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Asylum Aid has welcomed a landmark Upper Tribunal judgment finding that the Home Office acted unlawfully by operating a secret practice for around nine years of granting recognised victims of trafficking only 12 months' Temporary Permission to Stay (Victim of Trafficking) ("VTS leave") in recovery cases where applicants could not provide evidence showing how long their medical treatment would last. The case, brought by Asylum Aid, forced the Home Office to disclose for the first time that the practice existed and had been in operation for such a long time, was communicated only through verbal instructions and was never set out in written guidance.

The Public Accounts Committee’s report lays bare what organisations like Asylum Aid have long known through our daily work with people seeking protection: the UK’s asylum system is not only inefficient and costly, it is fundamentally failing the very people it is meant to protect. The findings confirm a system characterised by poor decision-making, chronic delays, and a lack of coherent strategy for reform.

We are deeply alarmed by the UK government’s proposed reforms to asylum support, set  out in its consultation on implementing provisions of the Immigration Act 2016.