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The government has been urged to reveal how many asylum seekers are detained each year and the length of time they are detained for by a leading human rights charity, writes Amy Taylor.

To coincide with the launch of Refugee Week, Amnesty International has launched a report which argues that the asylum system is in chaos.

The charity suspects that over 25, 000 asylum seekers were detained in the UK in 2004 and says that it is ‘gravely concerned’ that this information is not available.

The government publishes quarterly figures on how many people are being detained but this is only a snapshot figure taken on a particular day.

The report states that while the authorities put out an image to the public that detention only happens for short periods of time to asylum applicants whose claims have failed just before they are removed, in reality, this is not the case.

In many cases, detention is protracted, inappropriate, disproportionate and unlawful with many of those who are detained eventually being allowed to stay in the UK, it adds

Amnesty goes on to call for alternative non-custodial measures, such as reporting requirements, to always be considered before resorting to detention and for an automatic review of the lawfulness of the decision to detain someone by a court or similar independent body to take place in every case.

Amnesty International UK director Kate Allen, said: “Thousands of people who have done nothing wrong are being locked up in the UK. We found that in many cases there was no apparent reason to detain people.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: "The power to detain an individual is an essential part of protecting the integrity and effectiveness of our immigration controls. It is also central to our drive to increase the number of failed asylum seekers we remove and ensuring the public can have confidence in a system that is both robust and fair.

"It is also essential that those we do detain should be treated with humanity and dignity and we are committed to ensuring that this is the case.

"We are currently studying the Amnesty report in detail and welcome this opportunity to have a sensible debate about immigration and asylum issues."