My Lords, it is a pleasure to open the debate on this important Bill and to welcome the interest shown by so many noble Lords in seeking to speak. This is a key Bill for the Government and for the United Kingdom as a whole. I will set out why this Government have brought forward the Bill for the benefit of noble Lords today.
Immigration has always been an important part of the United Kingdom’s story. But for it to be so, it must be controlled and managed so that the system is fair and works for people in this country as a whole. Proper enforcement of and respect for the rules are key to that. The Bill before us addresses a number of those areas, and the recently published White Paper runs parallel to the Bill and covers a number of other areas.
The Bill is predominantly about the issues of illegal and irregular migration, and I think it is clear to noble Lords and any observer that the current situation cannot go on. Criminal gangs have had six years to take over the English Channel unchecked and to set up and run criminal enterprises that exploit people at their most vulnerable. As a result, there is a massive strain on the already overstretched immigration and asylum system supports. It is in nobody’s interest to continue as we are. The Bill seeks to make real change.
The criminal gangs have no respect for the lives of those they traffic. Often 50 people or more are crammed into unseaworthy vessels, sometimes facing threats and intimidation when they raise concerns. As a result, we have seen individuals tragically die in the channel. Make no mistake: this is part of a broader criminal enterprise, which seeks to bring weapons, drugs and a wide array of items used to carry out criminal activity into our local communities, smuggled into the United Kingdom. The Government are absolutely committed to taking down the gangs that risk the lives of so many people in our communities.
My Lords, I thank the Minister for opening this debate today. It promises to be both an interesting and informative debate. I look forward to the maiden speech of my noble friend Lord Harper, who I had the pleasure of working with at the Department for Transport and who I know will make a considerable contribution to the debates in your Lordships’ House. My noble friend has previous ministerial experience in the area of immigration, and I look forward to his contribution later.
I begin by welcoming the fact that, after years of opposing measures to improve border security and clamp down on illegal migration, the Labour Party has finally realised the importance of greater control over our borders. There are some positive noises coming from the Government’s actions. Clause 41 grants the Secretary of State the ability to detain a person while they are pending a deportation decision. Clause 48 reinterprets the United Kingdom’s construction of Article 33 of the refugee convention to include conviction of an offence under the Sexual Offences Act 2003 in the list of offences that constitute particularly serious crimes for which refugees may be removed. This is, of course, right: no person who enters this country and commits a crime, regardless of their method of entry or their status, should be permitted to remain.
Unfortunately, that is where our agreement with the Bill ends. Although, as I have said, the Government have begun to move in the right direction, the Bill does too little, too slowly. It does nothing to deter illegal crossings, it does nothing to expedite the removal of illegal migrants, and it does nothing to reduce the scale of illegal immigration.
On that last point, I am very pleased to see the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics, which show that net migration to the UK for 2024 was 431,000—half the level of the previous year. This is all thanks to the efforts of the previous Conservative Government, as the ONS has acknowledged. Last year, my right honourable friend James Cleverly strengthened the Immigration Rules, raising the minimum income for those on skilled worker visas and family visas, and imposing a limit on the number of foreign students able to bring their dependants. It is clear that Conservative policies have delivered.
My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing this slightly uneven Bill. It is a Bill that is both heavy and light at the same time: it is heavy on the supply side, taking strong measures to deal with the smugglers and gangs, but it is light on actions to support asylum seekers on a safe journey to the United Kingdom. I start with an initial question for the Minister: is the intention of this Bill to stop dangerous journeys by boat and other ways, or is it to stop people coming to claim asylum? The answer to this question is critical to our understanding of the intention of this Bill.
We on these Benches support a controlled, humane, ordered and planned migration system, both stopping dangerous journeys and creating a safe route to asylum, with those who do not qualify for asylum being removed swiftly and humanely. For those in the margins, there are some who may be persuaded by the measures in this Bill. However, our concern must surely be for those who satisfy the grounds for asylum in the United Kingdom but currently have a negligible or non-existent way to enter this country safely. Of those who travel here by small boat, 74% are successful with their asylum claims—and that figure does not take any appeals into consideration.
The answer to my initial question is fundamental to understanding the Government’s intentions. We welcome the measures in the Bill aimed at tackling criminal gangs and reducing deaths in the channel. We support the scrapping of the safety of Rwanda Act and significant parts of the Illegal Migration Act. However, we are concerned that this Bill’s purely punitive approach will not achieve its aims. We must be honest about the range of interventions needed to bring change. Voters are tired of tougher talk on immigration that fails to deliver promised outcomes. As a country, we cannot afford the consequences of more broken government promises on this issue.
