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Home Office

Answer

Mr. Lidington: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many failed asylum seekers departed voluntarily in each month since January 1997. [92780] Mr. Mike O'Brien: The available information is given in the table. The data do not include voluntary departures of in-country asylum applicants against whom enforcement action had not been initiated; the number of such departures cannot be quantified directly from Immigration and Nationality Directorate databases. Some persons may leave voluntarily without the knowledge of the Immigration and Nationality Directorate and, by definition, we have no record of the number of such departures. Voluntary departures {1} of asylum applicants, excluding dependants, 1 January 1997 to 31 December 1998 {2} _________________________________________________________________________________________________. Number of persons 1997 1998 January 170 150 February 150 140 March 180 140 April 160 140 May 150 120 June 150 120 July 140 {2}120 August 130 {2}150 September 130 {2}130 October 180 {2}190 November 150 {2}200 December 120 {2}200 _________________________________________________________________________________________________. {1} For port applicants the data cover voluntary departures up to and including notification of the decision on the asylum application but exclude any subsequent departure. For in-country applicants the data cover `voluntary' departures following enforcement action but exclude voluntary departures where enforcement action has not been initiated. Some persons may leave voluntarily without the knowledge of the Immigration and Nationality Directorate. {2} Data for July to December 1998 are provisional estimates.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

92780; 335 c741W;335 c743-4W

Session

1998-99

Subjects

Asylum Deportation Enforcement Refugees

Contains statistics

Yes