Corporate report

Single departmental plan 2015 to 2020

Published 19 February 2016

This was published under the 2015 to 2016 Cameron Conservative government

This corporate report was withdrawn on 14 December 2017

This has been replaced with another version.

£10.7bn Total Departmental Expenditure Limit (DEL) in financial year 2015 to 2016

This includes £10.3 billion resource DEL and £0.4 billion capital DEL

Source: Spending Review 2015 and Autumn Statement

Vision

The first duty of the government is to keep citizens safe and the country secure. The Home Office has been at the front line of this endeavour since 1782. As such, the Home Office plays a fundamental role in the economic prosperity of the United Kingdom.

Our ministers and management

Objectives

1. Prevent terrorism
2. Cut crime
3. Control immigration
4. Promote growth
5. Delivering efficiently: transforming the Home Office

1. Prevent terrorism

Lead ministers: Rt Hon John Hayes MP, Minister for Security and Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, Minister for Countering Extremism

Lead officials: Tom Hurd OBE, Director General, Office for Security and Counter Terrorism and Tim Foy, Director, Office for Counter Extremism

1.1 What the Home Office is doing

Prevent terrorism

The Home Office’s role is to develop, co-ordinate and oversee delivery of the government’s counter-terrorism strategy, CONTEST, which consists of the following 4 pillars:

• Pursue: to stop terrorist attacks
• Prevent: to stop people becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism
• Protect: to increase protection against a terrorist attack
• Prepare: to mitigate the effects of a terrorist attack

The national threat level from international terrorism has been set at SEVERE (meaning an attack is highly likely and could occur without warning) since August 2014. The principal threat to the UK is from militant Islamist terrorism, notably from Syria and Iraq and in the last year we have seen deadly Daesh-inspired terrorist attacks in Europe and other countries.

The situation in Syria has brought specific challenges for the prevention of terrorism, both in terms of dissuading those who might travel to Syria from doing so and in managing those who return. This makes the department’s work to prevent terrorism of continued vital importance, and is why it introduced a new duty in the Counter Terrorism and Security Act 2015 on a wide range of bodies to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism.

Daesh is also distributing large quantities of terrorist and extremist propaganda online, through social media, intended to radicalise people in the UK and other countries, and exploiting readily accessible encrypted online communications to plan terrorist attacks.

The government is committed to updating counter-terrorism laws wherever necessary to make sure they properly reflect the threats faced, particularly in maintaining the ability of the authorities to intercept the content of suspects’ communications, while continuing to strengthen oversight of the use of these powers.

The government has brought forward legislation that will transform the law relating to the use and oversight of investigatory powers, bringing up to date the ability of the police and security services to access communications data – the ‘who, where, when and how’ of communication, but not its content, to keep the country safe. The government will also introduce new communications data legislation to strengthen our ability to disrupt terrorist plots, criminal networks and organised child grooming gangs, even as technology develops.

The Strategic Defence and Security Review sets out the government’s priorities for counter-terrorism work over the next 5 years. At the Spending Review in November 2015 the government announced it will invest £500 million in counter-terrorism funding over the course of this Parliament to increase the capability of the police to pursue terrorists, counter poisonous ideologies at home, and ensure that the UK is properly prepared in the event of an attack.

Counter extremism

The government wants to do more to confront all forms of extremism, whether violent or non-violent. This includes:

• action to outlaw groups that foment hate with the introduction of new Banning Orders for extremist organisations
• the creation of new Extremist Disruption Orders to restrict the harmful activities of extremist individuals
• tackling the infiltration of extremists into our schools and public services
• enabling employers to check whether an individual is an extremist and bar them from working with children
• further measures to ensure colleges and universities do not give a platform to extremist speakers

The government has therefore placed countering extremism amongst its top priorities for this Parliament and the Home Office has lead responsibility for tackling extremism in all its forms. The government’s Counter Extremism Strategy, published in October 2015, sets out the work to deliver this:

