MPs concern over failure to deport 'small town' of foreign criminals

Failure to deport the equivalent of a "small town" of foreign criminals could lead the public to question why Britain should remain in the EU, a committee has warned.

MPs said it was "deeply concerning" and that urgent action must be taken after a report revealed that 5,789 offenders from overseas were free in the UK - the highest number since 2012.

The Home Affairs Committee said urgent action must be taken to "significantly" reduce the number of offenders in the UK - both in detention and in the community - said to be over 13,000 or the "size of a small town".

But Home Secretary Theresa May said the government removed a "record number" of foreign national offenders last year.

A report found that the top three countries offenders came from were all within the EU with Poles accounting for nearly one in 10 foreign offenders, a total of 983.

Some 764 were from Ireland and 635 from Romania.

MPs criticised the Home Office for failing to remove convicts despite their home nations being part of the 28-member bloc and warned it undermined the public's faith in EU membership.

"The clear inefficiencies demonstrated by this process will lead the public to question the point of the UK remaining a member of the EU," the report said.

The committee criticised Mrs May for being "unconvincing in suggesting that remaining a member of the EU will make it easier to remove these individuals from the UK".

It also warned it would take a "modern miracle" for David Cameron to meet his pledge to cut migration to under 100,000.

MPs also said it was "deeply concerning" that there had been so little improvement in the immigration backlog, which stood at around 345,400 at the end of last year.

Of the total number of deportations of foreign criminals in 2015-16, some 60% of the offenders were from countries in the European Economic Area.

The UK is signed up to the EU's Prisoner Transfer Agreement which means it can transfer foreign offenders criminals in prison to their home nations to continue serving their sentence there at their own country's expense.

The committee also said there were serious questions over the Home Office's judgment following the "extraordinary" decision it took to deport thousands of people on "questionable or insufficient evidence" of English language testing fraud.

Allegations of widespread fraud in the system lead to heavy-handed treatment of students despite the lack of an independent investigation into the claims, MPs said.

Vote Leave said the foreign offenders were costing £36,000 a year each to jail and that the EU made it "more difficult" to deport overseas criminals.

Backer Dominic Raab, the justice minister, said: "The EU is making us less safe. If we take back control we will be able to deport foreign criminals from our prisons.

"This damning report shows that the EU is making it more difficult to remove dangerous criminals which puts us at risk. It also costs UK taxpayers huge sums of money to keep these people in our prisons rather than sending them home."