§ Mrs. RocheTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) what is the average period of detention of those asylum seekers who are detained;
(2) what is the longest time for which an asylum seeker has been detained;
(3) pursuant to his answer of 12 December, Official Report, columns 483–84, for how long each of (a) the 103 asylum seekers who have been detained for more than six months and (b) the asylum seekers who have been detained for longer than 12 months have been in detention.
§ Mr. Nicholas BakerInformation on the length of detention of those people who had sought asylum and have been in detention longer than 12 months at 15 December 1994 is given in the table. Similar information for those detained longer than six months could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
The longest currently detained person who had sought asylum has been held in detention since 14 August 1990. The individual concerned has been detained for this exceptional length of time because he represents a substantial threat to national security.
Information on the average period of detention for persons currently detained, who had sought asylum is not available.
Persons detained longer than 12 months as at 15 December 1994, who had sought asylum, by the date on which each person entered detention Port cases Deportation cases Illegal entrant cases 10 September 1993 17 March 1993 27 May 1993 11 November 1993 8 June 1993 3 June 1993 2 December 1993 12 October 1993 15 September 1993 2 December 1993 13 November 1993 9 October 1993 4 December 1993 6 November 1993 15 December 1993 23 November 1993 25 November 1993