LONDON, Sept. 24 -- The government of the United Kingdom issued the following news:

In line withhis2026-27 Inspection Plan, the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration hascommencedan inspection ofthe Home Office's child safeguarding arrangements.

This inspection will examine theeffectiveness and consistency of the child safeguarding arrangementsacrossthe migration and borders system,withparticularreferenceto:

a) initialencountersof childrenat the border

b)management of referrals to the Home Office of children in-country, and onward referrals to statutory agencies

c)the sharing of safeguardinginformation;bothwithin the Home Office,and with external stakeholders

To gain a cross-systemview, inspectors areparticularly interested inevidence relating tothesafeguarding arrangements for thefollowing cohorts:

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children arriving at an airport, seaport or by small boat 

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accompanied asylum seeking children  

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young people who raise age disputes within an Immigration Removal Centre  

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children who areencounteredthrough Immigration Enforcement activity 

Onlyevidencethat specifically relates tothe abovepoints will beused.While inspectorsconsider allsubmissionscarefully,and theyprovidevaluable insightto informinspectionfindings,due to thecurrentshorterformat ofinspectionsyourcontributionmaynotbe directlycitedin thefinal report.

The Independent Chief Inspector would be pleased to hear both what is working well and what could be improved.TheICIBI InspectionFrameworkwill be used toassess the Home Office in this inspection.

This call for evidence will remain open until23:59 on15 October2026.

Please click here to email your submission to theIndependentChief Inspector.

Please note: The ICIBI's statutory remit doesnot extendto investigating or making decisions about individual cases. This remains a Home Office responsibility. However, theIndependentChief Inspector can take an interest in individual cases to the extent that they illustrate or point to systemic problems.

Data Protection 

Information on how we process personal data submitted in response to a call for evidence can be found in the ICIBI privacy information notice available on the ICIBI website. 

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