So, although prosecuting criminal gangs is essential, as long as desperate people seek refuge in the United Kingdom without alternative routes, demand will persist and criminals will profit. Given the strong push factors for those fleeing persecution in countries such as Sudan, Eritrea and Iran, we need interventions that change an individual’s calculation. Currently, paying a smuggler to bring them to safety is seen as the best, or the only, option available. We propose building on the successful UK resettlement scheme, which has already been referred to by the Minister, and family refugee reunion, along with a capped pilot for a humanitarian visa. Using the services of United Nations bodies in-country or close to in-country, this would allow those with a basis for a successful asylum claim to travel safely to the UK in order for their application to be considered. If the Government aim to reduce dangerous crossings, this would help; the Government would control an ordered, planned process and create an evidence base to evaluate such an approach. Safe routes are not an alternative to enforcement. They complement efforts to target criminal gangs. Both approaches must work together.
If I were to set our annual borders Bill debates to music, I would pick Stravinsky. It has become a rite of spring, with clashing discords from the Conservative Front Bench and ritual incantations that there can be a sacrifice of international law because we are a dualist system.
We had the Nationality and Borders Bill three years ago and the Illegal Migration Bill two years ago. Then there was the ultimate absurdity of the Rwanda Bill, where we were invited to close our eyes and, by magical thinking and Westminster decree, make Rwanda safe and make ineligible all those whom we sent to Rwanda ever to seek asylum here. The House liked none of those Bills, amended them all and was overruled every time. So it is a great pleasure to welcome the 2025 Bill, because I can find nothing in it which is in clear breach of international law—and this is the first in recent memory. Moreover, I particularly welcome Clause 37, which wipes away the stain on the statute book that was the Rwanda Act.
That is the good news—and it is very good—but the Bill is not all good news. Getting rid of the 2024 Act but only parts of the 2023 Act means that we are still left with some bits of the 2023 Act that some of us opposed, including its removal of modern slavery protections for trafficking victims coerced into criminality. We are also left with the default provisions of the 2022 Act, which many believe were, in some respects, contrary to what we like to think of as a national tradition of fairness; some of them are inhumane and others are illogical.
It is not humane that we should still be so reluctant to see families reunited, yet the May White Paper threatens to make reunions harder by imposing new language and financial tests. It is not right that Clause 31 of this Bill would deny legal redress to those unlawfully detained or that the broad powers that Clause 43 gives the Secretary of State on tagging and curfews are not tempered by legal safeguards of any kind. It is neither humane nor logical—as the noble Lord, Lord German, pointed out—that those waiting in the asylum queue should still be denied the right to find a job. Changing that would be a win-win: it would be good for them, the economy and the public purse; it would be bad only for the criminals preying on them in the black economy.
My Lords, I really enjoyed that speech. I was thinking more of the “1812 Overture” than the “Rite of Spring”, given how many borders and immigration Bills I have been through here and in the House of Commons. I congratulate my noble friend the Minister. I thank him for his openness and willingness to listen and to discuss with his right honourable friend the Home Secretary the issues that many of us are raising with him.
The Bill, together with the White Paper, has many good suggestions and ways forward. Quite a number have been mentioned already, including the removal of criminals from our country, which actually undermine the legitimacy of our border policy and the welcome that people in this country generally wish to give to asylum seekers.
It is wonderful that we are setting aside the legacy of Suella Braverman and the absurdity of the Rwanda suggestion. Now that it has gone, the Government have been able to start processing at some real speed. The Government have started to use this terrible Civil Service phrase that has crept into speeches as well as written material and letters, which is that they are “working at pace”. It is a terrible phrase. I really hope that people stop using it. It is a bit like “Stand ready”, which means “We are doing absolutely nothing”. We really have to talk normally. But the speeding up of the processing has been quite remarkable, as has the removal of people from the country who had no right to be here, and the Government deserve real credit for achieving that over the last 11 months. Asylum has now fallen substantially, which gives us a chance, I hope, to have rational and sensible debates about what needs to be done.
