HC Deb 17 December 2003 vol 415 c935W
Lynne Jones

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether Palestinian people were specifically excluded from his Department's recent one-off exercise to grant indefinite leave to remain to up to 15,000 families who sought asylum, and had children in the United Kingdom, before 2 October 2000; and whether a decision on all Palestinian asylum cases is due to be made. [140512]

Beverley Hughes

There are no nationalities excluded from the recently announced one-off exercise for families.

Decisions on Palestinian cases were put on hold pending a Court of Appeal judgment received in August 2002. Most of those cases have now been decided and all but a handful should be decided by the end of January 2004.

Lynne Jones

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what additional budgetary resources have been redirected and allocated to cover operating costs relating to section 55 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 since 8 January. [141791]

Beverley Hughes

The Immigration and Nationality Directorate's (IND) resources cover a wide range of activities including the cost of administering work related to section 55 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002. This cost is not separately identifiable within the total IND budget.