Half a Decade of Data: NRPF Connect in Scotland
Our review of the past 5 years (2020-25) of publicly accessible NRPF Connect data from Scottish Local Authorities.
Key Findings
Demand and support for NRPF-related issues across Scotland are rising - signficicantly outpacing inflation. Scotland's share of support across the UK is increasing although lags behind areas like Greater London, and is lower than one might expect given correlated metrics like % of foreign-born residents. Sadly a lower percentage of cases are closed due to a grant of Leave to Remain with recourse to public funds.
Table of Contents
NRPF Connect is the UK’s national database and case management tool for councils to record details of households with no recourse to public funds (NRPF) who are receiving accommodation and/or financial support from social services. Local authorities across the UK record the social care services they provide to families, adults with care needs, and care leavers with NRPF. Our work collates and analyses data recorded by councils in Scotland using NRPF Connect during the financial years 2020/21 to 2024/25. This data, according to the tools host, the NRPF Network, is used to inform policy recommendations. Unlike in England and Wales, Scottish Local Authorities do not report on costs for Children and Care Leavers, which, in turn, limits our understanding of trends in Scotland compared to the other home nations.
In Scotland, Glasgow and Edinburgh have provided data in all relevant years, whilst Aberdeen began uploading data in 24/25. This is not the entire population of Scotland; these three cities account for approximately 25% of the nation’s population. However, the vast majority of the nation’s migrants, our target population, reside in these cities. In their 2025 review, Fairway Scotland, a consortium that supports people facing homelessness or destitution due to their immigration status (our population for this analysis), estimates that these three cities account for two-thirds (66%) of the total potential need across Scotland, and by extension, a significant majority of the demand for the services logged on NRPF Connect.
To address this imperfect dataset, we focus primarily on relative measures, such as ratios and percentages, which normalise data and enable fairer year-on-year comparisons, much like a census would, as response rates differ across waves. Imperfect and/or insufficient data largely define this domain. Regardless, we don’t present this as conclusive or holistic; however, we hope this analysis may help decision-makers, support organisations, and lead to better-informed conversations.
The Scottish Landscape - Scale and Trajectory
This section looks at the size support in Scotland. We track Scotland’s growing share of UK cases and examine who needs support, whether families or single adults and their immigration status.
How has Scotland’s share of UK-wide NRPF referrals and support developed?
Scotland’s role has grown dramatically. Its share of UK-wide referrals has more than quadrupled since 2021/22, accounting for over 4%. Even more striking, Scotland’s share of households receiving support nearly doubled in the last year alone. Between 21/22 and 23/24, the trend was for the share of households supported to be vastly higher than the share of referrals. In 24/25, both have moved closer together, yet a gap remains.
This growth shouldn’t be surprising, as it likely reflects local authorities catching up with ongoing demand and addressing the Covid-19-induced backlog. This 4% figure, although increasing, lags behind relevant benchmarks; Scotland accounts for 8% of the UK population, 7.5% of GDP, and 6% of the UK’s migrant population.
Is the rise in Scotland’s NRPF caseload driven more by families or adult households?
Families. In the most recent year, referrals to family households increased by nearly 250%. This decouples from the more modest rise in adult cases. The system is now grappling with a surge in family need that is likely to have knock-on effects on demand for the type and duration of support required.
Which immigration types account for most NRPF referrals in Scotland, and how has this shifted?
People with no immigration permission remain the largest single group. But the telling trend is the steady, year-on-year growth in the share of people with Limited Leave to Remain (with NRPF). This likely points to a growing cohort trapped in long-term limbo; granted permission to stay but systematically locked out of the safety net, leaving them in prolonged dependence on council support. If you would like to hear firsthand accounts of such situations, please view our Lived Experience Groups’ recent film.
Durations and Outcomes of Support
Here, we ask: how long do individuals remain in the system, and how do their cases end? Trends in support duration and case closures indicate whether the system is resolving cases efficiently or if backlogs are increasing.
How has the average support tenure for households in Scotland changed?
Average support tenure has fallen sharply in the past two financial years. This drop has been most pronounced in adult households, whose support periods average roughly 1.5 years; this trend coincides with a massive surge in referrals. The shortening of support, hopefully, reflects a system adapting to shorter, more crisis-driven interventions rather than to rushed decisions to clear the substantial backlog, as we sometimes see in the UK’s asylum system.
Is Scotland seeing more long-term cases (>1000 days), and does this vary by household type?
The share of long-term cases increased sharply in the middle of the period but has since declined sharply, albeit not back to levels observed at the beginning of the decade; this pattern is coupled with household type. This suggests the drivers of long-term stays are systemic, linked to policy and case resolution rather than to processes specific to household type.
What are the main reasons for case closure in Scotland, and how does the closure rate compare to referral growth?
