As the UK enters a general election year, a dispute over immigration has erupted, underscoring its significance for voters in pivotal parliamentary constituencies that will shape the country’s next government.
The contention, marked by accusations of a “barefaced lie” against Rishi Sunak by the Labour Party, reflects the trajectory of future debates, centering on government promises and the interpretation of Home Office statistics.
Sunak claimed on Tuesday to have successfully “cleared” the legacy backlog comprising nearly 93,000 applications dating back 18 months. He asserted, “I said that this government would clear the backlog of asylum decisions by the end of 2023. That’s exactly what we’ve done,” in a post on the social media platform X.
Stephen Kinnock, the shadow immigration minister, countered Sunak’s statement, calling it a “barefaced lie” and an insult to public intelligence.
The origins of this dispute trace back to a commitment made by the prime minister in December 2022, where he stated, “We expect to abolish the backlog of initial asylum decisions by the end of next year.” However, the target was subsequently downgraded to clearing the backlog of 92,601 initial claims made before June 2022, following the implementation of the Nationality and Borders Act.
Since then, the government has invested resources in doubling the number of asylum caseworkers and agency staff, offering bonuses and overtime to expedite the clearance of the backlog.
On January 1, 2024, the Home Office claimed to have achieved Sunak’s target. However, on January 2, it released statistics indicating that 4,537 cases were still “awaiting an initial decision” under the “legacy backlog” category.
James Cleverly, the home secretary, defended the claim that the backlog had been cleared, citing the Home Office’s definition of an initial decision as either granting or refusing asylum or another form of protection.
Several unanswered questions surround the asylum backlog statistics, including the status of 35,119 “non-substantive decisions” within the legacy backlog and concerns raised by figures like Nigel Farage about cases rushed through for 51,469 people granted asylum in 2023.
The debate on asylum backlogs is crucial due to public concerns about the costs of housing asylum seekers in hotels, estimated at £8 million per day by the government. While the Home Office argues it has addressed a problem neglected by Boris Johnson, attention is turning to the “flow backlog” of cases since June 2022, which currently stands at 94,062 applications awaiting an initial decision, surpassing the legacy backlog when the prime minister made his pledge.
