customers that have been able to exit Sudan, processes are in place to re-direct printing of their visa and endorsement on a Form for affixing a visa (FAV) to another VAC location of their choice for collection.
UK Visas and Immigration are currently operating within their global customer service standards across all of the main legal migration routes for customers who make an entry clearance application from overseas. If exceptional compelling and compassionate circumstances are raised, these will be considered in the usual way.
Details of current performance against these customer service standards are updated regularly and can be found at:
Visa decision waiting times: applications outside the UK - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).
Customers are able to contact the UK Visas and Immigration contact centre, telephone: 0300 790 6268, Monday to Thursday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:45pm and Friday (excluding bank holidays), 9am to 4:30pm.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what progress her Department has made in directing local authorities, which have previously not been involved, to participate in asylum dispersal.
Answered by Kevin Foster
Since the Full Dispersal Scheme was announced in April 2022 we have begun procuring asylum accommodation in cooperation with local authorities (LAs). We have seen an increase in dispersed accommodation capacity, with new areas now engaged. We are committed to working collaboratively with local authorities to implement the full dispersal model and an informal consultation with partners to shape the redesign of the asylum dispersal system closed on 1 July.
As part of the informal consultation, we developed regional plans incorporating contributions from LAs across the UK and to support implementation of a reformed asylum dispersal model which is fair, sustainable, innovative and responsive to changing demands and needs over the long term. We have taken on board the representations made during the informal consultation period and are building the feedback into our plans for regional allocations. We will communicate these to Local Authority partners as soon as we can.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether it is her Department’s policy to consult with local authorities before procuring hotels to use as asylum accommodation in their area.
Answered by Kevin Foster
When any new site has been identified, the Home Office will write to the Local Authority Chief Executive and the MP for the area to inform them of our plans to house Asylum Seekers within the hotel/alternative accommodation identified. This is normally done in advance of a hotel being used, but where an urgent need for accommodation occurs, this may take place retrospectively.
The Home Office always gives as much notice as possible of our intention to use sites, however, the fluctuating nature of intake, coupled with the imperative to meet our statutory obligation, may mean we need to establish sites quickly to avoid people becoming destitute. Home Office officials would be in contact with appropriate Local Authority officers and all other relevant stakeholders to discuss the operational arrangements and share the necessary information. This would include our providers working with the emergency services to mitigate any risks to our service users and the wider community.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the number of asylum seekers housed in hotels in (a) Birmingham, (b) the West Midlands and (c) England in the last 12 months.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The asylum accommodation system is under enormous pressure because of the significant and sustained increase in asylum intake over the last 12 months and the build-up of the population as a result of Covid-19 related measures, which is placing unsustainable pressure on a limited number of local authorities. This has resulted in the Home Office having to source temporary contingency accommodation, such as hotels.
The use of hotel contingency is only ever a short-term solution and we are working with our accommodation providers to find appropriate dispersed accommodation across the United Kingdom to replace it.
The latest published Immigration Statistics detail the number of asylum seekers accommodated in each local authority area. These statistics can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/asylum-and-resettlement-datasets#asylum-support(opens in a new tab) Data is published on a quarterly basis, with the latest information published 26 May 2022. The next quarterly figures are due to be released in August 2022.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of the number of hotels that have been procured for asylum accommodation in (a) Birmingham, (b) the West Midlands and (c) England in each of the last two years.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The asylum accommodation system is under enormous pressure because of the significant and sustained increase in asylum intake over the last 12 months and the build-up of the population as a result of Covid-19 related measures, which is placing unsustainable pressure on a limited number of local authorities. This has resulted in the Home Office having to source temporary contingency accommodation, such as hotels.
The use of hotel contingency is only ever a short-term solution and we are working with our accommodation providers to find appropriate dispersed accommodation across the United Kingdom to replace it.
The latest published Immigration Statistics detail the number of asylum seekers accommodated in each local authority area. These statistics can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/asylum-and-resettlement-datasets#asylum-support(opens in a new tab) Data is published on a quarterly basis, with the latest information published 26 May 2022. The next quarterly figures are due to be released in August 2022.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she has taken to assess the number of hotels used for asylum accommodation in each local authority in England.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The asylum accommodation system is under enormous pressure because of the significant and sustained increase in asylum intake over the last 12 months and the build-up of the population as a result of Covid-19 related measures, which is placing unsustainable pressure on a limited number of local authorities. This has resulted in the Home Office having to source temporary contingency accommodation, such as hotels.
The use of hotel contingency is only ever a short-term solution and we are working with our accommodation providers to find appropriate dispersed accommodation across the United Kingdom to replace it.
The latest published Immigration Statistics detail the number of asylum seekers accommodated in each local authority area. These statistics can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/asylum-and-resettlement-datasets#asylum-support(opens in a new tab) Data is published on a quarterly basis, with the latest information published 26 May 2022. The next quarterly figures are due to be released in August 2022.
Asked by: Shabana Mahmood (Labour - Birmingham, Ladywood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate her Department has made of the number of applications for medical cannabis licences made by pharmacies in each of the last 12 months.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Home Office Drugs and Firearms Licensing Unit (DFLU) issue controlled drug licences to possess, produce or supply drugs; they are company, site and activity specific. Separate licences may be issued to import or export controlled drugs. Pharmacies would ordinarily obtain their supplies of controlled drugs from licensed pharmaceutical wholesalers and, generally speaking would not require licensing by the DFLU.
This means that the data provided in response to this question will not give an insight into UK-based medicinal cannabis patients nor the pharmacies via which they receive their prescriptions. Instead, UK pharmacies would generally only require a DFLU licence where they are involved in exporting medicinal cannabis overseas, primarily to the Channel Islands and other Crown Dependencies with whom we have established licensing processes enabling the supply of controlled drugs.
Individual consignment export licences have been issued by DFLU to companies who supply Cannabis-Based Products for Medicinal use in Humans (CBPMs) to patients resident in Crown Dependencies. Some of those applications will have been made by General Pharmaceutical Council- registered ‘pharmacies’.
The number of applications for CBPM licences made by pharmacies in each the last 12 months in England are as follows:
|
|
May-21 | 95 |
Jun-21 | 136 |
Jul-21 | 124 |
Aug-21 | 95 |
Sep-21 | 99 |
Oct-21 | 99 |
Nov-21 | 59 |
Dec-21 | 34 |
Jan-22 | 34 |
Feb-22 | 40 |
Mar-22 | 29 |
Apr-22 | 10 |
May-22 (to 17 May) | 18 |
|
|
No licences were issued over this period to companies based in the West Midlands, inclusive of Birmingham Ladywood.