Home Office quote appears to use unpublished immigration statistics

In a comment published in the Daily Telegraph today a Home Office spokesperson said: “We have already begun delivering a major surge in immigration enforcement and returns activity to remove people with no right to be in the UK, with 3,000 people already being returned since the new government came into power.”

An anonymous Home Office source is also quoted in the online version of the article as saying: “Under our plans, over 20 per cent more people who have no right to be here are being removed from the country.”

We’ve contacted the Home Office to ask for the source of these figures, but they would appear to be based on as yet unpublished immigration returns data for the third quarter of 2024. The latest published data covers the period up to June 2024, before the current government came into office. 

This comes after we wrote to the Home Office last month about Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s use of unpublished immigration statistics in his Labour party conference speech. We’ve still not had a response to that letter.

As we said then, Office for Statistics Regulation guidance states: “Where unpublished data are referred to unexpectedly, the information should be published as soon as possible after any statement has been made – ideally on the same day.” 

This is important because, without this, neither we nor the public can verify the claims being made about the government’s record.