Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to reduce the average processing time for asylum claims.

We have taken immediate action to speed up asylum processing whilst maintaining the integrity of the system. This includes simplifying guidance and streamlining processes and introducing shorter, focussed interviews, making the interview process more efficient and driving productivity improvements.

We have met our commitment to increase the number of asylum caseworkers to 2,500. As of the end of August 2023, provisional data shows that there are 2,510 decision makers in post.

This is more than double the number of asylum caseworkers a year ago in August 2022 and an increase of over 1,200 since December 2022.

We remain on track to clear the legacy asylum backlog by the end of 2023.