Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many asylum seekers were suspected of making fraudulent claims to be under the age of 18 in the last 12 months.

We publish statistics where the claimant’s age has been disputed and a formal age assessment has been carried out. In the twelve months to September 2015 there were 590 such cases. Data is taken from published statistics: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-july-to-september-2015/asylum

The results of these assessments and the Home Office’s eventual finding as to age are recorded on the immigration casework database but this information could only be obtained at disproportionate cost by examination of individual case files.