Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how long on average it takes for a person to go through the National Referral Mechanism.

Following a referral into the National Referral Mechanism, a reasonable grounds determination is made within 5 days, followed by a conclusive grounds determination on average in 98 days, as published in the evaluation of the 20 month pilot we ran to test a new decision-making process designed to improve timescales – https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/an-evaluation-of-the-national-referral-mechanism-pilot.

The findings from the pilot have been used to inform the recently announced package of reforms to the National Referral Mechanism, which includes measures aimed at improving decision-making timescales, such as the introduction of a new digital system.