National forms of protection
When an asylum application is rejected, the Home Office will also automatically consider whether the applicant should be granted leave on other human rights grounds under article 3 or article 8, as provided for under the Immigration Rules. Leave granted on article 8 ECHR grounds will generally be granted under Appendix Private Life[1] or Appendix FM[2] of the Immigration Rules and provides for a grant of leave lasting two and a half years. Leave must be renewed every two and a half years by making a paid application (£1,321 per person – £1,407 (€ 1,607) from 8 April 2026 – and the immigration health surcharge of £2,587.50 (€ 2,955) per adult and £1,940 (€ 2,216) per child)[3] unless a fee waiver is obtained, until the applicant has accrued ten years of lawful residence, at which point they are eligible to apply for settlement under Appendix Long Residence.[4] In addition to the longer period before settlement, those granted leave under these routes will not automatically be entitled to access public funds.
Return procedure
The returns process operates separately to the asylum process and there does not appear to be any structure as to how and when people are targeted for removal. It is common for people to have their asylum claims refused and to remain in the UK long after rejection of their appeal. For example, 5,000 or 3% of people who arrived by small boat between 2018 and 2024 were removed from the UK.[5]
Provisional data shows that in 2024 there were 2,636 enforced returns of people who had previously claimed asylum, and 3,432 in 2025.[6] For voluntary returns the figures are 6,794 people in 2024 and 8,199 people in 2025.
From time to time the Home Office announces that removals of refused asylum applicants to particular countries are suspended. This is rare and there are no such concessions currently in force (see Differential treatment of specific nationalities in the procedure).
[1] Immigration Rules, Appendix Private Life, available here.
[2] Immigration Rules, Appendix FM, available here.
[3] GOV.UK, ‘Family visas: apply, extend or switch’, accessed 7 February 2026, available here.
[4] Immigration Rules, Appendix Long Residence, available here.
[5] Migration Observatory, ‘Returns of unauthorised migrants from the UK’, 11 August 2025, available here.
[6] Home Office, ‘Immigration system statistics data tables, Returns summary, year ending December 2025’, table Ret_05, available here.