Asked by: Lord Tyrie (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the value of legal aid expenditure available to support asylum applications from individuals from (1) Hong Kong, (2) Ukraine, and (3) Afghanistan, over the past 12 months.
Answered by Lord Bellamy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Funding for legal aid is on a demand led basis, the Legal Aid Agency (LAA) does not have a specific budget allocation for delivery of legal aid services in relation to specific categories of law.
Statistical data is not centrally held regarding legal expenditure provided to individuals from the specified countries.
Asked by: Lord Tyrie (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many asylum seekers from Hong Kong have been waiting for their case to be processed for longer than (1) six months, (2) one year, and (3) 18 months.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
As of 10/03/2023, there are 52 Asylum Seekers in the Asylum Support Scheme with a Hong Kong nationality out of a total 108,700 Asylum Seekers. 22 of these 52 are currently in temporary accommodation.
All service users are entitled to access Wi-Fi wherever it is available with no restrictions placed on them accessing these services by the Home Office.
In 2022, 17 initial decisions were made on applications from Hong Kong nationals, 4 initial decisions were made on applications from Ukrainian nationals and 1,842 initial decisions were made on applications from Afghanistan nationals.
As at 31 Dec 2022, 115 Hong Kong nationals had been awaiting an initial decision for more than 6 months while 11 had been waiting 6 months or less (main applicants only). Please note that any further breakdowns in wait time are not published.
Asked by: Lord Tyrie (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many asylum applications were processed from individuals from (1) Hong Kong, (2) Ukraine, and (3) Afghanistan, in the past 12 months.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
As of 10/03/2023, there are 52 Asylum Seekers in the Asylum Support Scheme with a Hong Kong nationality out of a total 108,700 Asylum Seekers. 22 of these 52 are currently in temporary accommodation.
All service users are entitled to access Wi-Fi wherever it is available with no restrictions placed on them accessing these services by the Home Office.
In 2022, 17 initial decisions were made on applications from Hong Kong nationals, 4 initial decisions were made on applications from Ukrainian nationals and 1,842 initial decisions were made on applications from Afghanistan nationals.
As at 31 Dec 2022, 115 Hong Kong nationals had been awaiting an initial decision for more than 6 months while 11 had been waiting 6 months or less (main applicants only). Please note that any further breakdowns in wait time are not published.
Asked by: Lord Tyrie (Non-affiliated - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what proportion of Hong Kong asylum seekers are in temporary accommodation; and what proportion of those have no access to Wi-Fi.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
As of 10/03/2023, there are 52 Asylum Seekers in the Asylum Support Scheme with a Hong Kong nationality out of a total 108,700 Asylum Seekers. 22 of these 52 are currently in temporary accommodation.
All service users are entitled to access Wi-Fi wherever it is available with no restrictions placed on them accessing these services by the Home Office.
In 2022, 17 initial decisions were made on applications from Hong Kong nationals, 4 initial decisions were made on applications from Ukrainian nationals and 1,842 initial decisions were made on applications from Afghanistan nationals.
As at 31 Dec 2022, 115 Hong Kong nationals had been awaiting an initial decision for more than 6 months while 11 had been waiting 6 months or less (main applicants only). Please note that any further breakdowns in wait time are not published.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to open up safe routes for people seeking refuge to come to the UK.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The UK has a proud record of providing protection for people fleeing war and persecution. Between 2015 and December 2022, just under half a million (481,804) people were offered safe and legal routes into the UK.
In addition to dedicated resettlement schemes for Syria, Afghanistan, Hong Kong and Ukraine, the UK has welcomed refugees and people in need around the world through the UK Resettlement Scheme (UKRS), Community Sponsorship, the Mandate Resettlement Scheme, and Family Reunion.
It is not right that control of national borders should be suspended to allow people who have already reached safety in countries with fully functioning asylum systems, to travel further to another country as a matter of preference. This undermines the broader immigration system, and encourages people to fund criminal gangs and to risk their lives trying to get to the UK in unseaworthy vessels or packed dangerously into cars and lorries. Moreover, it diverts our finite resources from those who are most in need of assistance.
As outlined by the Prime Minister, as we tackle illegal migration, we will be able to bring forward more safe and legal routes.
Asked by: Marquess of Lothian (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether there are any circumstances in which it is currently possible for refugees to claim asylum from within the UK other than for claimants from Ukraine, Afghanistan or Hong Kong who apply under the relevant time-limited schemes.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
In addition to dedicated resettlement schemes for Afghanistan, Hong Kong and Ukraine, the UK welcomes refugees and people in need of protection through the UK Resettlement Scheme (UKRS), Community Sponsorship, Family Reunion, and Mandate Resettlement Schemes.
Any person who is not a British Citizen can claim asylum in the UK as long as they meet the requirements to do so, as set out in the Immigration Rules and published policy.
A claim for asylum from an adult who is not a British Citizen will be accepted where they make a particularised protection claim in person at a designated location. If they have previously applied for asylum, they would be required to submit new evidence under the further submissions process. A particularise protection claim refers to them providing a basic reason why they fear persecution or serious harm.
In the case of children claiming asylum, there is no requirement to particularise a protection claim when they register their claim.
A self-declared refugee or someone who has been recognised as a refugee by another country or the UNHCR would not be excluded from claiming asylum. If refugee status has been provided by another country or the UNHCR, that will be taken into consideration when the claim is decided.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what safe and legal routes are available for individuals to claim asylum in the UK for people who are not from (a) Ukraine, (b) Afghanistan and (c) Hong Kong.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The UK has a proud record of providing protection for people who need it and the UK will continue to welcome refugees from across the world through existing safe and legal resettlement routes. These include the existing global UK Resettlement Scheme (UKRS), Community Sponsorship and the Mandate Resettlement Scheme.
Asked by: Stephen Hammond (Conservative - Wimbledon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average processing time was for asylum applications made by people from Hong Kong from the initial claim to the outcome in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
This data for average processing times is not held in a reportable format, not routinely published, and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost as it requires a manual search through individual records.
The Home Office does publish data on the number of asylum applications awaiting an initial decision by duration, for main applicants only. This data can be found at Asy_04 of the published Immigration Statistics:
List of tables - GOV.UK
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1118222/asylum-summary-sep-2022-tables.ods
Further detailed asylum and resettlement data sets, filtered by nationality can be found:
List of tables - GOV.UK
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/asylum-and-resettlement-datasets
Asked by: Lord Leong (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assistance they are providing to those who have fled Hong Kong and are claiming asylum status in the UK; and of those applicants, how many are women.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The UK has a proud record of providing protection for people who need it.
Asked by: Marquess of Lothian (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government, other than for asylum seekers from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, what are the safe and legal routes into the UK for those seeking asylum.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
The UK has a proud record of providing protection for people fleeing war and persecution. Whilst we sympathise with people in many difficult situations around the world, we are not bound to consider asylum claims from the very large numbers of people overseas who might like to come here. Those who need international protection should claim asylum in the first safe country they reach as that is the fastest route to safety.
In addition to dedicated resettlement schemes for Syria, Afghanistan, Hong Kong and Ukraine, the UK welcomes refugees and people in need of protection through the UK Resettlement Scheme (UKRS), Community Sponsorship, Family Reunion, and Mandate Resettlement Schemes. These are global routes which have allowed thousands of people fleeing war and persecution to rebuild their lives in the UK.