Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 13 June 2016 to Question 39897, how many full-time equivalent officials of her Department are responsible for identifying, verifying and processing all asylum cases.

Asylum Operations in UK Visas and Immigration currently have 73 full time equivalent (FTE) staff who are responsible for screening asylum claims. Staff in Border Force and Immigration Enforcement will also encounter new asylum claimants in the course of their duties.

Asylum Operations have 271 (FTE) decision makers responsible for interviewing and deciding asylum

claims. Over 100 additional decision makers are currently being recruited and trained, and we continually review our staffing levels to ensure that we can deal with levels of intake. The figures quoted have been derived from management information and are therefore provisional and subject to change. This information has not been quality assured under National Statistics protocols