The justice and immigration ministry plan to introduce emergency legislation to stop payments to asylum seekers if it takes too long for officials to assess their cases.

The agency has six months to assess a simple asylum request, after which it becomes liable to pay its ‘clients’ compensation of up to €15,000.

There is currently a backlog of 14,000 cases which must be dealt quickly if the payments are to be avoided, junior justice minister Ankie Broekers-Knol told MPs in a briefing.

In all, the bill to the government for 2019 and 2020 is between €30m and €40m so far and is rising by €1m a week, the minister said.

The government has decided not to scrap legal help for refugees when they make their first application for asylum but ‘we are getting rid of the compensation,’ Broekers-Knol said. ‘The system is strange and it does not work, and it involves large sums of money.’