10:40

The Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration has recommended in a report (pdf) nine improvements in the Home Office settlement scheme for EU citizens.

Among them are recommendations that:

• A senior case worker signs off the less-straightforward family cases involving civil partnerships, durable partnerships or marriages between EU and non-EU nationals with marriage interview teams’ involvement in some cases.

• The Home Office should do more to “provide reassurance” that the impact of the scheme has been “fully considered”, particularly with regard to vulnerable and hard-to-reach groups.

• The Home Office should collect and publish data on complaints and proof that caseworkers are applying the evidence “flexibility” consistently.

The report comes just weeks after it emerged that DWP records of elderly applicants were not automatically being found during the process, forcing EU citizens in the country since the 1950s to prove their right to be in the country.

The Home Office said it was accepting eight of the nine recommendations but not its proposal on freephone helplines.