Asylum Seekers: Delays in Processing Applications Rise

Delays in processing UK asylum applications increased significantly last year, official figures suggest. Four out of five applicants in the last three months of 2019 waited six months or more for their cases to be processed, compared with three in four during the same period in 2018. In 2014, only one in five asylum applicants was waiting that long. The Home Office said it dealt with "a high number of complex cases" and wanted to end "unnecessary delay". Asylum seekers cannot work while their claims are being processed, so the government offers them a daily allowance of just over £5 and accommodation, often in hostels or shared flats.

Asylum applications made between March and December 2014 - the earliest information available - had a more than 80% chance of being decided within six months. By the end of 2019, this had dropped to 20%. By the end of June this year, out of the almost 43,000 applicants awaiting decisions, almost 17,000 had been waiting for at least a year.

Once an applicant has waited for a year they can apply for the right to work, but the jobs they can apply for are restricted to those on the government's occupation shortage list. The Home Office website says straightforward decisions are usually made within six months. But this standard was dropped as a target last year amid the growing backlog of complex cases.

Read more: Daniel Kraemer, BBC News, https://is.gd/lFfvpR

Destitute Migrants Unlawfully Forced Into Homelessness

Destitute migrants have been unlawfully forced into homelessness or held for prolonged periods in detention because the Home Office is using a “systematically unfair” policy to determine their eligibility for accommodation, the High Court has ruled. One South African man spent nine months living in a tent as a result of being denied accommodation by the government when leaving immigration detention, during which he was unable to wash and eat regularly, and lacked electricity and running water. A schizophrenic Polish woman, who gave a history of rape while previously homeless, was unlawfully held in detention for a prolonged period because she wasn’t granted bail accommodation. The two individuals, both of whom were detained after being convicted of offences in the UK, brought a challenge to the lawfulness of the Home Office’s policy for providing housing to non-asylum-seeking migrants who cannot be deported – whether because of a lack of travel documents or ongoing immigration appeals – but have no other means of support. The Home Office had admitted that decisions made in both cases were unlawful, accepting “flagrant” errors in the first case, but argued that these were “aberrant errors” by individual caseworkers, and that its policy remained ”fair and lawful”.

Read more: May Bulman, Indpendent, https://is.gd/GH5wJj

The applicants, R.R. and R.D., are Slovak nationals. The case concerned their complaint of police ill-treatment, lack of a proper investigation, and discrimination on the grounds of their Roma origin. On 19 June 2013 a police operation was carried out at Budulovská St in the town of Moldava nad Bodvou, which is in eastern Slovakia, with the declared purpose of searching for wanted persons and objects originating from criminal activities. The operation on the street, which is home to a Roma community, involved 63 officers, of which 15 were from the rapid-reaction force, and 23 vehicles. The first applicant, R.R., submitted that he had been handcuffed, dragged outside his house and beaten with truncheons. He had also been kicked by police officers and struck with an electroshock weapon. A police report on his detention stated that he was suspected of having committed a minor offence by disorderly conduct, that he had resisted being taken to the police station in connection with it and that officers had used lawful force, such as holds, grabs, blows, kicks and handcuffs.

A forensic report of August 2014 found, among other things, that he had suffered a fractured rib and had probably been hit by a baton on the back. The second applicant, R.D., submitted that police officers had beaten him and struck him with an electroshock weapon. He had also received blows from a baton on his right shoulder, back and the left side of his legs. A police decision on his detention stated that he had resisted arrest aimed at taking him to the police station in order to be investigated over a suspicion that he had also behaved disorderly in the course of the operation and that force had been used on him according to the law, consisting of holds, grabs, blows, kicks and handcuffing. A forensic medical report of August 2014 found in particular that injuries on him had been caused by a blunt, flat and oblong object, probably a baton. The injuries had been minor, and had not necessitated any sick leave and any treatment longer than seven days.
The applicants complained of a violation of their rights under in particular Article 3 of the European Convention as they had been mistreated by the police and the respondent State had failed to protect them from that mistreatment by conducting an effective investigation into it and into possible racist motives behind it. Under the same provision, in conjunction with Article 14, they also complained that their Roma ethnicity and what they considered to be institutional racism in Slovakia had been the decisive factors in their alleged ill-treatment and in the alleged failure to conduct a proper investigation into that ill treatment.