Mention has been made of More in Common, which is now the favoured political polling company. The truth is, and anybody who goes and speaks to people in communities such as the one I live in and used to represent knows, that it is the small boats crossing the channel that is worrying people. By its very nature it is going to worry them, not just because of the daily count and the reporting in the newspapers, but because of the danger and worry that people legitimately have for what is happening with organised criminality.
My Lords, it is my great privilege to follow the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, who is a person on those Benches I have the most respect for when he speaks about these subjects, which he does without cant and with a great deal of knowledge and credibility.
It is important to remember that although illegal immigration attracts the most public attention, it is only a fraction of total immigration. Legal immigration is continuing at a rate which dwarfs anything we have known in our history. Indeed, it dwarfs all previous waves of immigration put together, and it will transform our country by the middle of this century or soon after. It could mean that the indigenous population will be a minority, strangers in their own land, to coin a phrase. I think that will be as much regretted by those who have come to live in this country, who wanted to come here because of the traditions that had grown up over centuries and did not really want to see them dwarfed into minority status.
The case for mass immigration was economic; when made by Tony Blair, he claimed it was necessary to promote growth and fill vacancies. Over the two decades since then, we have experienced the highest influx of migration in our history, the slowest rate of growth since the Middle Ages, and vacancies have doubled. So the thesis was absolutely discredited. But illegal immigration raises moral rather than economic issues, and I want to ask a question about the moral basis which appears to underpin the Bill.
The Minister explained that this Bill does two main things. It purports to strengthen the measures to “smash the gangs”, which, if successful, would presumably prevent migrants reaching these shores, and it removes from the statute book the Rwanda Act, which aimed to deter migrants from coming here. Why is it morally acceptable to try to prevent people leaving the beaches of France to come to the UK, but immoral and unacceptable to deter them from leaving France to come here?
This Government are taking the necessary actions to secure our borders, to bring the immigration and asylum system under control and to go after the dangerous criminal gangs that undermine our border security. This legislation is part of that plan for change. The Government are determined to tackle irregular migration, to bring control back to our borders and to stop the appalling loss of life in the channel. It is also important that alongside this we have a properly functioning asylum and immigration system that delivers timely decisions for individuals and makes sure that those with no right to be here are removed.
The legislation before us will strengthen the UK’s border security. It is part of a serious, credible plan to protect UK border security that sees the Government working more closely with our international partners up stream and in our near neighbourhood, enhancing operational activity nationally and internationally and ensuring that our law enforcement and operational teams have the powers and tools they need to identify, disrupt and dismantle organised crime activity.
What are the key measures in the Bill? First, the Bill places a new Border Security Commander and his role on a statutory footing and clearly explains the functions that will allow this role to be an enduring one that brings together the skills and expertise of a variety of agencies to tackle the issues faced, united behind a set of border security priorities.
Secondly, the Bill establishes landmark new offences, contained within the legislation, which will provide law enforcement agencies working across border security with stronger powers to pursue, disrupt and deter organised immigration crime. This should not be a surprise to noble Lords, because in the election almost a year ago the Labour Party stood on a manifesto commitment to introduce new counterterrorism-style powers that will give law enforcement the ability to tackle those involved in putting lives in danger and threatening UK border security. This Bill will deliver the new offences.
Among the new offences is one to ensure that action is taken against those who endanger others during sea crossings to the UK. These crossings are exceptionally dangerous, and I regret the loss of life we have seen even this year. The Government are determined to prevent such loss of life in the channel with these new powers.
The Bill will also create new powers to seize and search electronic devices where there is suspicion of involvement in organised immigration crime activity. This will build a better picture for law enforcement agencies investigating the activity of gangs. The Bill will ensure that data-sharing capabilities will be expanded to assist in developing the intelligence picture of organised immigration crime and other threats, make it easier for public agencies to share information and enhance the ability to act. For example, measures to allow the DVLA to share trailer data and for HMRC to share customs data will enhance the work of Border Force.
The Bill’s biometric provisions will provide greater flexibility when taking biometrics from individuals who are part of a UK evacuation. They will allow for the provision of biometrics at ports in Scotland, fixing the situation that has developed where law enforcement officials are needing to drive to a police station to carry out this task.
Measures in the Bill also focus on serious and organised crime and make it clear that it will be an offence to possess the articles named in the Bill, which we know are used in criminality and which harm communities. There is also an expansion of the serious crime prevention order regime, introducing new interim orders which will allow law enforcement to act immediately to tackle criminality where it occurs.