Most closures are positive, with people gaining state support; granted leave to remain with recourse to public funds or asylum support account for>50% of closures each year; however, the former is declining at a substantial rate and is only likely to increase given proposals tabled by the Labour Government concerning settlement.
The system as it currently performs is not efficient enough to keep up with demand. Over the last year, referrals increased by 122%, whereas closures increased by only 33%. This is an unsustainable gap; the ratio is visualised below in the second graphic. This means that, despite closing cases, the system is falling further behind, creating a backlog in which uncertainty and destitution are likely to take root, which we elaborate on later.
Financial Analysis - Spending and Efficiency
How has Scotland’s spending on NRPF support changed over the last five years?
Scotland’s share of UK-wide NRPF expenditure shows overall growth despite fluctuation. While the percentage share dipped in 2022/23, but rebounding latterly, growing by over 72% to reach 1.9% of total UK expenditure by 2024/25, the highest level recorded, a figure nearly half of the nation’s share of referrals. In absolute terms, this reflects a significant surge in spending, particularly in the final two years. Total Scottish NRPF expenditure jumped from around £500,000 in 2023/24 to over £1.5 million in 2024/25. This dramatic increase aligns with similar growth in Scotland’s share of referrals and in the number of households supported.
What may have caused the sharp increase in Scotland’s NRPF spending?
While the rise in caseloads and the number of households supported is the clear trigger for higher spending, we can hypothesise what may have triggered this beyond an increased headcount.
NRPF Connect has not historically disaggregated spending by source (property vs person-related costs) until the 24/25 financial year. Thus, we do not have a full picture of the breakdown of rising costs; however, in 24/25 property costs accounted for >70% of spending.
We can hypothesise what factors may have lead to property-costs nearly monopolising NRPF-related support expenditure. We believe this is likely due to the following reasons
- COVID-19 and the consequential energy and supply-chain crises
- The overall “cost-of-living crisis”
- The Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Limited housing stock
- Brexit
How does this spending compare to other UK regions?
Scotland consistently has the lowest average cost per supported household of any UK region, with a figure approximately £6000 lower than the UK average. Scottish LA’s spend almost half as much per household as high-cost regions like the Southeast and Greater London. We can assume this is partly due to housing costs, but this does not fully account for the phenomenon.
Is Scotland’s spending more stable and predictable than in other UK regions?
Yes. The stability of a region’s spending can be assessed using the Gini coefficient, a measure of inequality commonly used in financial analysis; lower scores indicate greater equality, which is more consistent year-to-year in our case. In contrast, a higher score indicates greater year-to-year variation. Scotland’s Gini of 0.086 is below the UK average and far below more volatile regions like the Northwest of England (0.231).
Systems Pressures and Performance
Is Scotland’s referral-to-support ratio keeping pace with demand, or is a backlog forming?
A backlog is forming. For the first time, the referral-to-support ratio exceeded 1 in 23/24 and has continued to grow, albeit very marginally in 24/25, indicating more people are being referred than are being offered support. This is especially acute for families, whose ratio rose from under 0.5 in 21/22 to over 1.5 in 24/25, increasing in each intervening year. In comparison, the adult ratio is just below 1, although it rose above the threshold in 23/24.
What can we learn from the failings of the Asylum backlog?
The UK has struggled to deal with growing immigration backlogs – well summarised by Free Movement’s January 2026 analysis of the asylum system.
Rushed decisions shift problems elsewhere.
- The Home Office cleared its initial asylum backlog by rushing poor-quality refusals, which merely created a larger, more expensive appeals backlog. Ensuring that each individual and family receives support and direction towards proper pathways, for example, Section 22 support, benefits all.
The importance of legal representation
- Around half of asylum appellants now lack legal aid lawyers, causing judges to spend significantly longer on unrepresented cases. Although not applicable to all who fall under the statutory support, legal support for relevant change-of-condition or settlement applications for those with NRPF would accelerate case resolution and reduce support durations, saving money. This is particularly relevant in legal deserts like the North East of Scotland.
Conclusions and More on NRPF Connect
Scotland’s NRPF landscape has undergone a profound transformation over the past five years, marked by a surge in family referrals, a steady rise in cases involving people with limited leave to remain, and a near-tripling of expenditure. Yet, the system is struggling to keep pace. Despite encouraging signs such as falling average support tenures and a majority of case closures resulting in positive outcomes, growing backlogs and a referral-to-support ratio that now exceeds one signal a system under mounting strain.
Financial pressures are intensifying, with rising accommodation costs consuming the bulk of budgets, even as Scotland maintains the lowest average cost per household of any UK region. These trends need to be tabled when discussing any update to the Ending Destitution Together strategy in a way that addresses both the scale of demand and the structural inefficiencies that risk entrenchment.
We encourage all local authorities to use a case management system; we believe NRPF Connect is the best available.