Violation of Article 3 (inhuman treatment)
Violation of Article 3 (investigation)
Violation of Article 14 in conjunction with Article 3 – on account of the lack of investigation into the alleged discrimination in the planning of the operation of 19 June 2013, in so far as it concerned the applicants
Just satisfaction: 20,000 euros (EUR) to each of the applicants in respect of non-pecuniary damage, and EUR 6,500 to the applicants jointly in respect of costs and expenses
Source: European Court of Human Rights https://is.gd/q8XzIg

1. Number of males removed - 268
2. Number of females removed - 17
3. Number of escorts - 374
4. Number of flights in total - 7
5. Number flights to each country / number removed to each country
No children were removed

Poland - Number of flights 1 Number removed 33
Albania - Number of flights 2 Number removed 97
Romania - Number of flights 3 Number removed 151
Lithuania- Number of flights 1 Number removed 4

Total cost of Home Office charter flights for April/May/June 2020 was £1,105,931.02

Incidents of Self-Harm Requiring Medical Treatment Q2/2020

Hunger Strikes in Immigratin Detention Q2 2020

Latest Immigration Statistics Q2 2020 April/May/June

Deportations
In the year ending June 2020, enforced returns from the UK decreased to 5,304, 34% lower than the previous year and the lowest number since records began in 2004. The fall was largely accounted for by the fall in enforced returns of people who were in detention prior to their return (down 35% to 3,497). Although the number of enforced returns has been declining since 2012, the fall in the latest year was larger due to very few returns in the latest quarter, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Over the same period, there were 8,088 voluntary returns. Although these data are not directly comparable over time (as voluntary returns are subject to upward revision, as in many cases it can take time to identify people who have left the UK without informing the Home Office), the numbers recorded have shown a downward trend since 2015.

Immigration Detention
As at 30 June 2020, there were 698 people in immigration detention, down from 895 at the end of March 2020, and 60% less than at 30 June 2019 (1,727). The recent fall in the number in detention has been due to less people being detained in IRCs following the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the year ending June 2020, 20,097 people left the detention estate (down 18%). Two-fifths (40%) had been detained for 7 days or less, and three-quarters (74%) detained for 28 days or less. There has been an increase in the proportion of people leaving detention within 28 days since mid-2018, when around two-thirds left detention within 28 day The number of people entering detention in the year ending June 2020 was 19,128, 21% less than the previous year. Although in part affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, this continues a general downward trend since 2015 when the number entering detention peaked at over 32,000.

Grants of Asylum or Protection
The UK offered protection – in the form of asylum, humanitarian protection, alternative forms of leave and resettlement – to 16,952 people in the year ending June 2020, 8% lower than the previous year, although higher than levels seen prior to 2019. The Vulnerable Person Resettlement Scheme (VPRS) accounted for over three-quarters (2,956) of those resettled in the UK in year ending June 2020. Since the government announced the expansion of the scheme on 7th September 2015, including the target of resettling an additional 20,000 refugees under the scheme by 2020, 19,768 refugees have been resettled in the UK. In addition, 239 refugees were resettled prior to this, and do not count towards the 20,000 target.

There were 32,423 asylum applications (main applicants only) in the UK in the year ending June 2020, similar to the previous year, and lower than the recent peak in year ending June 2016 (36,546), although that figure will have been impacted by the measures taken in response to COVID-19 in the latest quarter. In year ending June 2020, 53% of applications, at initial decision, resulted in grants of asylum, humanitarian protection or alternative forms of leave (such as discretionary leave or UASC leave), up from 44% in the previous year.

