Written question asked by Mark Pritchard (Conservative) on Monday, 16 April 2012, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 18 April 2012. It was answered by Nick Hurd (Conservative) on Thursday, 19 April 2012 on behalf of the Cabinet Office.

Entry Clearances: Iran

Question: To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office how many Iranian nationals are residing in the UK on a visa.

Answer: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the authority to reply.Letter from Stephen Penneck, dated April 2012:"As Director General for the Office for National Statistics (ONS), I have been asked to respond to your Parliamentary Question asking how many Iranian nationals are residing in the UK on a visa (103805).""The most recent estimate of the number of Iranian nationals who reside in the UK is 41,000 with a corresponding margin of error of +/- 9,000. This estimate, along with other published Population by Country of Birth and Nationality estimates, is based on the Annual Population Survey and relates to the 12 month period of July 2010 to June 2011. These can be found on the ONS website, table 2.3 at:""http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/migration1/migration-statistics-quarterly-report/february-2012/population-by-country-of-birth-and-nationality.xls""The margin of error refers to the 95 per cent confidence interval and is a measure of the uncertainty associated with making inferences from a sample.""Information on the immigration status of these Iranian nationals is not available."

Secondary information