The Department of Home Affairs does not keep track of how many people claim asylum at Australian airports, freedom of information documents have revealed.

The revelation has prompted concern that there is no way of knowing if Border Force officers are ensuring all asylum seekers are being appropriately assessed.

Using the Right To Know system for seeking government documents, an applicant had asked the department for records of claims for protection made at Australian airports prior to or during immigration clearance since 2008. The request was refused because the requested documents did not exist.

“[The] total number of persons raising protection claims at Australia’s borders remains undetermined,” the FOI response said.

Under Australian immigration processes, an individual who arrives at an airport can be referred on for further assessment by a Border Force official under one of two codes: refugee claims or manual/reasons unknown.

Reasons for referral include suspicions of invalid documents, which would be referred under the manual code, or claims for protection, referred under the refugee code.

However, if the protection claim is made during a second interview after referral under the “manual/other’” code, there is nothing which requires the department to log it.

“Essentially what the danger is, if the process isn’t being applied correctly, then people who should be given the ability to apply … and access this screening process, are not getting access,” said Regina Jefferies, a Scientia PhD scholar and Kaldor Centre affiliate, who lodged the FOI.

“Where a traveller makes a claim for protection in immigration clearance, the claim is referred to the duty delegate, Humanitarian Program Operations Branch,” the home affairs department said.

Claims cannot be approved immediately – they can only be referred on for further assessment – but they can be rejected on the spot.

The lack of data means there is no method of scrutiny to ensure this is being done properly.

In 2017-18 ABF processed more than 43 million air travellers who arrived at airports with visas. In that same period 4,584 were refused immigration clearance.

In the first few months of that period just 10 people raised a protection claim at the time of arrival, were referred under the refugee code, and refused. The prior year saw just 46. It is not known how many were approved for further assessment.

There is no way of knowing how many of the remaining 4,574 may have raised a protection claim, or if they were then sent on to appropriately trained officers.

Jefferies said there had been “little scrutiny” of the way entry screening operated for asylum seekers arriving in Australia by air, and suggested it could be because the only recorded numbers – under the refugee claims code – were so small.

“The onshore protection visa framework implements Australia’s international obligations under the refugee convention – including the obligation not to return an individual to a place where they fear persecution or other serious harm,” she said.

“Yet, immigration clearance and the entry screening process may operate in a manner that runs afoul of that obligation.”

Seeking asylum at the airport also dramatically changes the nature of the protection granted to someone, Jefferies said.

If a person is granted protection at the airport, they are granted one of Australia’s temporary protection or safe haven entry visas. However, should they get through to Australia with their original visa still valid, they can apply for asylum and live on a bridging visa – with support and work rights – while it is processed.

“Australian law and policy incentivise not raising [the claim at that time] because… you become subjected to a process which makes it impossible to apply for permanent protection,” Jefferies said. “That feeds this backlog of claims the government is currently dealing with.”

The average time to process an application is now around 600 days.

Last week Crikey reported the number of applications for onshore protection visas with the Administrative Appeals Tribunal had blown out from 8,587 in 2014-15 to almost 28,000 in 2017-18.

The home affairs department said the total number of protection visas lodged onshore was declining “with a 19% decrease between 1 January 2019 to 30 June 2019, compared to the same period in 2018”.

Jefferies said the question was not about onshore approval rates or assessment backlogs.

Rather it was about how the department could develop policy if it did not have in place “adequate procedures to determine the number of people who have requested protection at Australia’s borders, or an operational framework that ensures the fair and expeditious processing of legitimate protection claims”.