The Bill will strengthen the immigration and asylum systems as a whole. The Government had a clear manifesto commitment to end the wasteful migration and economic development partnership with Rwanda and use that funding to set up our new Border Security Command, led by Martin Hewitt.
Let me be completely clear: the Government’s plans in the previous Parliament to deal with Rwanda were wholly unworkable. They were going to cost the taxpayer billions of pounds and would never have dealt with the sheer number of migrants we are seeing in the channel. Around £700 million has been spent to date, and it is time to close it down. Only four people left the United Kingdom under the Rwanda scheme, and they left voluntarily. The legislation before us, as a manifesto commitment, repeals the costly and unworkable measure introduced by the previous Government and introduces new provisions to start to address the real challenges faced, to tackle harm and to build a more efficient and robust asylum and immigration system.
Beyond the provisions that repeal the safety of Rwanda Act and huge swathes of the Illegal Migration Act, the Bill will equip the Immigration Services Commissioner with the tools they need to identify and tackle abuses within the immigration advice sector. Under the Bill, the Immigration Advice Authority will have new powers to fine or suspend those who provide poor-quality advice to those going through the immigration process, restoring trust in the system—I hope and believe—by tackling such poor practice.
In this extensive Bill, we are also introducing measures that aim to begin taking the action needed to ensure a properly functioning, effective immigration system. The Bill will introduce a new, 24-week statutory timeline for appeals as part of the Government’s work to tackle the enormous backlog of cases we have inherited. To assist cases to move through the system and to provide individuals with clarity on outcomes, cases where the individual is in asylum accommodation—at great taxpayer expense—and cases of non-detained foreign national offenders will be prioritised as far as practically possible.
The Bill also provides for greater protections against harm in our communities, supporting—as I know noble Lords will support—the removal of foreign national criminals and ensuring that sexual offences are treated with the seriousness they deserve. For example, those convicted of Schedule 3 offences will not benefit from refugee protections in the United Kingdom. We recognise the devastating impact that these offences have on victims and our communities, and we as a Government are determined that individuals who commit them cannot benefit from our protections.
Stronger conditions will be placed on those who pose a threat pending their removal from the United Kingdom. These measures mean that those who do not qualify for asylum or protection under the refugee convention but cannot be removed due to obligations in law can have certain conditions placed upon them if they pose a threat to the public. This is another measure to try to keep our communities safer.
We are strengthening the detention powers available to the Home Office when an individual is subject to deportation on the basis that their presence in the United Kingdom is not conducive to the public good. This measure removes ambiguity around when powers may be used.
Extending the right-to-work scheme to those who fall under other working relationships will crack down on those working illegally, many of whom are being exploited for cheap labour. It is an objective of the Government to try to drive down that cheap labour market, which is an underbelly in our communities at large.
Finally, changes to the EU settlement scheme, which will be welcomed by a number of noble Lords, will confirm as a matter of UK law what the UK has sought to do in practice since the beginning of this scheme; namely, to ensure that all EU citizens and their family members with status under the scheme have equal rights in the United Kingdom.
The main priority of the Bill is to protect the UK’s border and to make changes to enable a properly functioning immigration and asylum system. We are ensuring that those with a genuine right to be here are properly supported, while those who have no legal right to remain in the UK do not abuse the system and undermine the protections that the UK has a long history of providing to those in need.
We have a responsibility to the British people, who rightly expect our borders to be secure and our laws to be enforced, and we have a moral duty to prevent further tragedies at the hands of criminal gangs. The plan before us is a clear, impactful plan for change. The Bill will restore order and trust to our immigration and asylum system, and provide law enforcement with the tools that they need to be able to tackle the people-smuggling gangs who exploit individuals and place them in perilous situations in the channel. This Government are committed to a fully functioning system, and we will debate migration as a whole in the White Paper in due course.
The Bill is about protecting those who need it, swiftly removing those with no right to be here and cracking down on criminal gangs. To date, since the Government were elected, the National Crime Agency has seized 600 boats and engines, taken down 18,000 social media accounts, ensured that 30,000 people have been returned since the election, including a 23% increase in enforced returns of foreign national offenders, and is taking action on illegal working visits and arrests, increased by 40% and 42% respectively. But the Government need more powers to improve their performance on illegal migration. The Bill before the House today gives those powers to the agencies to make that difference. I beg to move.
