28 May 2004
Government auditors have endorsed the overall reliability of asylum statistics but warn that some aspects of them are 'misleading' because of the way they are presented.
The National Audit Office's review of the veracity of Home Office figures published on May 25 concludes that they are 'in most respects reliable'. But it identifies several areas where the figures are incomplete or unclear.
Up to 16,000 cases of individuals and families, as well as 7,000 unaccompanied children, for example, are missing from the statistics because their support comes from outside the National Asylum Support Service.
'If people supported under arrangements involving [the Department for Work and Pensions] and local authorities were included in the statistics, there would be a significant increase,' the report says.
The presentation of statistics is also criticised for not allowing users to track applicants through the asylum process. Overall, however, Home Office statisticians were found to have complied with Office for National Statistics guidelines and standards.
The government's assertion that it met its target to halve the number of asylum applications between October 2002 and September 2003 is judged to be reliable and a consequence of tighter government controls and the closure of the Sangatte reception centre in France.
The NAO's review, announced by Prime Minister Tony Blair in April, was prompted by the visa row that led to the resignation of former immigration minister Beverley Hughes.
'The 61% fall in applications since October 2002 is genuine,' Blair said this week. 'Asylum applications have not been pushed into other managed migration categories, as has sometimes been intimated.' The government would act on the NAO's recommendations, he added.
Public Accounts Committee chair Edward Leigh called for better means of identifying migrants, both legal and illegal.
'Producing such estimates is not easy but other countries have made more progress. The Home Office has dragged its feet in working out how this could be done,' he said.
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