§ Miss WiddecombeTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department which recommendations of the vantagepoint report on asylum procedures(a) have been implemented and (b) are yet to be implemented; which will not be implemented; and if he will make a statement. [151748]
70W
§ Mrs. RocheI refer the right hon. Member to the answer I gave her on 26 October 2000,Official Report, column 209W, which in turn referred to the answer my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley (Laura Moffat) on 29 February 2000, Official Report, 255W.
The background to the radical overhaul of the asylum decision-making process undertaken by this Government was set out by my right hon. Friend. It was explained that the asylum process project/vantagepoint report was part of the overhaul, but it was never intended that it be viewed in isolation. Indeed, many changes had already been introduced before the report was completed, as part of our strategy to streamline asylum processing as a whole. Thus many improvements had already been made.
Improvement continues. The Immigration and Nationality Directorate made over 100,000 initial decisions in 2000. The backlog has fallen for 12 consecutive months and we expect this to continue. We remain on course to make further substantial reductions by April 2001.