Let us look at what this Government have promised and what they have delivered. The 2024 Labour Party manifesto promised to
“turn the page and restore order to the asylum system so that it operates swiftly, firmly, and fairly; and the rules are properly enforced”.
Yet the Government have presided over the highest asylum figures recorded in a single quarter, with 31,276 people claiming asylum between September and December 2024. The number of people being given a grant of protection has increased to 17,477 in quarter 4 of 2024, up from 7,185 in quarter 2 of 2024. They have reversed the progress made by the previous Government in reducing asylum claims.
Not only this but the Government pledged to close all asylum hotels. After the previous Government reduced the number of asylum seekers housed in hotels to 29,585 by 30 June 2024, since the election those numbers have jumped to 38,079 on 31 December 2024, representing a rise of 22.3%. This begs the question: when will they end the use of asylum hotels, as they promised in their manifesto?
We heard time and again during the election, and indeed ever since, that the Government will “smash the gangs”, but it is now evident that this slogan was mere hyperbole. Can the Minister tell me how many gangs have been smashed by the policies of this Government? I look forward to receiving those figures, perhaps in his closing speech.
The Minister was keen to highlight the new role of the Border Security Commander and their counterterrorism-style powers. However, Clause 1(1) states that:
“The Secretary of State must designate a civil servant as the Border Security Commander”.
Clauses 3, 4 and 5 state the functions of the commander, the duty to prepare annual reports and the duties of co-operation, and that is it. What the Government have presented us with is simply a redesignated civil servant without the powers to command anything. That extends across the whole Bill.
The Government have talked up this legislation as comprising tough new measures to tackle the people-smuggling gangs, yet they are repealing two pieces of legislation which would have had that exact effect. Clauses 37 and 38 repeal the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Act 2024 and the Illegal Migration Act 2023. The safety of Rwanda Act, ably taken through your Lordships’ House by my noble friend Lord Sharpe of Epsom, would have—had it not been scrapped the day the first flight was due to take off—provided a suitable deterrent to those considering taking the journey across the channel.
The Minister has pointed to the Government’s focus on the people-smuggling gangs which facilitate channel crossings. We agree that those gangs must be pursued, for theirs is a repulsive trade, but it is not enough to simply tackle supply; we must also tackle demand. While there are large numbers of people who are undeterred from paying the traffickers, the trade will continue.
The Rwanda scheme was the deterrent that would have hit that demand for small boat crossings. This built on the work of the Illegal Migration Act 2023, and I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Murray of Blidworth for steering through that legislation, which created an obligation for the Home Secretary to remove any person who arrives illegally and prevented illegal entrants claiming asylum.
The previous Conservative Government struck a returns deal with Albania, which meant that the number of illegal arrivals of Albanian nationals fell from 12,658 in 2022 to just 924 in 2023. That is a 93% reduction in Albanian nationals illegally crossing the channel.
If the Government are serious about reducing illegal migration, why remove the deterrents that the Conservative Government legislated for? We can see the effects of the Government’s policies already; noble Lords will have seen the figures over the weekend. On 31 May, 1,194 migrants crossed the channel in small boats—the highest figure for a single day this year. This brings the total number of migrants who have crossed in small boats so far this year to 14,811; that is a 42% increase on the same point last year.
This Bill not only undoes much of that work but fails to provide suitable alternatives. The offence of endangering another during a sea crossing, as created by Clause 18, is unlikely to have any real impact because it can be committed only if a person has already committed an offence under subsections (A1), (B1), (D1) or (E1) of Section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971—offences that were inserted into that Act by the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, which my noble friend the Opposition Chief Whip took through this House. Moreover, Section 25 of the Immigration Act 1971 already makes it an offence to assist or facilitate unlawful entry into the United Kingdom—an offence that is punishable by life sentence thanks to the changes made by my noble friend in the Nationality and Borders Act.
Furthermore, the powers contained in Clauses 20, 21 and 23, authorising officers to search, seize and access electronic devices, already exist in Section 15 of and Schedule 2 to the Illegal Migration Act, which the Government are repealing. Would it not make more sense to keep the existing powers, rather than repealing them and replacing them with something that is virtually identical? Of course, they would not have to include these “new” powers if they were not in the same Bill repealing Section 15 of and Schedule 2 to the Illegal Migration Act.
