Our Immigration System is not fit for purpose!

There was a time when a letter in support of an Asylum claim from an MP or Peer would be pretty certain of a reply from the Home Office. People have received permission to stay in the United Kingdom following such letters. Deportation decisions have been reversed. It is not too much to claim that lives might have been saved.

That is not the case today. I myself am still waiting for six or seven responses.

Tens of thousands of Home Office decisions on an individual's status have been declared unsound. - the initial decision found to be wrong and reversed on appeal. In 2005, 13,221 decisions were declared unsound. In 2010 , 35,563 decisions and in 2015, 17,581.

When I get the numbers for the intervening years it could be that there have been a quarter of a million wrong decisions by the Home Office in the last ten years!! A QUARTER OF A MILLION!! If these folk hadn't gone to appeal they could have been wrongly deported!

Imagine trying to plan the next move. No helpful legal advice. Penniless. The heartache. And all because of a decision that was overturned on appeal. Something is seriously wrong.

I had not been long in the House of Lords when it was decided in 2006 that every first-time applicant for a UK Passport was to have a face-to-face interview. 69 interview centres were set up at a cost of £93 million and about 600 staff. The government stated, "Interviews will be carried out in 69 local interview offices across the UK…over 95% of the population will live within one hour's travelling time of their nearest office. "

But in a Parliamentary answer last week I was told that 57 of these centres had been closed. Only 12 remained!

These were;

• Belfast Law Society House Belfast BT1 3GN
• Birmingham Kensington House 6F, Suffolk Street, Queensway Birmingham B1 1LN
• Durham Freemans Reach Durham DH97 1PA
• Glasgow Northgate Glasgow G4 0DX
• Leeds Part GF, 33 Park Place Leeds LS1 2RY
• Liverpool Passport Office, 101 Old Hall Street Liverpool L3 9BD
• London Globe House London SW1V1PN
• Newport Nexus House, Usk Way Newport NP202DW
• Peterborough Aragon Court Peterborough PE1 1QG
• Plymouth Mayflower House Plymouth PL1 1LD
• Portsmouth Building 1000 GF, Lakeside North Harbour, Western Road Portsmouth PO6 3EZ
• Salford Quay Dallas Court Salford Quays M50 2GF

It's a long, long way from Shetland to Glasgow ! from Holyhead to Newport! Little wonder that any confidence we might have had in our Immigration system has vanished.

* Lord Roberts of Llandudno is a Liberal Democrat Member of the House of Lords