Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what was the cost to the public purse of cancelled removal flights in each year since 2015.

We are determined to remove those with no right to remain in the UK – including dangerous foreign criminals.

All spending is carefully scrutinised to make sure that every pound of taxpayers’ money is spent in the most effective way.

The Government’s efforts to facilitate entirely legitimate and legal returns of people who have entered the UK illegally are often frustrated by late legal challenges submitted hours before the flight.

The information requested would require a manual reconciliation of the individual cases against financial records to see if a cancellation cost was levied. This could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.