Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government on what grounds their consultation on reforming support for failed asylum seekers proposes to remove all support from some 15,000 asylum applicants who are not able to produce sufficient evidence to sustain their cases; what assessment they have made of the likelihood that such people will be removed or returned to their countries of origin; and whether they plan to publish a summary of the consultation and their response to it.

The consultation document on reforming support for failed asylum seekers published on 4 August referred to the estimated 15,000 failed asylum seekers and their dependants who were in receipt of support under section 95 or section 4 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 at 31 March 2015. It set out proposals for transitional arrangements for these cases, under which that support would remain available, subject to the use of existing powers under which it can be discontinued. A summary of the consultation and the Government’s response to it will be published in due course.