Katie Lam MP: speeches

Speeches

• 24 Mar 2025 · Chancel Repair (Church Commissioners' Liability) Measure (HC 773) Church Funds Investment Measure (HC 772) · Hansard source

  More

  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Jeremy. The Church of England has been at the heart of our national life for centuries. It is our national Church and it plays an important role in many of the great ceremonies and occasions that bring our country together. Even in an age of increasing secularisation, parish churches are a central organising pillar of many of our communities. For many, especially for people who live in villages like those in my constituency, the Weald of Kent, the parish church is where we meet, celebrate, marry and grieve. The Church of England is also arguably Britain’s largest heritage organisation. It is responsible for the upkeep of more than 16,000 church buildings, more than 12,500 of which are listed by Historic England in recognition of their enormous historical and architectural value. Given the Church’s continued significance in our national life, the financial decisions taken by and on behalf of the Church are a matter of significant public interest. I am therefore heartened that we have an opportunity to debate the Measures before us today, which provide some transparency for the public around the Church of England’s finances and the legal liability for chancel repair. It is right that there should be clear, accountable structures providing oversight of how and why the Church of England spends its money. It is for that reason that rule 2 paragraph (6) of the National Institutions Measure 1998 stipulates that after the end of each year, the Archbishops’ Council “shall cause a certificate to be issued to the Church Commissioners to the effect that the application and distribution of the sums made available by them as aforesaid has been in accordance with subsection (3) above.” Could the Second Church Estates Commissioner, representing the Church Commissioners, please disclose the amount certified under the Measure for each year since the provision came into force, and place copies of the relevant certificates in the House of Commons Library? Last year, the Church Commissioners for England launched a programme, dubbed Project Spire, to provide reparations in relation to historical transatlantic slavery. The commissioners have committed £100 million to the fund, which is intended to be distributed through: “initiatives led by and for people of African descent, through a reparative and intersectional lens” These are thought to be impact investments, which by their nature are suboptimal commercially, and grants and research projects, which produce no financial return. Any money that is given in grants, used to pay for research, or forgone as the result of commercially suboptimal investments, is money that is not available for hard-pressed parishes. The project seems to be a departure by the Church Commissioners from their core duties. The funds are intended for the upkeep of parish churches, the management of historical records and the provision of salaries for members of the clergy. A commitment to wide-ranging historical reparations clearly falls outside the scope of the commissioners’ charitable duties, yet little information about the funds’ structure or management has been made public. We simply do not know how the Church Commissioners are attempting to justify the use of these funds according to their charitable aims, nor do we know the details of conversations between the Church Commissioners and the Charity Commission about how the fund will be structured and administered lawfully—or whether it can be. We do not know whether the idea of a separate fund was considered, or perhaps is still being considered. As the figures relating to the chancel repair Measure show, the new fund could not come at a worse time. According to the National Churches Trust, nearly 1,000 historic cathedrals, churches and chapels across England are at risk of falling into disrepair. However, rather than providing the funding needed for those crucial repairs, the Church Commissioners are choosing to allocate £100 million to an ill-conceived, opaque fund for reparations. That seems to be a dereliction of their primary duty, and directly undermines the Church Commissioners’ role as stewards of our national history. The horrors of slavery and slave trading are as old as organised human society. Shamefully, Britain was no exception from participation, but we were exceptional in being among the first people in the history of the world to abolish both. We went on, rightly and proudly, to do penance for slavery by spending resources, ships, money, political capital and the lives of Royal Navy sailors in fighting slavery across the globe for 150 years. It is certainly not feasible to demand financial reparations from every institution with a tangential relationship to that awful trade. In the Church of England’s case, its involvement is said to stem from its connection with Queen Anne’s Bounty—a charity created by statute to support poorer members of the clergy—which invested in wide variety of companies over its 243-year history, and in turn, that charity’s involvement in the South Sea Company. Queen Anne’s Bounty acquired South Sea Company annuities, and later shares in its trading activities, at a point when it was not involved in the slave trade, although it subsequently became so in 1722. Those shares were all disposed of by 1730 and, overall, the result was a substantial loss. The Church as an institution did not endorse the slave trade—indeed, many Church of England ministers were at the forefront of the fight against this evil practice, and as far as anyone is able to tell, Queen Anne’s Bounty did not make money from it at all. It is therefore wrong of the Church Commissioners, with the apparent approval of Church leaders, to allocate millions of pounds that they hold on behalf of others to reparations, at a time when so many parishes desperately need support. It is particularly wrong to do so in this manner, which is opaque, unaccountable, and evasive. In the light of the direct involvement of the archbishops, bishops, and clergy in the Church Commissioners’ governance, and in order to get the full picture of the Church’s financial position, which is necessary to debate the Measures properly, I ask the Second Church Estates Commissioner the following questions. What information can she provide on when discussions about Project Spire began between the Charity Commission and the Church Commissioners? What legal advice, if any, has been obtained to ensure that the proposals for Project Spire are within the statutory powers of the Church Commissioners, and can it be published? Which grant-making power will be used to make any relevant grants? What other statutory powers do the Church Commissioners intend to use to facilitate Project Spire, bearing in mind that, as a statutory corporation, they can act only in accordance with powers granted by statute? Are the commissioners proposing to set up a new charity to administer Project Spire, the Bishop of Salisbury’s remarks at last month’s General Synod meeting suggest? The Bishop of Salisbury also specified that it is necessary to seek approval from the Charity Commission for the project. If the project is already within the rules, why is that necessary? If the Church Commissioners are confident that this activity is permitted by law, under what section of which statute? If Project Spire will instead be ultra vires—which is to say, unlawful—have the Church Commissioners spoken to the Charity Commission about this? If so, what problems were identified—

