Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has admitted that the Home Office remains not yet fit for purpose, even as new figures show arrests for illegal working have reached record levels across the UK.
According to the latest Home Office data, immigration enforcement visits rose to 21,858 in the 12 months to September the highest since comparable records began in 2011.
That figure represents a 38% increase from the previous year, while arrests for illegal working climbed 63%, reaching 8,232 over the same period.
Officials say the surge follows a renewed crackdown on illegal employment, with £5 million allocated to support enforcement at sites such as takeaways, beauty salons and car washes.
However, Mahmood acknowledged that the department still faces deep structural problems.
“I’ve already said the Home Office is not yet fit for purpose. It’s a department with a range of problems from contract procurement to staff retention and has long struggled to rise to the scale of the crises it faces,”she narrated to BBC
Her comments echo those made nearly two decades ago by former Labour home secretary John Reid, who famously described the department as not fit for purpose in 2006.
Mahmood’s admission comes amid continued political scrutiny of the government’s handling of immigration and border security.
Despite the record enforcement figures, critics argue that systemic inefficiencies within the Home Office risk undermining progress on illegal migration and broader immigration reform
