Commons debate: Illegal Migrants: Unknown Whereabouts

The hon. Member is giving a very powerful introduction to his speech. He and I share profound concerns about the scale of illegal migration to the UK, and the ability of those migrants to arrive here and then disappear. For me, the most disturbing aspect of the case that he has mentioned, which was reported yesterday, is the fact that we are being gaslit by the media. Those two Afghani boat arrivals were described as being from Leamington—they are not from Leamington. Does the hon. Member agree that women and girls are less safe in this United Kingdom now, today, than they were five years ago, for this reason?

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way—I did give him notice that I was going to intervene. It is inconceivable, is it not, that Home Office Ministers would not know the answer to that question? When I was a Home Office Minister, I would ask my officials for exactly that kind of information. It is not just that the hon. Gentleman did not know; it seems that Ministers did not either. I cannot believe that. It is inconceivable.

I commend the hon. Gentleman for securing the debate. He has illustrated with the story that he has related, and by citing the evidential base, how bad things are. Data from the Home Office—I checked this before the debate—shows that, as of October 2025, 53,298 migrants had breached their immigration bail or absconded from detention, which means that their whereabouts were unknown. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that this only adds to the stress in our communities, including that caused to the health and housing systems, and that more must be done to find those who have illegally breached immigration bail and deport them to their countries of origin?

Given that 53,000 illegal immigrants have absconded with no address, and 736 who have committed crimes have absconded, does the hon. Member agree that this Government have lost control of their borders and their immigration policies, and they have lost all credibility when it comes to immigration issues?

Will my hon. Friend write to the Procedure Committee with his file on this case? The Procedure Committee is at the moment inquiring into the quality of answers to written questions, and is very concerned about the lack of quality. I am also concerned about receiving answers, in my case from the Treasury recently, that suggest there was an attempt to deliberately mislead, which has been exposed only as a result of supplementary answers.