• countering extremist ideology – continuing to confront and challenge extremist propaganda, ensuring no space goes uncontested, including online, promoting a better alternative, and supporting those at risk of radicalisation
• building and supporting a partnership with all those opposed to extremism – going further to stand with and build the capacity of mainstream individuals, community organisations and others in society who work every day to challenge extremists and protect vulnerable individuals
• disrupting extremists – creating new targeted powers to disrupt the most dangerous and active extremist activities
• building cohesive communities – reviewing, understanding and addressing the reasons why some people living here do not identify with our country and our values. A new Cohesive Communities Programme will help those communities most at risk of isolation

To drive this work, the new Office for Counter Extremism (OCE) was established in June 2015. OCE is responsible for co-ordinating government’s implementation of the strategy, taking forward key elements, and assessing the impact of its approach.

A dedicated cross-government Extremism Analysis Unit (EAU) has been established within OCE to identify and provide analysis of individuals, groups or issues of concern and to lead the government’s work on understanding trends in extremist attitudes across the country.

The department will work with partners in government to strengthen Ofcom’s role so that tough measures can be taken against channels that broadcast extremist content.

1.2 How the Home Office is doing

Prevent terrorism

The police and security services have stopped a number of attempts to attack the UK in the last 12 months. Our programme to prevent radicalisation involves working with hundreds of mosques, faith groups and community organisations and the new Prevent duty – which came into force last summer – is ensuring that key bodies including schools and the police play their part, working in partnership. The department has also strengthened border and aviation security further, both overseas and in the UK.

A detailed assessment of progress on counter terrorism work is provided in the CONTEST Annual Report for 2014. Further data relating to counter terrorism, including terrorism arrests and outcomes, can be found in the statistical bulletin: ‘Operation of police powers under the Terrorism Act 2000’.

Counter extremism

Overarching measures to prevent terrorism can be found in the statistical bulletin for the ‘Operation of police powers under the Terrorism Act 2000’; while the cross-government EAU will help the department monitor the impact of its counter-extremism measures as laid out in the Counter-Extremism Strategy.

2. Cut crime

Lead ministers: Rt Hon Mike Penning MP, Minister of State for Policing, Fire, Criminal Justice and Victims (jointly with Ministry of Justice); Rt Hon John Hayes MP, Minister for Security; Karen Bradley MP, Minister for Preventing Abuse, Exploitation and Crime; and Baroness Shields OBE, Minister for Internet Safety and Security (jointly with Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

Lead officials: Mary Calam, Director General, Crime and Policing Group and Tom Hurd OBE, Director General, Office for Security and Counter Terrorism (for serious and organised crime)

2.1 What the Home Office is doing

Cut crime and prevent abuse and exploitation

The department is continuing to reform the police service to give it the freedom and discretion to get on with fighting crime, and cutting bureaucracy and waste. This means enabling fire and police services to work more closely together, developing the role of elected and accountable Police and Crime Commissioners, and transparent leadership. It also means improving the calibre and diversity of the workforce, which will be achieved by improving the diversity of police recruitment, especially of black and ethnic minority officers, through supporting the development of new direct entry and fast-track schemes, such as Police Now, which offer top graduates a new route into policing. Digitisation and technological innovation are also key to delivering a more efficient police service; to help achieve this, the Police Innovation Fund will be used to accelerate the adoption of new technologies that will transform the service the public receives.

The use of police-led prosecutions will be extended, putting the police in charge of more straightforward, uncontested cases and allowing them to retain a greater percentage of the value of assets they seize from criminals. The government will also legislate to mandate changes in police practices if stop and search does not become more targeted and stop and search to arrest ratios do not improve. Furthermore, the police complaints system will be overhauled and the recommendations of the Chapman Review of the police disciplinary system will be implemented. The department will also increase protection for police whistleblowers and change the role, powers and governance of the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) and Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC).

The department is also developing a modern crime prevention strategy setting out ways to reduce crime and of working with industry, charities and other public services to reduce the opportunity and incentives to commit crime. Work to fight alcohol and drug related crime will continue, including the introduction of a ban on new psychoactive substances and sobriety orders for alcohol abuse.