It is apparent that this Bill presents a missed opportunity. Even after this legislation becomes law, activist lawyers will still be able to use the Human Rights Act to bring vexatious claims against the Government to prevent the legitimate removal of those who have abused our immigration system, entered the country illegally and committed criminal offences. The Government should follow our policy of disapplying the Human Rights Act in relation to immigration law, thereby ensuring the timely removal of those with no right to be here. The Government have indicated that they are willing to shift in this direction. The immigration White Paper states that the interpretation of Article 8 of the convention must be reconsidered; even the Attorney-General has indicated that he is open to reinterpreting the convention as well.
This Bill also presents the Government with the opportunity to tighten the conditions for visas and indefinite leave to remain. The Immigration and Visas Bill, presented by my right honourable friend the shadow Home Secretary, would ensure that indefinite leave to remain can be granted only if the applicant’s salary does not fall below £38,700 and if they do not apply for any form of state benefits. Being granted the ability to remain in the UK indefinitely is a privilege, not a right. As such, we believe that those wishing to obtain that privilege should have made a net contribution to our country. Raising the threshold for receiving earned settlement would ensure precisely that. Given the Government’s new-found vim and vigour for more stringent controls of legal migration, I am sure that they will be amenable to such policies.
Let us not forget that reducing the level of net migration to the UK is overwhelmingly backed by the British people. Polling by More in Common has found that 65% of the public believe that immigration should be reduced. I should add that that stretches to supporters of all political parties, given that 57% of Liberal Democrat voters and 49% of Labour voters support cutting immigration. Further, 62% of the public, including 61% of Liberal Democrats and 50% of Labour voters, agree that it is too easy for people to live here illegally. We would all do well to remember that this is the voice of the British public, and it is precisely what they are demanding of their parliamentarians.
This Bill does not deliver what the British people desire or deserve. Where are the powers to prevent vexatious legal challenges being used to thwart legitimate removals? Where are the powers to ensure the deportation of all foreign criminals? Where is the deterrent? Where are the measures to bring down the level of net migration? The answer, of course, is that they are simply not there. These are glaring omissions that could and should be fixed by your Lordships as the Bill progresses. We on these Benches will be seeking to strengthen this Bill to deliver on the British people’s priorities; I hope that the Government will want to follow suit.
We are rightly concerned at the expenditure costs of maintaining and accommodating the nearly a quarter of a million people, which includes those going through appeals, in the processing backlog. In our view, the Government have missed the opportunity to include in this legislation permission to allow asylum seekers to work after three months. Although we welcome the 13% decline in the asylum backlog, the proportion of people waiting six months or more for a decision has risen sharply over the past decade, going from 25% at the end of 2014 to 59% at the end of 2024. When the current working ban was introduced by the Labour Government in 2002, the argument about processing times was identical—a six-month target to process applications, after which those granted asylum were able to work—but the six-month target was not met then and is not being met now.
Allowing asylum seekers to work would help reduce the asylum support budget, the use of hotels and child poverty. It would assist local authorities in supporting newly recognised refugees. If someone has a job, they are more likely to support themselves quickly, reducing homelessness and state benefits claims. It would also improve cohesion between host communities and asylum seekers if they are seen to be “paying their way”. Visible delivery is what the Government need, and this policy could contribute to that, especially if communities saw hotels being closed.
The Government have never produced any evidence that suggests that employment rights play a role in determining people’s choice of destination when seeking safety; the evidence in fact shows that employment rights are largely unknown to asylum seekers before they arrive in the United Kingdom. We have one of the most restrictive working policies compared to our European neighbours. Lifting the ban on work would align the UK with other OECD member states. In countries such as France, Spain, Italy and Germany, asylum seekers gain the right to work much earlier—after six months, three months, or even less. Faster application processing and enhanced working rights should be complementary policies. That is why we also seek a three-month service standard for asylum decisions.
We welcome the Government’s repeal of Sections 31 to 35 of the Illegal Migration Act. However, if integration is the ultimate goal for us as a society, we should not choke off a person’s chance to become a British citizen simply on the basis of how they arrived in the United Kingdom. Recent updates to the Nationality: Good Character Requirement guidance limit access to citizenship for refugees who entered the UK irregularly. This is counterproductive to integration and cohesion for those settled in the UK. The unclear policy guidance deters refugees from applying for citizenship due to the risk of wasting thousands of pounds if the application is refused out of hand.
