Recommendation 6

We are concerned that the Home Office’s work to resolve the asylum backlog may increase costs elsewhere, such as for Local Authorities or the Ministry of Justice. The Home Office has a track record of poor engagement with local authorities, and some of the written evidence submitted to us illustrates the missed opportunities to better understand the impact of its work on local areas. Furthermore, as we have previously stressed, the Home Office’s efforts to reduce its reliance on hotels could continue to have unintended consequences, such as increasing homelessness and placing unacceptable financial pressure on local councils by driving up rental prices. We are pleased to hear the Home Office has increased the number of liaison officers and is introducing a joint working group with local authorities to improve engagement. The Home Office told us it also plans to work with the Ministry of Justice to fund additional capacity within the courts and tribunal system to manage the growing number of asylum appeals. It also asserts that the newly introduced Border Security Command will, in time, help reduce the number of people illegally 7 arriving in the UK to claim asylum. While these steps are positive, the Home Office will need to act quickly to achieve the planned savings in the cost of supporting asylum seekers. It remains to be seen whether the Home Office will be able to do this without pushing costs to other areas of the asylum system. recommendation The Home Office should, alongside its Treasury Minute response, write to the Committee setting out how it intends to reduce spending on asylum support, including: by when it will have processed the current backlog of asylum claims; how it will work with HMCTS to ensure Immigration Tribunals have enough capacity to hear appeals in a timely way; by when it expects to stop using hotels to accommodate asylum seekers; how it will ensure asylum seekers are fairly dispersed and integrated in Local Authorities; and by when it ex