Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if her Department will publish information providing the average time taken from the date of an asylum claim to the date of a substantive asylum interview taking place for each of the least three years.

The Home Office does not currently report on the average time that is taken between the date of an asylum claim to the date of a substantive asylum interview taking place. However, the Home Office does publish data on the number asylum applications awaiting an initial decision by duration, for main applicants only. This data can be found at Asy_04 of the published Immigration Statistics:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-statistics-year-ending-september-2021/list-of-tables#asylum-and-resettlement

We are investing in a programme of transformation and business improvement initiatives that will speed up and simplify our processes, reduce the time people spend in the asylum system and decrease the number of people who are awaiting an interview or decision. These initiatives include conducting shorter, more focused interviews or omitting interviews where it is appropriate to do so, streamlining decision templates for grants and refusals and focusing on improving quality to ensure decisions are right first time. We have extensive recruitment and training plans in place, including career progression options that will aid the retention of staff.

We are continuing to develop existing and new technology to help build on recent improvements such as digital interviewing and move away from a paper-based system. We are streamlining and digitising the case working process to enable more effective workflow, appointment booking and decision-making. Additionally, we have introduced specialist Decision Making Units, providing greater ownership and management of cohorts of asylum cases.