We were concerned about a prevailing culture within the Home Office that normalises operating in an emergency and led it to weaken approval processes when acquiring large sites like Northeye. Moreover, it has often appeared that the Home Office has prioritised appearing to address the issue of asylum accommodation over value for money and the effective implementation of projects. The National Audit Office reported that the Home Office dispensed with some established processes to acquire the N...

We were concerned about a prevailing culture within the Home Office that normalises operating in an emergency and led it to weaken approval processes when acquiring large sites like Northeye. Moreover, it has often appeared that the Home Office has prioritised appearing to address the issue of asylum accommodation over value for money and the effective implementation of projects. The National Audit Office reported that the Home Office dispensed with some established processes to acquire the Northeye site, in part due to the pressure to acquire at speed.66 In our evidence session, the Home Office acknowledged an “optimism bias” in its asylum a Type: conclusion | Number: 21 | Response status: under_consideration