Timeline of events leading to Charles Clarke's admission of a "shocking state of affairs" over the release of 1,023 foreign prisoners who should have been considered for deportation:

May 2, 1997: Jack Straw becomes Home Secretary, replacing Michael Howard as Labour take power

February, 1999: A foreign national becomes the first of 1,023 prisoners to be released without the necessary deportation hearing.

June 8, 2001: David Blunkett replaces Jack Straw as Home Secretary.

1999 - 2001: 24 foreign convicts released

December 5, 2002: HM Inspectorate of Prisons report warns: "There is an increasing number of foreign nationals in UK prisons… policies and practices are not sufficiently developed. Some prisons do not know how many they hold, or understand their needs. There is a great deal of confusion."

January 20, 2004: Chief Inspector of the Prisons warns of "institutional blind spot for foreign nationals". States that 32 prisons have no specific foreign national work, and many did not know how many they held until inspectors informed them. He wrote: "This was not helped by the dilatory attitude of the Immigration Service, which, unless pressed, was not monitoring those liable to deportation, and making arrangements for this to take place as soon as sentence had expired. In many prisons, we found prisoners well beyond sentence with no idea when they might be released and go home."

December 15, 2004: Charles Clarke replaces David Blunkett following his resignation for fast-tracking the visa application of his lover Kimberly Quinn's Filipino nanny.

January 2005: In a briefing, Downing Street states that it has sent new management into the Home Office to assess the scale of the problem.

January 26, 2005: Chief Inspector of the Prisons warns: "In spite of the growing number of foreign national prisoners, there is still no national strategy… Detention often appeared to be the result of delays in instituting deportation action. These delays were in turn caused by poor communication between the Immigration and Nationality Directorate (IND) and individual prisons, and inefficient practices within IND."

July 2005: Charles Clarke became aware of a "systemic problem between the Prison Service and the IND", according to an interview given to BBC2's Newsnight last night. This has become a crucial point: the subsequent release of 288 prisoners after the Home Office became aware of the problem is the most damaging aspect of the furore.

July 14, 2005: NAO report on returning failed asylum seekers warns the Home Office: "Our examination of case files suggested that preparations for removal could be made much earlier. In some instances, action on criminal cases was not being initiated until a late stage, allowing insufficient time to make preparations for removal before the end of sentence".

August, 2005: Government allocates an extra £2.7 million to address the issues.

October 2005: Richard Bacon, a Conservative backbencher, asks the Public Accounts Committee how many foreign nationals have been released before being considered for deportation.

December 2005: Home Office says that 403 foreign nationals have been released without being considered for deportation.

2001 - 2005: 609 foreign convicts released

April 25, 2006: Charles Clarke admits in a written statement to the Public Accounts Committee that 1,023 foreign prisoners - including murderers, rapists and child sex attackers - have been released without being deported. He admits this is a "shocking state of affairs" but refuses to resign.

April 26, 2006: Tony Blair pledges that since April 1, 2006 everybody identified as a foreign national has had their deportation case considered before their release. He says that this is because the Home Office has addressed the problems, and gives his backing to his embattled Home Secretary.

Aug 05 - March 06: 288 foreign prisoners released

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