Illegal Migration

With permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will make a statement on illegal migration.

The Government have made it our top priority to stop the boats, because these crossings are not only illegal, dangerous and unnecessary, but deeply unfair. They are unfair on those who are genuinely in need of resettlement, as our finite capacity is taken up by people—overwhelmingly young men—coming to the UK directly from a place of safety in France, but most of all they are unfair on the law-abiding British public who face the real-world consequences of illegal migration through housing waiting lists, strained public services and, at times, serious community cohesion challenges, and it is the interests of the British public that we have a duty to advance.

We have developed what is among the most comprehensive and robust plans to tackle illegal migration in Europe, and over the last year the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and I have focused on delivering it. The plan starts with taking the fight to the people-smuggling gangs upstream, long before they are even in striking distance of the United Kingdom. We have already doubled the funds for the organised immigration crime work of the National Crime Agency, and at a meeting of the European Political Community earlier this month the Prime Minister announced new, tailored initiatives with Belgium, Bulgaria and Serbia, which come in addition to the enhanced strategic partnerships that we have already agreed this year with Italy and Turkey. Our two agreements with the French Government have elevated our co-operation to unprecedented levels. This is degrading the organised immigration crime groups, and in the last few weeks new physical barriers have been installed to make it considerably harder for the flimsy dinghies to be launched.

As we are increasing disruption abroad, so we are restoring deterrence at home. We are breaking the link between arriving here illegally and a life in the UK. The number of removals of those with no right to be in the UK has increased by more than 75% in comparison with last year’s figure. Since we struck our enhanced returns agreement with Albania in December, we have returned more than 4,100 Albanian immigration offenders, and, as I saw for myself in Tirana last month, some of those individuals are being returned home in as little as 48 hours.

In August we announced the biggest shake-up in a decade of the penalties imposed on rogue employers and landlords who encourage illegal migration by hiring or renting to illegal migrants, and as we proceed with that, more unscrupulous businesses are getting the knock on the door. We have increased the number of enforcement raids by more than two thirds since this point last year. The surge has led to a doubling in the number of fines imposed on employers, and has tripled the number issued to landlords. However, for those who are complicit in the business model of the people smugglers, severe financial penalties are not enough, which is why we have dramatically increased the number of company directors who have been disqualified for allowing illegal working.

Our concerted efforts at home and abroad are making progress. For the first time since the phenomenon of small boat arrivals began four years ago, they are down by more than a fifth in comparison with those in the equivalent period in 2022, and in recent months we have seen still further falls—and let me dispel the myth peddled by some of our increasingly desperate opponents that that is because of the weather. The weather conditions this year were more favourable to small boat crossings than those in 2022, but we have still seen a marked decrease. By contrast, in the year to June 2023 detections of irregular border crossings at the external borders of Europe increased by a third, and irregular arrivals in Italy from across the Mediterranean have almost doubled. However, we must and will go further to stop the boats altogether. We remain confident of the legality of our Rwanda partnership and its ability to break the business model of the people smuggling gangs once and for all, and we look forward to the judgment of the Supreme Court. As the success of our Albania returns agreement has shown, with swift removals driving a 90% reduction in the number of illegal migrants seeking to enter the UK, deterrence works.

The real-world impacts of illegal migration on our communities have been raised many times in the Chamber. One of the most damaging manifestations of this problem has been the use of hotels to meet our statutory obligation to house those who arrive illegally and would otherwise be destitute. Ever since the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and I assumed office a year ago, we have made it clear that that is completely unacceptable and must end as soon as practicable. Those hotels should be assets for their local communities, serving businesses and tourists and hosting the life events that we treasure, such as weddings and birthdays, rather than housing illegal migrants at an unsustainable cost to the taxpayer.

We therefore took immediate action a year ago to reduce our reliance on hotels. We significantly increased the amount of dispersed accommodation, and we have increased funding for local councils. We reformed the management of the existing estate: by optimising double rooms and increasing the number of people sharing rooms we have created thousands of additional beds, and in doing so have avoided the need for a further 72 hotels. We have mobilised the large disused military sites that are more appropriate, and have worked closely with local authorities to ensure that they have less impact on communities. We are in the process of a re-embarkation on the barge in Portland, and, as of 23 October, occupancy had reached approximately 50 individuals. That will continue as planned, in a phased manner, in the days and weeks ahead.

Nearly a year on, as a result of the progress we have made to stop the boats, I can inform the House that today the Home Office wrote to local authorities and Members of Parliament to inform them that we will now be exiting the first asylum hotels—hotels in all four nations of the United Kingdom. The first 50 exits will begin in the coming days and will be complete by the end of January, with more tranches to follow shortly. But we will not stop there: we will continue to deliver on our strategy to stop the boats, and we will be able to exit more hotels. As we exit those hotels, we are putting in place dedicated resources to facilitate the orderly and effective management of the process and limit the impact on local communities.

