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.
Read this first
Prison nationality is not immigration status. ‘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.
Largest foreign-national groups in prison in England and Wales, all custody types, male and female. Prison population: 30 June 2026 (Ministry of Justice, Offender management statistics quarterly), as at 30 June 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.”
“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.”
The statutory borders inspectorate, on the machinery behind the community-FNO and returns figures below. IE is Immigration Enforcement.
FNOs living in the community
19,779
foreign national offenders subject to deportation action who are living in the community — not detained, not removed. The stock has risen every quarter on the current series.
Series on the current (criteria and non-criteria) basis, available from 2022 Q4. Immigration Enforcement data: January to March 2026 (Home Office, Migration transparency data).
Returns from the UK by type, per calendar year. Returns summary tables, year ending March 2026 (Home Office, Immigration system statistics). Voluntary returns include assisted, controlled and other verified returns; recent years are provisional.
Enforced returns peaked in the mid-2000s at more than double today's level. Returns are rising again — but the enforced component remains a fraction of the irregular arrivals shown on the arrivals page. We state both numbers and let readers judge the gap; the cohorts differ, so we do not construct a ‘removal rate’ from them.
FNO returns by nationality
Top nationalities of FNOs returned, year ending March 2026. Returns summary tables, year ending March 2026 (Home Office, Immigration system statistics). Provisional.
FNO returns by offence group
Offence groups of FNOs returned from the UK, year ending December 2025. Offence groups of FNOs returned from the UK, summed across published nationalities. Experimental statistics from a redesigned data system.
Offence groups by nationality
The Home Office publishes the offence groups of FNOs returned, by nationality. Counts are reproduced exactly as published for the largest nationalities and offence groups.
FNO returns by nationality and offence group
Nationality
Drug offences
Theft offences
Violence against person offences outside of homicide
Counts of FNOs returned, by nationality and offence group, exactly as published. Says nothing about offending rates within any nationality — the denominator is people returned, not people resident. Experimental statistics from a redesigned data system.
People entering immigration detention and the end-of-period detained population. Immigration detention summary tables, year ending March 2026 (Home Office).
Detention capacity in use is a fraction of its mid-2010s scale — the detained population at the latest year end is 1,955, against 19,779 FNOs subject to deportation action living in the community.
Disruptions of organised immigration crime by public agencies, per quarter, all threat levels. Organised immigration crime summary tables, year ending March 2026 (National Crime Agency and Home Office).
A disruption is an enforcement outcome against organised-crime activity, graded minor/moderate/major by the NCA.