We have deep concerns about the expansion and retention of Section 59 of the Illegal Migration Act on the safe country list. The list is problematic when decision-makers must declare asylum claims inadmissible from countries listed even where there is evidence of persecution. An example of that is Georgia, where its Members of Parliament are being locked up because they have offended the current Government. That country has been sanctioned by the UK for human rights abuses. This means that individualised assessment of asylum claims is essential and necessary. Countries may be safe for some people, but not always for all people.
We are concerned that the Bill retains and expands the detention powers in the Illegal Migration Act without implementing the safeguards recommended by the Brook House inquiry. We remain deeply concerned about immigration detention and the lack of progress since the Brook House report’s recommendations. Recent reports by the Chief Inspector of Prisons on Harmondsworth indicate ongoing significant concerns. Poor processes and case progression result in people being detained when removal is not imminent and for longer than necessary in unacceptable conditions. Vulnerable people are detained when they should not be. The indefinite nature of detention causes particular harm and places no pressure on the Home Office to deal swiftly with cases. For those reasons, we will seek to amend the Bill with a 28-day time limit on detention, following recommendations from the Home Affairs Committee, the Joint Committee on Human Rights and the joint inquiry by the APPGs on migration and on refugees. This would reduce unnecessary and unlawful detention and ensure that it is used sparingly and only when removal is imminent and realistic.
We are also concerned that the criminal offences in Clauses 13 to 16 and 18 are too broad and risk criminalising those seeking asylum rather than solely targeting criminal gangs. We will seek to amend these clauses in Committee. My noble friend Lady Hamwee will expand on the modern slavery implications of the Bill later.
Finally, there is much to be done to secure action across our part of this continent. Resetting our relationship with the EU and its agencies is still in its headline stages. My noble friend Lady Ludford will examine these issues later.
I return to where I started: the fundamental question of supply and demand and the Bill being light on its ability to change asylum seeker behaviour. While the Bill may make a dent in the ability of the smuggling gangs to operate, it fails to answer the question of how we plan a safe way to manage those seeking asylum in our country. The Bill has a number of good points, many missing points and some major areas of concern—and we will try to deal with those areas during the course of our debates.
I will make two further general points. Changing the rules of the game mid-match is usually not right. I find the retroactivity in Clause 31 particularly worrying. My inbox and Friday’s Financial Times remind me that a much larger community is worried about the potential retrospective application of the proposed change tucked away in paragraphs 264 and 266 of the White Paper.
People here on work visas, which they obtained under the points-based system, have had the right to apply after five years for indefinite leave to remain, but the White Paper suggests that in future this will be 10 years. Is that just for new arrivals, or does it mean that those already here will have to stay in limbo for another five years? The uncertainty about whether their uncertainty is to be extended is worrying many, as my inbox shows.
Retrospection would be unfair—it usually is. If retrospection is not the intention, it would be very good if the Minister could reassure the many who are worried. The FT tells us that 1.5 million people are worried about the Government’s intention. I very much hope he can reassure them and will do so.
Finally, back on asylum, it bears repeating that the best way of stopping the boats and putting the criminals out of business is to provide safe and legal routes to sanctuary. But for many with a justifiable, “well-founded fear of persecution”, in the words of the convention, in practice we provide no such route. Take Sudan, the world’s biggest current humanitarian catastrophe, worse even than Gaza. Sudan used to be our responsibility and should be on our conscience. There is a large Sudanese diaspora in this country, but for those now fleeing the civil war, carnage and starvation there, there is realistically no official or safe way they can apply to join Sudanese people here. Virtually 100% of those who do get here, coming by unofficial routes and seeking asylum, are granted asylum, such is the obvious horror they have left behind. It is our fault that they have to come as they do, with many dying en route. It does not need a Bill to put that right, but it really should be put right soon.
My suggestions, which have not yet been taken up, are twofold. One is that the new relationship with the President of France that has been developed by the Prime Minister could lead us to develop a licensing scheme for parts of boats so that they could not be purchased, transported or sold to people in France. That would immediately have a major impact on the ability of the French to intervene in the warehouses and transportation. The other would be that we build on Clause 45 of the Bill, which provides for electronic visas and documentation. Given that we have got the new NHS moves to digitalisation, the DVLA electronic programme, the unique pupil identifier and the so-called government digital wallet, it is time we had a sensible identity system for everyone, and that way, we could stop illegal working and access to public services by those who did not have the right to be here.