The department continues to implement the serious and organised crime strategy, particularly paying attention to tackling: criminal facilitation and smuggling of illegal migrants, including people trafficking; child sexual exploitation and abuse; and access to firearms. The government also wants to improve investigative capability in relation to the internet, and provide increased protection to potential cyber crime victims, which will be achieved through reforms to police training and an expansion in the number of volunteer ‘Cyber Specials’. In addition, a set of standards, performance data and a ranking system for the security of smartphones and tablets, as well as online financial and retail services, will be published.

As well as cutting crime, the police service has an important role to play in protecting vulnerable people, including children, from being abused and exploited. The department is leading the way and this Parliament saw the introduction of a ministerial post to focus specifically on these challenges. Detecting and preventing child sexual exploitation and abuse brings significant challenges, reflecting the scale of the threat and the mixture of face-to-face and online abuse. As part of this, an overhaul will be undertaken of how police, social services and other agencies work together to protect vulnerable children, especially from organised grooming and sexual exploitation. Furthermore, to stop children’s exposure to harmful sexualised content online, age verification for access to all sites containing pornographic material and age-rating for all music videos will be required. The department has also put in place procedures to identify instances where children may be at significant risk or harm should a passport be issued to /or continued to be held by them, as well as the unlawful removal of minors from the UK. In addition, Justice Goddard’s independent inquiry has started its work to uncover past failures in child protection.

The department will review the legislation governing hate crimes, including the case for extending the scope of the law to cover crimes committed against people on the basis of disability, sexual orientation or transgender identity.

The Modern Slavery Act, which the department implemented in 2015, is the first of its kind in Europe and will tackle slavery and human trafficking in the 21st Century. The government is also taking a range of specific actions to give child victims a wider range of tailored support (including trialling child trafficking advocates) and establishing specialist multi-agency safeguarding and anti-trafficking teams at the border.

Protecting women and girls from violence, and supporting victims and survivors of sexual violence, are priorities. The department will strive to intervene earlier in the abuse cycle, including doing more to deter and rehabilitate perpetrators, improving protection for victims and continuing to bring offenders to justice. In October, the mandatory reporting duty included in the Serious Crime Act 2015 was implemented to help ensure that professionals have the confidence to confront Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). In addition, the department will work with local authorities, the NHS and Police and Crime Commissioners to ensure a secure future for specialist FGM and forced marriage units, refuges and rape crisis centres.

Mental health is also a priority area. Further work will be done to reduce the amount of time the police spend dealing with people with mental health needs, while ensuring that vulnerable people get the support they need. The government wants to end the use of police cells for those detained under the Mental Health Act and to ensure proper provision of health and community based places of safety for people suffering mental health crises.

2.2 How the Home Office is doing

Cut crime

Police reform is working; crime has fallen by 8 per cent year-on-year and by more than a quarter since June 2010, according to the independent crime survey for England and Wales. People, communities and property across the country are safer as a result.

While there has been a rise in the police recording of violent and sexual crimes, the Office for National Statistics has been clear that a large part of this rise is thought to be due to improved compliance with national recording standards by police forces in the last year.

A detailed assessment of progress tackling serious and organised crime is provided in the Serious and Organised Crime Strategy Annual Report 2014 and the National Crime Agency Annual Report 2014.

Prevent abuse and exploitation

Child sexual abuse has been recognised as a national threat in the Strategic Policing Requirement, obliging police forces to maximise specialist skills and expertise. The department has also provided a £7 million increase in funding for non-statutory organisations supporting victims and survivors of sexual abuse. An additional £1.5 million has been made available to the National Policing Lead to fund improvements in the police response and better identify organised abuse. All UK territorial police forces and the National Crime Agency are now connected to the Child Abuse Image Database. This provides tools which can reduce the time taken to identify images and increase the ability to identify victims.

As part of the landmark Modern Slavery Act, the new provision related to transparency in supply chains has now come into force. Businesses that operate in the UK with a turnover in excess of £36 million are required to set out the actions they have taken to ensure that there is no modern slavery in their organisation and wider supply chain. Transparency in supply chains guidance has been published to advise businesses of the requirement. The Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner reports annually on progress made and where more needs to be done.

