Up the creek without a paddle

The Home Office senior civil servants are to coin a phrase 'up the creek without a paddle'.

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Lin Homer is the UK Immigration and Nationality Directorate chief. She told the Commons home affairs committee this week it would take "at least a couple of years" to get the service "into the shape I would like".

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She also told MPs that several hundred of the foreign criminals facing potential deportation have been allowed to stay in Britain. Additionaly she confirmed eight serious sex offenders released without being considered for deportation were still at large.
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Asked by MPs whether senior figures in the Home Office had supported ex-home secretary Mr Clarke, she told MPs: "I felt I let him down."

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Two weeks ago the new Home Secretary, Dr John Reid MP had to apologise to a parliamentary committee after he discovered that a foreign murder who he he had claimed was in jail had in fact been released on bail.

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Two senior officials were apparntly removed from their duties after it emerged the home secretary had not been told that bail hearings were taking place.

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Pressed about how many cases bail applications the Home Office had lost in court during the past fortnight, she said she was unable to give the committee the latest figures.

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The senior civil servant told the MPs that no more murderers had been released(as far as she knew) but suggested that another serious offender had applied successfully for bail. Persumably not the metropolitan police chief.

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Asked by Mr Denham about press reports that six civil servants had been sacked for selling visas, Ms Homer replied, amazingly, that she "did not recognise that number". But she did added: "At any time we are undertaking a number of investigations into potentially corrupt behaviour by members of staff. "In the last full year that I have figures for, that activity led to 15 members of staff being either dismissed and/or prosecuted. So I would have more confidence in that than the figure that has been quoted to you."

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A Home Office spokesman later confirmed those figures stating: "Since January 2005, 15 members of Immigration and Nationality staff have been dismissed following investigations by our security and anti-corruption unit over allegations of professional misconduct," he said.He refused to release figures for previous years and said he could not confirm whether the 2005 figure included the individuals accused of selling visas in last weekends press reports.

The expression of up the creek without a paddle comes to mind when concidering any issue associated with the Home Office.

Deep desperandum indeed !