The Home Office is unable to confirm how many convicted foreign nationals were issued a deportation order against in 2023.
Responding to a freedom of information request, the Home Office said it was unable to confirm figures due to a disruption to data systems.
It added that the cost of acquiring the information would go above the £600 limit set on requests amid an extensive overhaul of its information management systems.
The latest data on deportation orders issued is only available up to September 2022.
The Home Office said it was unable to confirm figures due to a disruption to data systems
PA
Any information on 2023 is still missing.
The Home Office said it did not “recognise the claims,” and pointed to the number of foreign national offenders who have been removed from Britain since 2019.
The latest revelations on missing data comes as a report from the border inspector last year found that there is “no reliable ‘single version of the truth’ for data recorded by FNORC (Foreign National Offender Returns Command)” for reporting.
The report quoted a staff member who told inspectors: “I wouldn’t be comfortable sending data out in the public domain, but thankfully that’s not my job.”
Robert Bates, Research Director at the Centre for Migration Control, said: “Over the last five years the Home Office has abjectly failed the country.
"Our borders have never looked like more of a shambles and this is, in large part, thanks to the work of civil servants on Marsham Street.”
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:
Any information on 2023 is still missing
PA
Mr Bates added: “However, even the harshest critic of the Home Office would have struggled to believe that it was capable of this level of incompetence.
"Data on the number of foreign nationals issued with deportation orders is a rudimental part of national security, yet well-paid bureaucrats have somehow managed to misplace the information.
“It is impossible to have an honest debate about mass migration without these figures. I would urge the Home Secretary to launch an immediate review into how this disruption could have been allowed to happen.
“The figures on foreign national deportations must be published, in full, as a matter of urgency. The British public deserve to know the risks that they have been exposed to as a result of mass migration.”
The fresh revelations come as the government is considering an amendment to the criminal justice bill that would require details of nationality, immigration and visa status to be recorded whenever there is a conviction.
The amendment, being raised by former immigration minister Robert Jenrick, comes as net migration reached a record 745,000 in 2022.
Net migration reached a record 745,000 in 2022
PA
Former minister Neil O’Brien said: “We need far more transparency about everything to do with immigration. I hope that the government will accept the amendments to the criminal justice bill which will require greater transparency on exactly this.
The Tory MP added: “The courts have made it harder and harder to deport anybody, leading to a collapse in the number of people being deported. They have taken texts agreed in the 1950s and transformed them beyond all recognition through judicial activism.
“People are now being allowed to stay in the UK, even if they are dangerous, for absurd and flimsy reasons.
“We must overhaul the system to bring it back in line with what the overwhelming majority of people in the UK think is fair.”
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We do not recognise these claims, and no data has been misplaced. Our focus is on keeping the public safe, and we have already made great progress by removing 17,700 foreign national offenders since January 2019.
“Our staff work tirelessly to deliver the Home Office’s priorities to stop the boats, cut migration, keep the country safe and tackle violence against women and girls.
"We are transparent on progress across all areas by regularly publishing statistics on gov.uk.”