I have a real worry about the attitude on naturalisation in the Bill and the White Paper. Naturalisation is something we should be strongly in favour of. I have had very good discussions with my noble friend the Minister about this, and I understand the difficulties he faces. Because we are setting aside the awful legislation that we had to deal with, there is no legitimacy in or excuse for saying that those whose assigned claims can be processed should not be able to move in exactly the same way as others towards naturalisation. It is really unfortunate because it undermines our credibility in every other area in which we are now taking steps to reassure the world that we are committed to our international obligations and to the way in which we carry through our legal requirements.
I ask the Minister to please think again because it is bad for integration. Why would people want to stay here and not want to integrate? If they want to go home that is absolutely fine. The real problem now is people who are here legitimately on other visas, who then attempt to claim asylum when their visa stay is over. We could deal with that very easily by ruling out asylum for those whose country of origin has not had any material changes in terms of the threat to their life and the danger to their liberty. So let us try to get some balance into this at the same time as very strongly welcoming the measures that are being taken.
I have one final, small thing to ask my noble friend the Minister: please go back to the White Paper and set aside the notion of a surcharge on overseas students. It is a particularly pernicious and unpleasant measure, and unless the Home Office and the Department for Education get their act together and understand that when people pay for a service, when that service is provided at full cost when those costs allow us to cross-reference into research and to maintain our university system, we retain our reputation across the world. When we start to pull the plug on it, we do ourselves damage for no good reason whatever. I have not met anybody, even a Reform voter, who thinks it is a bad idea to encourage overseas students to pay large sums of money to receive a service and then to go back home and tell the world what a wonderful place the United Kingdom really is.
We know that prevention does not work—Saturday saw nearly 1,200 people arrive by boat in a single day. Most measures in the Bill, supposedly designed to beef up prevention, appear trivial. The border security commander will be made statutory, but he will have no troops to command, only the power to convene existing operational agencies, which, I would have thought, was the duty of the Minister. He will have to produce a strategy—a frank admission by the Government that they do not themselves have a strategy. But even if these measures have some practical impact, it is clear that tens of thousands of asylum seekers will continue to cross the channel—unless, that is, the Government succeed in smashing the gangs. Then what happens? Does that mean that no asylum seekers would be able to reach this country, and there would be no one to facilitate their journey, or would they be able to come without the help of the gangs? In which case, why do they not do that now, if these gangs are so cruel, vile and horrible? There is a clear conflict within the Government’s policy. Either their policy will work, in which case it will stop people getting here and claiming asylum, or, as we know, it will not really work and will have precious little effect.
By contrast, we know that deterrence can work. Once it was made clear that Albanians would be returned to Albania, the number of arrivals from that country, or at least purporting to be from that country, plummeted. When Australia demonstrated the certainty of being returned to Indonesian waters, the influx into Australia ended. At present, given the choice between staying in France and coming to England, many migrants are prepared to take the risky crossing. But does anyone believe that, if they knew the choice was not between France and Britain but between France and Rwanda, they would opt for Rwanda? They would stay in the EU, if not in France. So, prevention will not stop illegal immigration, which means lives will continue to be lost, whereas deterrence has the potential to start to work and therefore save lives. So I repeat my question: why is prevention morally acceptable but deterrence immoral and unacceptable?
The Minister asserted that the Rwanda scheme was unworkable. He did not explain why or in what ways. Those who operated the Australian system believe that Rwanda is eminently workable, and other countries are looking at it and are attracted to it. But in any case, it is a bit rich to say that the Rwanda scheme would not work when prevention manifestly has not worked here or anywhere else.
The noble Lord, Lord German, speaking for the Liberal Democrats, argued that we should create safe and legal routes. That is often presented as if it is largely going to solve the problem of migration. The noble Lord, Lord Kerr, argued the same; it is indeed a springtime tune from him, or rather, he advocates safe and legal routes in all seasons. The suggestion is that somehow, the people who would have come by boat will come by these safe and legal routes. Some of them might but many would not, and many would be refused and would then still want to come via the boats. But, once these safe and legal routes are established, many other people who at present do not attempt or consider attempting the crossing will apply. So the total number of people coming is bound to increase significantly.
I would like to know whether those who are advocating this as if it is a soft option would be happy to see these additional people coming by safe and legal routes ending up in Liberal Democrat constituencies, for example. I suspect they would find that their voters—who are never told at the local level that it is Lib Dem policy to increase the number of people coming to this country—would be very unhappy about what is proposed.