Immigration officers should wear pastel-coloured clothing when attempting to deport families, so that they are less intimidating to children, Home Office officials have recommended.

The proposal to dress officers in clothing that is less like a uniform came in a government review of attempts to remove families from Britain. It urged a change of clothing for those involved in trying to deport families, to make the process less frightening.

The review by the Border and Immigration Agency said: “Consideration should be given to providing standard-issued clothing in softer colours (currently issued in navy) for enforcement officers involved in family work to reduce the appearance of a ‘uniform’ and be less intimidating to children.”

It also suggested that if a child was close to school examinations it would be a factor in determining whether a family was removed.

The proposal to clothe immigration officers in pastel colours came as ministers abandoned a controversial policy of removing welfare benefits from failed asylum-seeker families in the hope that it would encourage them to leave. The Government dropped the blanket operation of the policy after a pilot project found that it led to no significant increase in voluntary returns or removals from Britain.

The full extent of the failure of the policy was disclosed in a Home Office paper showing that only one family monitored in the pilot project was successfully removed from the country.

Thirty-two families in the project disappeared from their accommodation during the year, probably because of concerns about the planned withdrawal of welfare support, the paper said.

The report said: “The evidence indicates there was no significant increase in the number of voluntary returns or removals of unsuccessful asylum-seeking families.”

It said that the policy of withdrawing benefits did not influence people to cooperate with being removed from the country though there was an increase in the number of applications for travel documents.

The report said that the ability to remove benefits from failed asylum-seeking families, which was introduced by David Blunkett when he was Home Secretary, could not be seen as a “universal tool” to encourage departure.

It said: “We therefore do not propose that the provision should be used on a blanket basis by the Border and Immigration Agency in the future.”

The agency will retain the power to remove benefits from families who are wilfully refusing to cooperate with the authorities in efforts to remove them.

The move came as the Home Office announced an overhaul of the way it deals with children in the immigration and asylum system, including attempts to find alternatives to holding them in detention centres.

The proposals would mean that the Border and Immigration Agency would have a legal obligation for the first time to keep children safe from harm.

Liam Byrne, the Minister for Immigration and Asylum, said: “When we keep our borders safe we can’t forget the need to treat often vulnerable children with care and respect.”

Damian Green, the Conservative immigration spokesman, said: “A firm immigration and asylum system, which is what we need, does not have to be inhumane.”

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