Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many new enquiries her Department's MP Urgent Enquiries inbox handled in each month in from January 2021 to May 2022; what steps her Department is taking to manage the (a) performance and (b) case management of those teams; what steps she is taking to oversee the performance of the Urgent Enquiry inbox; and if she will make a statement.

There are multiple ways for Members to raise queries with the MP Account Management Team (MPAM) including submitting via the MP Urgent Enquiries inbox. Whilst the department collates detailed information regarding Member’s queries this cannot be broken down by the specific inbox used to raise a query.

Performance against target has been impacted by a significant increase in the volume of correspondence received, including the unprecedented amount of correspondence about the situation in Afghanistan and more recently in Ukraine.

The Department continues to prioritise enquiries related to Ukraine and recognises it has not been able to meet service standard in other cases. Actions have been taken to clear backlogs and drive-up performance. MPs can also escalate urgent and compassionate cases via the team at Portcullis House.

The Department continues to recruit additional resources and has recently been loaned staff from non-operational areas to assist in clearing the backlogs. A detailed recovery plan to support a return to an acceptable service standard is being prepared.

Data about intake and performance in answering Hon. Members correspondence are published quarterly with the latest Quarter available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/customer-service-operations-data-q1-2022