The previous government's Rwanda policy failed despite spending £700 million over two years. Channel crossings increased from 83,500 when the scheme was announced. Since July, hotel use has seen a net increase of seven hotels due to closures and new openings.

Agrees that they inherited a broken system, restarted processing to eliminate backlogs, and are working towards more cost-effective solutions. Criticises Conservatives for creating issues now being addressed by Labour.

That was quite a rant. It made certain assumptions that are completely untrue, including that the Rwanda scheme would have worked. We already know that it cost £700 million to send four volunteers to Rwanda. The Conservative party was planning to spend £175,000 per person sent to Rwanda, and it had not managed to send anyone to Rwanda. Had the Conservatives put aside the money, going into billions of pounds, to pay this £175,000 per person sent to Rwanda? No, they had not. No money was set aside. What we inherited was a system where no processing was going on—well, fewer than 1,000 asylum cases a month were being processed. We are now processing up to 10,000 asylum cases a month. The right hon. Gentleman knows, because he was a Home Office Minister, that there are backlogs and lags between the first decision in processing and all the potential appeals. We cannot exit people from the asylum estate until they have a final decision. We inherited backlogs of more than two years in the tribunal system because the Conservatives did not fund it properly. In the last period, we have returned nearly 10,000 people, which is nearly a 20% increase on the numbers returned last year. We are working on making the asylum system fit for purpose. We inherited an unholy mess from the Conservatives.

We are prioritising getting the system up and running again so that we can have throughput in our asylum accommodation estate. The fact that the system had ground to a complete halt when we came into government, with 90,000 unprocessed cases, has meant that there have been delays in getting it up and running. I explained to the House that we have gone from making 1,000 asylum decisions a month to 10,000. The system is beginning to get flow-through, and as that happens, we will exit from hotels. We have had to have a small increase. We have been in power four months. The manifesto did not say that we would end the use of hotels in four months. When the Conservatives were in power, more than 400 hotels were in use at its height, and they did not give any MP two weeks’ notice that those hotels were opening.

I do not agree that allowing asylum seekers to work while their claim is being considered will not be a pull factor. The way to deal with this issue is to have a fast, fair and efficient asylum system. We are looking at how we can redesign it, and at what we can do to deal with the huge backlogs that we inherited, not least in the tribunal system when there are appeals. We need a much better end-to-end system that is fair and efficient. That will mitigate any of the issues that the hon. Lady raises with respect to asylum seekers not being allowed to work. Were that restriction to be lifted, I believe that it would be a huge pull factor, which would have potentially serious consequences.

I agree that it is about doing the day job effectively and efficiently, and if it cannot be done effectively and efficiently, redesigning it so that it can be, rather than having huge rows with the international community, threatening to leave the European convention on human rights, and setting up a parallel scheme that was not agreed by anybody, which spent vast amounts of money and ground the system to a halt. That is not the way to achieve success in this area. Considering the use of a wave machine to somehow send boats back to France just about sums up the reality of the Conservatives’ attitude to what is a difficult situation.

We have a relatively new Government in France just bedding in. I reassure the right hon. Gentleman that we are working closely with them to see how we can strengthen and deepen our co-operation and partnership.

My hon. Friend will be comforted to know that I am thinking of precisely those things.

We have a relatively new Government in France just bedding in. I reassure the right hon. Gentleman that we are working closely with them to see how we can strengthen and deepen our co-operation and partnership.

No, I do not. I noticed the revelations at the weekend about why the Conservatives decided to call the election earlier than some of us had perhaps thought. One reason set out in Tim Shipman’s book “Out” was that illegal migration was a problem with a new armada of small boats predicted and the issue of whether they would be able to get a repatriation flight to Rwanda in the air before polling day. They evidently decided that they could not.

We certainly want those who gain status to be usefully employed, and my part of the system is ensuring that we get those asylum decisions up and running as fast as possible. Unfortunately, we have inherited a difficult situation, which we are working hard to resolve.

Since we came into government, we have done much more to co-operate across Departments, and I will certainly take that issue up with my opposite numbers in the Department for Education and MHCLG.

We are processing asylum claims, which were at a standstill when we came into government, not least those that are extant in Northern Ireland. I hope that will lead to a process where we get throughput in the system and we begin to exit hotels.

For the integrity of any asylum system, it is important that a person who is not granted asylum recognises that they do not have the right to stay in the country. Hopefully they will leave voluntarily; if not, they will be removed.

We are working on it, but, as the hon. Gentleman knows, we have inherited a huge mess with large backlogs that are not easy to clear.

Yes, but it is tough and difficult, and to be successful, it requires international co-operation across borders operationally, politically and diplomatically, and we are doing that.

Our manifesto commitment was not to close all asylum hotels within four months of being elected.

I certainly do agree.

We certainly are having to get the system back up and running from a virtual standing start.

I welcome any progress, but I also recognise the seasonality of arrivals.

No. The previous Government did not do that either, for safeguarding and public safety reasons.