The Home Office Analysis & Insight Directorate is recruiting two Research Officers to work on Irregular Migration. If like Joel, you wish to use your social science degree to impact an important area of public policy, then we’d love to receive your application.
“Since June 2024, I’ve managed a project building up the evidence base on all areas of the irregular migration. This project maps evidence on irregular migration both upstream and at the UK’s near border, as well as on organised immigration crime and the UK’s refugee resettlement schemes. Expanding our evidence base is about deepening our understanding of the data we rely on to inform government policy, especially when it comes to the borders of Europe. It’s our job to contribute to a central database of source material, ensuring our evidence remains up-to-date and accurate.
Our team is made up of both analysts and statisticians who collaborate closely to report on irregular migration trends. The regular reports we produce are important, but a lot of our work is driven by special research projects and ad-hoc requests from teams across government. We advise ministers, making sure they understand the evidence we have – and sometimes, the evidence we need to develop further.
The research project is almost entirely qualitative and has allowed me to use my critical thinking and analytical skills. It’s a real team effort to identify and review the evidence we rely on, which spans multiple teams within the Home Office. We’ve developed our own analytical tools to score and rank this evidence, and it’s been great to see other teams adopt our methodology as well.
What’s next? At the appropriate time we plan to publish outputs from our work to increase transparency – and help educate on our specialist research area. I take fulfilment in knowing I’m working on something that’s not just shaping public policy but is accessible for colleagues at all levels to work with.”