Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will allocate additional funding to the Department for Housing, Communities and Local Government to support the continuation of the Controlling Migration Fund and local authority support for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

The Controlling Migration Fund opened in November 2016 with the aim of easing pressures on local services linked to recent migration and providing targeted immigration enforcement activity. Until 2020 the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has contributed £100 million of funding, with the Home Office contributing £40 million worth of enforcement activity.

The Home Office also provides funding to local authorities as a contribution to the costs they incur when supporting unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC), which is in addition to the money provided through the local government finance settlement. In May 2019, the Home Office announced a significant increase in the funding: from 1 April 2019, local authorities now receive £114 per UASC per night for each UASC in their care, regardless of their age or when they entered the UK. This represented a 61% increase to the lowest rate that was previously paid.

Future spending decisions on the Controlling Migration Fund and funding for Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children will be taken at the Comprehensive Spending Review this year.