Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the scope is of work to change (a) people capabilities, (b) processes and (c) technology for asylum (i) casework, (ii) accommodation and (iii) other support through the Asylum Transformation Programme.

The Asylum Transformation Programme consists of a number of projects delivering improvements to the people, processes and technology that make up the Asylum system. Those improvements are delivered across 4 operational areas or programme pillars; Asylum Caseworking, Accommodation and Support, Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children (UASC) Age Assessment, and Appeals and Litigation Review (ALAR). These pillars and associated projects are focused on improving the end to end asylum journey by streamlining, simplifying and digitalising processes to speed up decision making; establishing an asylum accommodation system with the right capacity and at optimum cost, whilst reducing the burden on the Appeals system.

Additional scope added to the Asylum Transformation Programme Business Case in April 25 came in two areas. Firstly, the introduction of new appeals focused projects which aim to ease the bottleneck in the appeals and courts system, aligning to the Government ambition to address challenges across the end-to-end asylum system. The second area of expansion enabled the rehousing of three in-flight Age Assessment projects which were added when the Sovereign Borders Programme closed.

The Asylum Transformation Programme (ATP) was rated Amber following its most recent Gate 0 review. Successful delivery of the programme to time, cost and quality was acknowledged as feasible but the Amber rating also denoted the existence of significant issues and subsequently led to recommendations from National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA). The recommendations were accepted and have provided additional mitigation against the risk NISTA identified.to Successful delivery of the programme. The programme proactively assesses government policy in this area as part of its planning and business case development cycle.

The Home Office Sovereign Borders Programme, which was working to support the previous Government ambitions around the Illegal Migration Act (IMA), was closed 2024. This led to a review of the in-flight projects within the Sovereign Borders Programme to identify and reallocate, any projects for which there continued to be a sound business case. Three in-flight Age Assessment projects were identified and have now moved into the scope of Asylum Transformation Programme (from Business Case 25/26). These projects aim to optimise and digitise the age assessment process through new technology, new tools and updated policy processes. This is in line with the programmes objectives to create a more resilient and effective asylum system.

A Move on function was established and has been Operational since August 2024. The Asylum Transformation Programme continues to work with Discontinuations and Move on teams to transform their joint processes to ensure a smooth transition from asylum support into mainstream services.