The new domestic abuse offence, to target coercive and controlling behaviour in intimate and familial relationships, came into force on 29 December 2015. The cross-government strategy for tackling violence against women and girls (including domestic violence) published in 2010 is currently being refreshed.

A new duty which requires professionals to report confirmed cases of FGM came into force on 31 October 2015. Multi-agency guidance has been published to help professionals prepare for the new duty.

3. Control immigration

Lead ministers: Rt Hon James Brokenshire MP, Minister for Immigration and Richard Harrington MP, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (jointly with Department for Communities and Local Government and Department for International Development)

Lead officials: Oliver Robbins CB, Second Permanent Secretary; Mandie Campbell CBE, Director General, Immigration Enforcement; Sir Charles Montgomery KBE, Director General, Border Force; Sarah Rapson, Director General, UK Visas and Immigration; Mark Thomson, Director General, Her Majesty’s Passport Office; and Paul Morrison, Director, Resettlement Gold Command

3.1 What the Home Office is doing

Control immigration

The government’s ambition remains to reduce annual net migration to the tens of thousands. As part of this, the Migration Advisory Committee has been commissioned to advise on changes to skilled work migration which will entail review of Tier 2 visas and the Shortage Occupation List, including requiring those regularly using the list to provide long-term plans for training British workers. A cap of 20,700 people will be maintained for skilled economic migration.

The Immigration Bill will address illegal immigration. To tackle non-EU migration, the department has tightened legal migration routes into the UK and extended the ‘deport first, appeal later’ rule to all immigration appeals and judicial reviews, apart from asylum claims. Changes have been made to the student visa route to tackle abuse and reduce the number of students staying once their visas expire, the sponsor system for student visas will be reviewed, and targeted sanctions will be introduced for any colleges or businesses that fail to ensure that migrants comply with the terms of their visa.

Changes will also be made to tighten rules on free movement (within the scope of EU rules) and EU workers’ access to benefits. This is being pursued as part of the EU re-negotiation, which will also involve negotiating to introduce stronger powers to deport criminals and stop them coming back, and tougher and longer re-entry bans for all those who abuse free movement. And the government is seeking powers, in the Immigration Bill, to mandate tagging of foreign national offenders who are released on bail - and will bring forward proposals to extend this for foreign national offenders awaiting deportation. Furthermore, the requirement for non-EU spouses to join EU citizens will be toughened, including an income threshold and English language test.

The department is also implementing a wide range of measures to make it harder for people to enter or remain in the UK illegally by making it difficult for those who do not have the appropriate status to access benefits and services, improving compliance with immigration rules and compelling those who are here unlawfully to regularise their status or leave the country. Landlords will also be required to check the immigration status of their tenants while the sham marriage referral hub will work to prevent abuse of marriage as a method of fraudulently gaining UK citizenship, for example, through bringing together the department’s immigration enforcement and passports work. Moreover, those coming to Britain on a family visa but speaking only basic English will be required to become more fluent over time, with a new test for those seeking a visa extension. The government will also introduce a Controlling Migration Fund to ease pressure on services and pay for additional migration enforcement.

The department has developed an illegal working strategy that seeks to improve employer compliance by increasing awareness of the right-to-work checking process, strengthening knowledge of the perceived risks of employing illegal migrants and taking focused, multi-agency enforcement action against employers that abuse the system. As part of this the department will harness data from multiple agencies, including Exit Checks data, to identify illegal immigrants and businesses that employ illegal workers.

The department will also work with partners in government to:

• enhance our border security and strengthen the enforcement of immigration rules
• take away opportunities for spurious legal challenge and opportunities to abscond
• clamp down on the number of so-called ‘satellite campuses’ opened in London by universities located elsewhere in the UK
• clamp down on illegal immigration and abuse of the minimum wage
• introduce tougher labour market regulation to tackle illegal working and exploitation

Refugee resettlement

Following the Prime Minister’s commitment that Britain will resettle up to 20,000 Syrian refugees over the course of this Parliament, the Home Office has established the Syrian Resettlement Programme to co-ordinate efforts across government and work with key partners in helping Syrian refugees resettle in Britain. This will be achieved through the expansion of the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement scheme that has, since 2014, integrated vulnerable people directly from the region, rather than after they make the hazardous journey across the Mediterranean and Europe.

