Asylum removals are running at the lowest level for five years as the Government struggles to repatriate thousands of failed applicants, according to figures published yesterday.

At the same time the number of asylum-seekers and dependants arriving in Britain jumped by almost 20 per cent between the second and third quarters of this year — although, overall, the figures for each quarter are down on last year.

The number of applications from would-be refugees and their dependants to stay in the UK between July and September this year rose to 7,090 — an increase of 19 per cent on the previous quarter — according to figures published by the Home Office.

The country from which most people have applied for asylum is China.

Separate figures released show that nearly 750,000 people from eight former Soviet bloc states have applied to work in the UK since May 2004.

Since that date more than 123,000 applications have been granted for child benefit and tax credits from migrants from Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

About 50,000 East Europeans applied to work in the UK in each of the first three quarters of this year — a decline of 10,000 on the same quarters last year.

However, the figures on asylum for this year show that only 3,120 applicants and their dependants were removed from Britain between July and September — the lowest number since the second quarter of 2002. The number of removals is 5 per cent lower than for the second quarter of this year and 18 per cent lower than in the third quarter of last year. A quarter of those removed were offered a financial incentive to leave.

Reviewing the figures, Liam Byrne, the Immigration Minister, said: “Although assisted voluntary returns are down, we are delivering record [numbers of] enforced removals. Simultaneously tougher border security has helped deliver the lowest level of asylum claimants since the beginning of the 1990s.”

Last month the Government increased the value of a support package to those departing voluntarily from £1,500 to £4,000. The package can include help with private schooling and university fees, childcare costs and setting up a business.

Damian Green, the Tory immigration spokesman, said: “The fall in the number of removals means the Government is failing completely to make inroads into the backlog of half a million people who have no right to be in this country. This is another sign that the Government’s tough talk on immigration and asylum is not matched by effective action.”

Sir Andrew Green, the chairman of Migrationwatch, which campaigns against mass immigration, said: “Despite a 20 per cent increase in applications, removals are the lowest they have been for years and fall far short of the Government’s target. This failure to remove [people] undermines the integrity of the whole system.”

— The Border and Immigation Agency said last night that only 261 of the foreign citizens at the centre of the row that led to the sacking of Charles Clarke as Home Secretary had been deported. Of the 1,013 foreign prisoners released without being considered for deportation, 370 have been allowed to stay in the country. A further 127 are still at large.

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