24 Week Asylum Appeals Target Starts. Who It Covers and What It Leaves Unchanged

The Home Office announced on 14 August 2026 that a 24 week target for certain new asylum and immigration appeals is now in force. From 12 August, the First tier Tribunal is expected to hear those in scope cases within 24 weeks of receiving them. The current average wait for a judge to decide a case is 67 weeks.

Minister for Border Security and Asylum Anna Turley said delays have left taxpayers paying while cases drag on for months, and sometimes years. The government says faster decisions will speed up the removal of people who lose their appeal and have no right to stay, free up accommodation, and contribute to estimated savings of £6.9 billion.

The target is narrower than the headline. It applies to two groups of new appeals received from 12 August, foreign national offenders who are not in detention, and people already on asylum support and accommodation.

Appeals from foreign national offenders who are detained are already prioritised by the judiciary, the Home Office says. Those cases are not what this announcement changes. Existing appeals already waiting in the system are also outside the 24 week window.

The government is open about the scale of what remains. It says more than 150,000 appeals are still waiting to be heard. Ministry of Justice tribunal statistics for January to March 2026 recorded an open caseload of 152,000 in the First tier Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber at the end of 2025/26. The mean time to clear Asylum/Protection appeals was 67 weeks. Across all categories in that chamber, the mean was 61 weeks.

Turley said the target would see cases resolved faster and reduce reliance on taxpayer funded accommodation. The Home Office places that claim in a wider cost picture. It says asylum costs have fallen by £1 billion since the 2024 general election, and that every asylum hotel will close by the end of this parliament. Under 170 hotels are now in use, down from a peak of 400 in 2023.

On removals, the government says nearly 10,000 foreign national offenders have been removed, up 36% compared with the 21 months before the election.

Capacity is also being added inside the existing tribunal. Sitting days in the First tier Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber are due to rise by 19% this year compared with 2024 to 2025, so more cases can be heard.

The 24 week target sits alongside a larger change still going through Parliament. The Immigration and Asylum Bill, which passed its second reading on 13 July 2026, would create a new Independent Immigration Appeals Authority.

The IIAA is intended as a simpler, faster route for deciding appeals. It would run alongside the First tier Tribunal for several years and take on new cases gradually, so the tribunal can work through the existing backlog. Independent adjudicators would be able to prioritise the most urgent cases and those the government describes as being in the public interest, including high harm foreign national offenders and what the Home Office calls "dubious human rights claims."

A June 2026 Home Office announcement said the new authority is due to start hearing appeals from late 2027, phased in stages. Adjudicators would be professionally trained and independently appointed. Decisions, the government says, would remain independent of ministers.

The Home Office argues that the current caseload cannot be sustainably managed within the existing system, and that wider reform is needed so appeals do not become a barrier to removal.

The 24 week expectation applies only to new in scope appeals received from 12 August. How quickly the backlog of more than 150,000 cases is cleared will depend on sitting days, the Bill's progress through Parliament, and how fast the IIAA is stood up.