Sacked inspector's damning reports expose chaotic and dysfunctional Home Office
The chief inspector of borders and immigration, David Neal, was sacked following an interview he gave to a newspaper in which he called out alleged security failings at London City Airport.
Thursday 29 February 2024 19:44, UK
During his time as chief inspector of borders and immigration, David Neal repeatedly raised concerns the department was too slow to publish his reports.
The department was not keeping a commitment to lay them in parliament within eight weeks.
In one such case he complained he submitted a report about border security to the home secretary on 24 February 2022 and it had still not been published nearly five months later. In total, he had submitted 15 unpublished reports.
Politics live: Safety issues exposed in fired Home Office inspector's reports
This all came to the fore last week when the Home Office sacked Mr Neal, a persistent thorn in its side.
He was let go following an interview he gave to the Daily Mail newspaper, in which he called out alleged security failings at London City Airport.
Opposition parties seized on Mr Neal's comments, accusing the government of a lack of transparency and asking what the department had to hide. This afternoon the government published 13 of those reports.
They cover Afghan resettlement schemes, asylum case processing, e-passport gates and hotels for housing unaccompanied asylum seeker children.
The details are damning.
Read more on Sky News:
Gove under investigation by standards watchdog
Rough sleeping soars by 'truly shameful' 27%
'Non-dom' tax breaks for rich people may be scrapped
A chaotic and dysfunctional department
In those reports, Mr Neal describes a chaotic and dysfunctional department that is unable to implement its own policies.
He accused the Home Office of collecting and holding "inexcusably awful" data and described a clear disconnect between policymakers in Whitehall and operational staff in airports, migrant centres and asylum processing centres.
The reports highlight inadequate staffing at e-passport gates and poor safeguarding of unaccompanied minors at hotels.
They criticised the Home Office for not providing any guidance to hotel providers on when a DBS check should be renewed.
The disconnect was damaging morale within the operational workforce.
Be the first to get Breaking News
Install the Sky News app for free
Handling of reports has attracted more attention
In one report, Mr Neal said the department's focus on clearing the legacy backlog at "all costs" meant 60% of decision-makers wanted to leave their role because the pressure to meet targets was affecting their mental health.
It went on to say the relentless focus on bringing down the backlog impacted the quality of interviews and decisions, which had the potential to add to the appeals queue.
No 10 said it wanted to publish the reports "as swiftly as possible following the necessary and appropriate due diligence," undermining suggestions it was deliberately sitting on embarrassing data.
However, its handling of this and the ensuing fallout has undoubtedly attracted more attention than it would have liked.