The Syrian Resettlement Programme is a tri-lateral team incorporating staff from DfID and DCLG. The programme is working closely with local government on their offer of places for Syrian refugees and is also drawing on the efforts of non-governmental organisations, particularly the United Nations High Commission for Refugees and the International Organisation for Migration in the region.

3.2 How the Home Office is doing

The latest immigration figures show that net migration was 336,000 in the year ending June 2015. More detailed data and analysis about migration is provided on the website of the Office for National Statistics.

The government has met its commitment for the Syrian Resettlement Programme to resettle 1,000 Syrian refugees in the UK by Christmas 2015.

4. Promote growth

The Home Office’s strategic goals make an important contribution to securing economic growth. Cutting crime improves feelings of safety, reduces costs to business and creates a positive investment climate. Counter terrorism not only protects individuals and their families, but also prevents a fall in net foreign investment and bilateral trade flows.

The border, immigration and citizenship system also has an important role to play in supporting growth, and meeting the needs of UK businesses, including facilitating international travel and trade. The total number of journeys into the UK in the year ending June 2015 increased by just over 5% to over 120 million, a record number which demonstrates the attractiveness of the UK as a destination to visit, study, work and invest. The department will continue to promote growth through an efficient yet secure visa service, including through speeding up the visa process for low-risk tourists, supporting wider efforts to ensure those coming to the UK contribute to economic growth. And for those travelling the Home Office continues to roll out enhanced technology for faster processing of people and goods while ensuring that border security is maintained.

5. Delivering efficiently: transforming the Home Office

Lead minister: Rt Hon Theresa May MP, Secretary of State for the Home Department

Lead officials: Mike Parsons, Chief Operating Officer and Julie Taylor, Director General, People and Transformation Group

5.1 What the Home Office is doing

The scale and ambition of Home Office transformation was set out by the Home Secretary in a speech in November 2015.

The department is committed to reducing its operating costs over the Parliament, while continuing to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of its services including through:

• increased use of automated data analytics to better identify risks, allowing resources to be targeted to achieve the same or better outcomes at lower cost
• technology that will allow many administrative tasks, currently undertaken manually, to be automated, freeing staff to focus their effort on tasks which need human skills, thus increasing productivity and improving assurance levels
• reviewing how costs are allocated so that those who create demand bear the responsibility for a greater proportion of its funding
• rolling out new, user-friendly digital interfaces and channels for customers, together with the standardisation and automation of business processes, to improve the efficiency of services and provide customers easy access through modern digital channels
• participating in the government’s shared services strategy which involves working with Cabinet Office and other government departments to develop a wider range of tools and services to support more efficient departmental operations – this includes the Single Operating Platform for enhanced human resources and finance capabilities at a reduced cost, and a shared Business Intelligence service to maintain and improve upon the quality of Management Information
• reducing losses through fraud and error alongside developing a debt management strategy

5.2 How the Home Office is working collaboratively across government

The Home Office is working collaboratively with Cabinet Office, HM Treasury and other government departments to deliver transformational change in key areas, including:

• enabling fire and police services to work more closely together, including the recent consultation on Emergency Services Collaboration. The joining up of fire and police governance within central government provides the opportunity to drive greater collaboration and more efficient and effective emergency services
• developing digital solutions that meet common standards set by the Government Digital Service and using cross-government platforms such as GOV.UK Verify, GOV.UK Pay and GOV.UK Notify as part of departmental digital services wherever this demonstrates the best value money solution for government
• rationalising our estate in a joined-up way, looking to develop ‘government hubs’ with other government departments, releasing land for housing where possible and participating in the development of the new commercial property model
• delivering savings in commercial relationships including through spend on common goods and services, delivered in partnership with the Crown Commercial Service
• continuing to build the department’s commercial capability and working with the Crown Commercial Service to deliver the government’s 33% commitment of spend with SMEs by 2020
• working in partnership with the Cabinet Office to deliver Arms Length Bodies’ transformation plans, and the Infrastructure and Projects Authority on major projects and programmes and prioritisation