Home Office has lost track of thousands of asylum seekers

Since 2019 there have been 45,272 asylum applications "implicitly withdrawn"

45,272 asylum applications have been “implicitly withdrawn” since 2019, new analysis of Home Office figures by the Centre for Migration Control shows.

The Home Office previously admitted it had been unable to reestablish contact with a third of these cases. This could mean that 15,000 asylum seekers - most of whom will have arrived on small boats - have been lost to government officials over that period. This reveals the folly of accommodating unvetted individuals in hotels and unsecure accommodation around the country.

The Home Office must urgently account for the precise whereabouts of each of the 45,272 individuals who have had their asylum applications “implicitly withdrawn”.

This research comes just a week after the Casey review identified the involvement of asylum seekers and foreign nationals in the grooming gangs, and a month after Iranian spies were found to have crossed the channel in small boats and claimed asylum.

This is further proof that asylum seekers should be kept in secure accommodation whilst their applications are being processed - to ensure that the number of “implicit withdrawals” falls to zero. Further, any individual who has crossed the channel should be immediately detained with no prospect of claiming asylum.

About implicit withdrawals

Home Office guidance says that asylum applications will be implicitly withdrawn if the individual fails to keep regular contact with government officials.

In 2023, the Home Office reported that a third of individuals whose cases have been implicitly withdrawn that year remained in the country with government officials unable to make contact with them. The remainder are either believed to have left the country or have reengaged with the Home Office.

The Asylum Support and Appeals Project says that “more typically, we have found that implicit withdrawals occur when a person claims asylum and then shortly after they leave HO accommodation and go ‘underground’.”

Research by the IPPR sets out that many “withdrawals have lost contact altogether” with the Home Office and “may be working in the informal labour market”

Between 2019 and the Q1 2025, there have been 45,272 “implicit withdrawals” of asylum applications:

2019 - 1,809

2020 - 1,587

2021 - 1,447

2022 - 3,110

2023 - 20,111

2024 - 14,108

Q1 2025 - 3,100

If we assume that the Home Office figures that indicate a third of implicit withdrawals completely disappear, then we presently have 15,000 unvetted individuals running around the country without the Home Office knowing anything about their whereabouts or intentions.

The nationality/regional breakdown is below:

National Breakdown

Regional Breakdown

Age and gender breakdown

This is a huge embarrassment for the Home Office. They have lost touch with potentially tens of thousands of unvetted males, who are now likely operating in the criminal underworld and posing a threat to public wellbeing.

Every individual crossing the English channel should be detained in rudimental accommodation - they should not be placed in unsupervised hotels where they are free to do as they please. We now know that asylum seekers are both a threat to British children, participating in the grooming gangs, and to national security with it being reported that several Iranian asylum seekers were working to undermine national security.

It comes a week after the Centre for Migration Control, having obtained data from the Ministry of Justice, revealed that foreign nationals accounted for up to a third of sexual assault convictions in 2024.