How Many People Came to the UK
There were an estimated 103.2 million passenger arrivals in the year ending June 2020 (including returning UK residents), a 29% (42.1 million) decrease compared with the previous year. This was driven by significantly fewer passenger journeys in the second quarter of 2020, when there was a 97% (27.7m) decrease compared to the same quarter in the previous year, due to the travel restrictions imposed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. There were 2.1 million visas granted in the year ending June 2020, a 29% decrease compared with the previous year. Of these, around three-quarters (72%) were to visit, 12% were to study (excluding short-term study), 7% were to work, 2% were for family, and 7% for other reasons.

Family
There were 154,257 visas and permits granted for family reasons in the year ending June 2020, 9% fewer than the year ending June 2019, with sharp falls seen in the second quarter of 2020 (90% lower than in the same period in 2019) due to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. There were falls in family-related visas granted (down 8% to 45,350) and dependants of people coming to the UK on other types of visas (down 10% to 66,663). There were also 29,527 EEA Family permits granted, and 12,717 EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS) family permits granted since the scheme was launched on 30 March 2019.

Citizenship
There were 148,780 applications for British citizenship in the year to June 2020, 15% fewer than the previous year. Applications for citizenship by EU nationals fell by 24% compared to the previous year to 40,627. Applications made by non-EU nationals fell by 11% in the year ending June 2020 to 108,153. There were 141,896 grants of British citizenship in the year ending June 2020, 8% fewer than the previous year. This fall was due in part to the COVID-19 pandemic response and comes after a period of relative stability since 2014.

Settlement
There were 86,255 decisions on applications for settlement in the UK from non-EEA nationals in the year ending June 2020, a 3% decrease on the year ending June 2019. Of these, 83,641 (97%) resulted in a grant.

EEA Nationals and Their Family Members
In the year ending June 2020, there were a total of 68,414 decisions in applications for EEA residence documents, down 72% compared to the previous 12 months. This included 29,688 registration certificates and registration cards issued, down 69% on the previous year, and 18,743 documents certifying permanent residence and permanent residence cards issued, 79% fewer than the previous year.

EEA residence documents – including registration certificates, registration cards, documents certifying permanent residence and permanent residence cards – will not be valid after 31 December 2020. Since 30 March 2019, EU and EEA nationals resident in the UK, along with their non-EEA family members, can apply to the EU Settlement Scheme to continue living in the UK.

Extension of Temporary Stay in the UK
Excluding extensions granted to individuals who were unable to leave the UK because of travel restrictions or self-isolation related to COVID-19, there were 259,560 decisions on applications to extend a person’s stay in the UK (including dependants) in the year ending June 2020, 9% fewer than the year ending June 2019.

Work
There were 144,938 work-related visas granted (including dependants) in the year ending June 2020, 22% lower than the previous year. The fall was particularly driven by Skilled (Tier 2) work visas, which account for 60% of work-related visas and decreased by 20% to 87,044. Grants of Tier 2 visas had previously been at the highest level on record, however, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic led to a fall in the year ending June 2020.

Study
In the year ending June 2020, there were 255,776 Sponsored study (Tier 4) visas granted (including dependants), a 1% increase on the year ending June 2019. Grants of Tier 4 visas had previously been at the highest level since 2011, however, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic meant that this was no longer the case in the year ending June 2020. Previous increases were counteracted by a 99% fall in Tier 4 grants in the second quarter of 2020, leading to an overall stable number for the year as a whole. Chinese nationals were the most common nationality granted Tier 4 visas in the year ending June 2020, accounting for a third (34%) of the total. However, grants to Chinese nationals were down 19% compared with the year ending June 2019, due to COVID-19. Indian nationals saw a notable increase in the number of Tier 4 visas granted, more than doubling compared with the year ending June 2019, and continuing an increase seen since 2016.

Source: Home Office, https://is.gd/on3Y5D

Incidents of Detainees at Risk of Self-Harm Q2 2020