We made a clear commitment to the British public to stop the boats, not because it would be easy but because it was, and remains, the right thing to do. We are making solid progress, and our commitment to this task is as strong as ever. We will continue to act in the interests of the law-abiding majority, who expect and deserve secure borders, and I commend this statement to the House.

I call the shadow Minister.

I thank the Minister for advance sight of his statement.

At the time of the last election, the asylum backlog had already spiralled under Conservative mismanagement, but the number of small boats crossing the channel was close to zero, as was the number of emergency hotels being used. If we fast-forward four years, we see before us a picture of Tory boats chaos. For the third year running, more than 25,000 people have crossed the channel in small boats, while the number of hotels being used is about 400, at an eye-watering cost to the taxpayer of £8 million a day—higher than the cost last year. And what is the Government’s response? A Rwanda plan, but they have sent more Home Secretaries than asylum seekers to Rwanda; an Illegal Migration Act that is counterproductive and has not even been brought into full force yet; and a new barge that was meant to bring down hotel costs, but has only added to them. Also, the military bases promised by the Prime Minister last December are still not ready. All of this has left the Prime Minister with an asylum strategy this summer that was less akin to the Australian asylum model that he is so desperate to replicate and more in tune with the Australian cricket team during this summer’s Ashes: cross your fingers and pray for rain. Surely the Prime Minister knows that this was the wettest summer since 1912, and surely he recognises the impact that this had on small boat crossings.

The Government also like to claim to be bringing the backlog down, but it stands at 176,000. They like to talk about a legacy backlog, but this is just nonsense. It is a figment of the Prime Minister’s imagination. He is taking last year’s workload but ignoring this year’s workload. The backlog is the backlog is the backlog. You can slice the cake however you want and spin it however you want, but the cake is still the same size: 176,000 in the last quarterly figures—up, not down. As for those who are being processed and rejected—slowly, it must be said, at half the productivity of seven years ago—are they actually being returned? Removals are down 70% since Labour left office, with a 40,000 removals backlog.

So it is all down to the weather again. Every time I come to this Chamber, it is about the weather. The hon. Gentleman is becoming the Michael Fish of British politics: he always gets the forecasts wrong. The truth is that he cannot bear to admit that our plan is actually starting to work. Returns are up, raids are up, productivity is up 10 times and, above all, small boat arrivals are down. We are closing hotels; he wants to open our borders. The Government will never elevate the interests of illegal migrants over those of the hard-working taxpayers of this country. That is what we hold in our minds every day in this job, and that is the difference between the Labour party and this Government.

We used to think that the Labour party had no plan, but now we know that it does not even want to stop the boats. In the summer, the Leader of the Opposition said that, even if the Rwanda plan was working, he would still scrap it. How telling was that? Even if we were securing our borders, he would scrap it and wave people into our country. He also said on his fabled trip to Europe that he would strike a new deal with the EU, which would bring thousands of people into the country. The new towns that he announced at the Labour party conference would be filled with illegal migrants. We will never do that. The Labour party’s strategy is to force the British public to grudgingly accept mass migration. We disagree. We believe that the British public believe in secure borders and that they want a robust and fair immigration and asylum system. Our plan is working. Don’t let Labour ruin it.

Any day when an Immigration Minister can come to this House and give us good news is a day for celebration. My right hon. Friend and his team are to be commended for the hard work that has gone into the successes he has outlined today, and I hope that Ashford will benefit from one of the forthcoming tranches of hotels being closed. Can he also say whether the extra resources that have clearly gone into clearing the long-term backlog are still available, so that we will be able to cope with the constant flow that one gets of asylum seekers and not see any future backlogs building up?

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his good advice and wise counsel. He had to clear up the mess left by the last Labour Government, so he knows how challenging these situations can be. We have put in place more resource. We met our target of 2,500 additional caseworkers to manage the asylum system. When I stood at this Dispatch Box in my first week in this role, the Home Office was making around 400 decisions a week. We are now making 4,500 a week, and I commend the civil servants at the Home Office who have driven that extraordinary improvement in management, grip and productivity. But we on this side of the House do not believe that we can grant our way out of this challenge; we have to stop the boats in the first place. That is why true deterrence is so critical, and it is why our Rwanda partnership, which Labour has tried to frustrate at every opportunity, is so important to securing our borders.

I call the SNP spokesman.

The Minister will know that Mears has recently signed a contract with a hotel in Glasgow South West, so perhaps he can update us on the status of that contract. He has mentioned the backlog. Not everyone in a hotel in asylum accommodation is illegal; some will be successful in being granted refugee status. Can he tell us what discussions he is having with local authorities—I am thinking of Glasgow City Council in particular—on supporting and providing financial support for those successful refugees who will have to leave their hotel or asylum accommodation following a decision? Will he meet me and my Glasgow colleagues to discuss this issue?

