Asylum disaster deepens as courtroom backlog greater than doubles in a yr to almost 70,000 instances (and guess who’s footing the invoice!)

The taxpayer is facing vast extra costs for supporting failed asylum seekers after the backlog in the immigration courts more than doubled in a year.

New data from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) showed the backlog of asylum cases in the lower tribunal rocketed by 104 per cent to 69,670 by the end of September, up from 34,234 a year earlier.

New appeals submitted to the court soared by 240 per cent from 4,818 in June to September to 16,398 in the same period this year.

Asylum seekers who are waiting for appeals to be concluded remain eligible for taxpayer-funded support, such as free full board in asylum hotels.

The average time taken to hear a case in the First Tier Asylum and Immigration Chamber has jumped to 60 weeks.

After the general election Labour moved to clear a separate backlog of the number of asylum seekers who were awaiting an initial decision from the Home Office.

But as that backlog has been reduced it has simply moved into the immigration courts.

About seven out of 10 asylum seekers whose claims are rejected by the Home Office go on to launch legal challenges in a bid to have the decision reversed.

Migrants sprint through the surf on Gravelines beach, northern France, to board a smugglers’ dinghy to Britain, in August this year

Last month Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood announced plans to scrap the existing asylum appeals system – but the changes will be arduous and take a long time to implement.

Under her proposals the first-tier immigration and asylum tribunal will be replaced with a new body controlled by the Home Office.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has announced plans to reform the asylum appeals system – but changes are still a long way off

Independent ‘adjudicators’ will scrutinise appeals instead of judges.

But legislation to implement the reforms is yet to be published and is likely to face strong opposition, particularly from the House of Lords and the legal establishment.

The shake-up is unlikely to be in place until the end of next year, or later.

Today’s MoJ figures showed the total backlog in the lower immigration tribunal – including asylum cases and other types of appeal – has jumped 92 per cent in a year.

At the end of September last year it stood at 63,016 and at the same point this year it had hit 121,015.

Aside from asylum cases, the number of human rights appeals in the backlog jumped from just under 17,000 to more than 26,000 in the year.

Migrants cross the Channel  towards Britain aboard a ‘mega-dinghy’ – approximately 40ft in length – in September

Appeals brought under European Economic Area ‘free movement’ rules went up from 11,500 to just under 25,000 over the same period.

The total number of cases completed by the tribunal increased by 50 per cent period-on-period to just under 15,000.

A Home Office spokesman said: ‘We are spearheading a major reform to the immigration system, both removing the incentives that draw illegal migrants to Britain in the first place and making it easier to deport illegal migrants.

‘As part of this, we are reforming human rights laws and replacing the broken appeals system, bringing an end to unacceptable delays and repeat applications, with extra funding to maximise the number of appeals that can be heard in tribunals.

‘These initiatives will more than halve appeal times, enabling swifter movement out of asylum hotels and removal of those with no right to be in the UK.’