Written questions by Morton.

For what period of time her Department has allocated funding for additional neighbourhood police officers; and whether individual police forces will need to cover the ongoing costs of these officers through local precepting.

The 2025-26 final police funding settlement provides funding of up to £19.6 billion for the policing system in England and Wales. This is an increase of up to £1.1 billion when compared to 2024-25 and includes £200.0 million to kickstart the recruitment of new neighbourhood police officers and PCSOs in communities across the country.This will support the first steps of delivering 13,000 more neighbourhood personnel as part of the Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee in 2025-26. This major investment supports our commitment on safer streets and reflects the scale of the challenges that many forces face .Setting the police precept is a matter for individual Police and Crime Commissioners taking into account the views of the local community and Police and Crime Panels.

Whether funding allocated to police authorities to cover increased employer National Insurance contributions will be added to base budgets for future financial years.

The 2025-26 final police funding settlement provides funding of up to £19.6 billion for the policing system in England and Wales. This is an increase of up to £1.1 billion compared to 2024-25 and includes £230.3 million for territorial police forces to support them with the costs of the changes to National Insurance Contributions.

With reference to paragraph 2.40 of the Autumn Budget 2024, published on 30 October 2024, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of the increase in Employer National Insurance contributions on West Midlands Police (a) staffing revenue budgets, (b) staffing levels and (c) non-staffing revenue budgets.

As set out at the final police funding settlement on 30 January, overall funding for policing will total up to £19.6 billion in 2025-26, an increase of up to £1.1 billion when compared to the 2024-25 settlement.Total funding to police forces will be up to £17.5 billion, an increase of up to £1.1 billion compared to the 2024/25 police funding settlement. This equates to a 6.6% cash increase, and 4.1% real terms increase in funding.The 2025-26 provisional police funding settlement provides an additional £230.3 million to support territorial police forces with the increase to the changes to employer National Insurance Contributions as set out by the Chancellor in the Autumn Budget.Based on the provisional police funding settlement, in 2025-26, West Midlands will receive funding of up to £ 844.5 million, an increase of £54.1 million compared to 2024-5. This includes £11.6 million towards covering the costs of the employer National Insurance Contributions increase.Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) are the locally elected and democratically accountable official for policing in their area, and it is up to PCCs to decide how to balance their expenditure on their policing and crime priorities based on their local knowledge and experience.

What assessment she has made of the potential implications of the number of asylum seekers entering the UK in December 2024 for (a) community cohesion and (b) the use of hotels for housing asylum seekers.

This government inherited an asylum system under exceptional strain, with tens of thousands of people stuck in limbo without any prospect of having their claims processed. At their peak use under the previous government, in the autumn of 2023, more than 400 asylum hotels were being leased by the Home Office, at a cost of almost £9 million a day.We took immediate action to resolve that chaos by restarting asylum processing, establishing the new Border Security Command to tackle the people-smuggling gangs, cracking down on illegal working across the country, and increasing the return and removal of people with no right to be here.Inevitably, due to the size of the backlog we inherited, the Home Office has been forced to continue with the use of hotels for the time being. But this is not a permanent solution, and the small increase in the number in use at the end of last year was just a temporary but necessary step to manage pressures in the system, which is now in the process of being reversed.It remains our absolute commitment to end the use of hotels over time, as part of our reduction in overall asylum accommodation costs. In the interim, we are also continuing to increase our operational activity against smuggling gangs and illegal working, and we have increased returns to their highest level since 2018, with 16,400 people removed in the first six months this government was in charge.The safety and wellbeing of the local communities in which asylum accommodation is located is of paramount importance. The Home Office works in collaboration with local authorities and other partners to ensure that accommodation sites are successfully managed and the impact upon the local community is minimised. Any incident relating to security or community cohesion is reported to the Home Office immediately, so any necessary changes can be made as soon as possible.

What estimate she has made of the number of small boat crossings of the Channel each day in December 2024.

The Home Office publishes information about Channel crossings on a daily basis. This can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/migrants-detected-crossing-the-english-channel-in-small-boats/migrants-detected-crossing-the-english-channel-in-small-boats-last-7-days.

How many asylum hotels had been closed as of 4 July 2024.

This Government inherited an asylum system under unprecedented strain, with thousands stuck in a backlog without their claims being processed.The Home Secretary took immediate action by restarting asylum processing and scrapping the unworkable Rwanda policy. This will save an estimated £4 billion for the taxpayer over the next two years. We are delivering a major uplift in returns to remove people with no right to be in the UK. Over the long term this will allow us to end the use of hotels to accommodate asylum seekers as part of our programme to reduce overall asylum costs.Data on the number of supported asylum seekers in accommodation, including hotels, can be found within the Asy_D11 tab for our most recent statistics release: Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).

How many asylum seekers were housed in hotels as of 30 November 2024.

This Government inherited an asylum system under unprecedented strain, with thousands stuck in a backlog without their claims being processed.The Home Secretary took immediate action by restarting asylum processing and scrapping the unworkable Rwanda policy. This will save an estimated £4 billion for the taxpayer over the next two years. We are delivering a major uplift in returns to remove people with no right to be in the UK. Over the long term this will allow us to end the use of hotels to accommodate asylum seekers as part of our programme to reduce overall asylum costs.Data on the number of supported asylum seekers in accommodation, including hotels, can be found within the Asy_D11 tab for our most recent statistics release: Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).

How many asylum hotels were opened in (a) July, (b) August, (c) September, (d) October and (e) November 2024.

This Government inherited an asylum system under unprecedented strain, with thousands stuck in a backlog without their claims being processed.The Home Secretary took immediate action by restarting asylum processing and scrapping the unworkable Rwanda policy. This will save an estimated £4 billion for the taxpayer over the next two years. We are delivering a major uplift in returns to remove people with no right to be in the UK. Over the long term this will allow us to end the use of hotels to accommodate asylum seekers as part of our programme to reduce overall asylum costs.Data on the number of supported asylum seekers in accommodation, including hotels, can be found within the Asy_D11 tab for our most recent statistics release: Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).