Can the Minister tell us the estimated total operational and associated costs of this new system that he is creating, including barges, military sites, detention facilities and removal centres, alongside the proposed Rwanda deportations? Finally, an investigation by “The News Agents” has found that people traffickers say they are having an easier time sending small boats across the channel because of Brexit, which removed biometric system sharing and pan-European co-operation. What steps is he taking to create a returns agreement with the European Union, binding closer alignment with the EU and system sharing?

Far be it from me to cast doubt on the journalism of “The News Agents”, but I disagree with the premise of the hon. Gentleman’s question. In this role, I have come to the view that leaving the European Union was more important than ever because the migration crisis being faced by Europe today, which is likely to grow every year in the years and decades to come, will be very significant and challenging. The ability to control our own borders and make our own decisions is critical for the future of this country.

With respect to the situation in Glasgow, I would be happy to meet the hon. Gentleman there. Glasgow has had a high preponderance of asylum seekers, as he will know, but that was the choice of the Scottish Government. To my eyes, they did not want to house asylum seekers in other parts of Scotland. That is now changing, but it does mean that there will be a particular challenge in his community and I would be happy to meet him to discuss that.

I commend my right hon. Friend and the Home Secretary for the real progress that is now evident. It may not be sufficient for many at the moment, but the real issue is, as I believe the French are now beginning to understand—I would like confirmation on that, if it is true—that the Human Rights Act, in our case, and the European convention on human rights and the refugee convention are not only a European problem but a global problem. Does my right hon. Friend believe that the French are going to make real changes on this? Is he in discussions with them? As I have said for many years now, unless we sort this out, the tangible benefits will not be as evident as they could be.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his support over the last year, in particular with our landmark Illegal Migration Act 2023. He is right to say—this is a point I made in a speech at Policy Exchange earlier this year and the Home Secretary made in a speech in Washington more recently—that the international framework, whether it be the European convention on human rights or the refugee convention, although undoubtedly well intentioned at the time, is now in need of serious reform. Today we find ourselves in a world in which hundreds of millions of people are on the move and eligible for refugee status. The situation is incomparable to the one we experienced in the immediate aftermath of the second world war.

The signatories and authors of those documents would be appalled to see some of the abuses we see in our present system, which frustrates our ability to support those who are truly in need and fleeing war and persecution. Across Government, the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and I are raising this with all our partners and allies at every opportunity.

At the Public Accounts Committee in July, Home Office officials told me that the Government were paying for 5,000 empty hotel beds as a buffer in case of an upsurge in people travelling across the channel. Could the Minister update the House on how many empty hotel beds the Government are currently paying for?

I would hope the right hon. Lady welcomes today’s news that, as a result of the good progress we have made on reducing small boat crossings, we are now in a position to begin closing those hotels. It is true that the Home Office kept a proportion of hotels precisely to ensure that we did not find ourselves in the position we saw last autumn, when I took on this position and we had problems at the Manston facility in Kent. As a result of the significantly fewer numbers crossing the channel this year, those beds have not been necessary, which is one of the many contributory factors behind our ability to start closing the hotels.

The Minister and the Home Secretary are to be commended for their crusade against devilish people smugglers, dodgy lawyers and deluded interest groups, but will he acknowledge that the bar needs to be raised for asylum applications? Far more applicants are granted asylum in this country than the European average. The standard of proof needs to be improved.

Does the Minister also accept that, while these improved numbers are to be welcomed, the asylum system needs fundamental change so that it is only for people in genuine fear of persecution, and so that economic migrants who just want a better life cannot come here using asylum as justification?

I strongly agree with my right hon. Friend. The Home Secretary and I are driven by two ambitions that must come together. One is efficiency in the system, and the other is rigour and integrity. We have to ensure that, as we process claims faster than ever before, we are rigorous in interrogating the evidence and weeding out those individuals who have absolutely no right to be here in the United Kingdom. We want to ensure that the UK is a place of refuge for those in genuine peril, but not a home for economic migrants. It has to be said that a very large proportion of the people coming to the UK are, in one form or another, economic migrants. At the very least they are asylum shoppers, because almost all of them come from a place of evident safety in France.

The Minister has heard me say before that the use of hotels serves nobody. It does not serve the taxpayer, it does not serve local communities and it certainly does not serve those people seeking refuge in this country, so the fact the hotels are to be stopped is good news. Can he give me some indication of where the hotel in Knowsley fits into his timetable? Does he agree that people need to tone down their rhetoric and stop peddling false narratives about what is going on with refugees? Frankly, all that does is worsen community relations.