Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to her Department's press release entitled, Support for British and non-British nationals in Afghanistan, published on 22 August 2021, how many calls have been made to the support helpline; of those calls, how many were answered; whether that helpline is still open; and what the average waiting time is for calls made to that helpline to be answered.

The Afghanistan Support Helpline is open and available to non-British nationals in Afghanistan, or family members of a non-British nationals in Afghanistan, in need of assistance and is open 9am to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday.

From the 4 January, we have been offered 7326 calls and answered 6964 which is 95% calls answered. Average wait time was 1 minute 38 seconds.

The helpline received a large proportion of calls in the initial 2 weeks of opening which saw longer wait times. This impacted the overall waiting time and number of calls answered.

The department continues to closely monitor and review the volume of calls being made to the helpline, with a significant reduction in the number of calls since opening.