MigrationWatchdog

Foreign national offenders, prison and deportations

What official statistics say about foreign national offenders (FNOs): how many are in prison, how many live in the community while subject to deportation action, and how many are actually removed.

10,217 foreign nationals were in prison in England and Wales (11.6% of the prison population, as at 30 Sept 2026), and 9,669 people were returned from the UK by enforcement in year ending June 2026.

Read this first
Prison nationality is not immigration status. A foreign national includes people living in the UK entirely lawfully, and prison figures alone say nothing about irregular migrants. Nationality is as recorded by the Ministry of Justice. This page reports the official numbers and their official definitions — no more.

Foreign nationals in prison

10,217
foreign nationals in prison (E&W)
as at 30 Sept 2026 · source
11.6%
share of the prison population
as at 30 Sept 2026 · source
87,712
total prison population (E&W)
as at 30 Sept 2026 · source

Of the 10,217 foreign nationals held: 6,439 sentenced, 3,381 on remand (unconvicted or awaiting sentence) and 397 non-criminal holds — a distinction the headline number hides.

as at 30 Sept 2026 · source

Largest foreign-national groups in prison

AlbanianAlbanian: 878878IrishIrish: 707707PolishPolish: 625625RomanianRomanian: 577577IndianIndian: 392392JamaicanJamaican: 352352AfghanAfghan: 341341IranianIranian: 323323PakistaniPakistani: 322322IraqiIraqi: 288288PortuguesePortuguese: 285285SomalianSomalian: 248248
Largest foreign-national groups in prison in England and Wales, all custody types, male and female. Prison population: 30 September 2026 (Ministry of Justice, Offender management statistics quarterly), as at 30 Sept 2026.

What the inspectorate found

“This inspection found evidence of problems both between and within the various Home Office functions that have some responsibility for those identified as being in the UK without leave.”
An inspection of Home Office management of contact with migrants who are without leave to enter or remain (September 2024 – February 2025), ICIBI · foreword · retrieved 2026-08-10
“This inspection found problems between different Home Office functions, with IE feeling that it was left to deal with the downstream consequences of a system that was not sufficiently joined up.”
An inspection of Home Office management of contact with migrants who are without leave to enter or remain (September 2024 – February 2025), ICIBI · para 2.7 · retrieved 2026-08-10

The statutory borders inspectorate, on the machinery behind the community-FNO and returns figures below. IE is Immigration Enforcement.

FNOs living in the community

21,294

foreign national offenders subject to deportation action who are living in the community — not detained, not removed. The stock has risen in each of the last 14 published quarters.

as at end of 2026 Q2 · source
21k02022 Q42026 Q22022 Q4 — 14,6332023 Q1 — 15,0122023 Q2 — 15,4332023 Q3 — 15,8002023 Q4 — 16,4312024 Q1 — 16,9462024 Q2 — 17,6772024 Q3 — 18,1572024 Q4 — 18,6622025 Q1 — 18,6742025 Q2 — 18,9932025 Q3 — 19,1532025 Q4 — 19,4172026 Q1 — 20,0272026 Q2 — 21,294
Series on the current (criteria and non-criteria) basis, available from 2022 Q4. Immigration Enforcement data: April to June 2026 (Home Office, Migration transparency data).

The rest of this subject

Three things that used to sit on this page under a heading about foreign national offenders, which is not what any of them is about. Each now has its own page.

Download this data

Every file carries provenance headers. All datasets →

Data as of

Cite this page

Crime and justice: foreign national offenders and returns. Migration Watchdog, data as of 2026-11-01.
https://migrationwatchdog.com/crime
Underlying figures: UK official statistics, re-published under OGL v3.0 — every figure links to its source on the page.

Sources for this page