• 24 Mar 2025 · Chancel Repair (Church Commissioners' Liability) Measure (HC 773) Church Funds Investment Measure (HC 772) · Hansard source

  More

  Thank you, Sir Jeremy. I would add, though, that the very funds that the Church Commissioners might supply, for example, for chancel repairs, may be the same funds that have been allocated to Project Spire. The underlying money that we are talking about for these Measures is all the same, and therefore I do believe that these questions are relevant. I would like to ask two final questions specifically regarding the chancel repair Measure. What is the position of third-party landowners against whom a claim for 100% of the liability has been made by a parochial church council under the Chancel Repairs Act 1932, for which the Church Commissioners would formerly have been regarded as jointly liable under that Act? Finally, will a PCC now have to make two claims, one under the Chancel Repairs Act 1932, and one under this Measure, where the Church Commissioners do not hold 100% of the liability?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  The Minister might be anticipating what I am about to say: we would very much appreciate, in that case, if she could instead provide an evidential basis from the Government on which we could make some of these decisions.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I welcome the Minister’s response. Might she please commit today to a date by which the Home Office at least aims for all migrant hotels to be closed, as per her party’s manifesto commitments? I also welcome what she had to say about bringing down costs. She is right to say that the best way to minimise the Home Office’s bill for asylum accommodation is to process applications as quickly as possible. Where asylum applications are approved, though, most of those costs transfer to the welfare system, so I would be interested to hear her response on who in Government is currently responsible for tracking and understanding that cost.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  As I have set out already, there was never what we are talking about here, which is a formal cap set by Parliament in legislation. However, a number of aims and promises were given to the electorate over the years, and those promises were not kept. Selective, limited and tailored to our needs—that is the immigration system that the British public have voted for time and again. If we are serious about delivering it, we must take steps to ensure that future Governments do not renege on their promises as previous Governments have. But this is not just about delivering the immigration system that the British people have voted for repeatedly; fundamentally, it is about public trust and accountability. Put simply, a hard numerical cap on the number of visas issued each year would force Government and Parliament to have accountability for their immigration decisions. If we believe that the overall level of immigration is too high, we should set the cap accordingly, to ensure that technical mistakes do not produce the kind of migration wave that we have seen over the past few years. If we believe that the overall level of immigration is too low, we should be willing to say that publicly, to explain our reasons and to defend our record. Either way, we must be transparent. That will not rebuild public trust in our political system overnight, but it will represent a significant step in the right direction.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I think and hope that it has been clear from everything I have said that I make no defence of the previous Government’s activity. It is incredibly important that Conservative Members are able—as is our duty and our responsibility to the public—to talk about the many things that went wrong and, I hope, to help this Government to avoid making the same mistakes.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I hope it was clear in my remarks, but for the avoidance of doubt or ambiguity I want to say that the Opposition do not criticise our judges. Indeed, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton West said, they are doing the best they can with the rules and precedents under which they operate. That is why the new clause seeks to change those rules—

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I welcome the Minister’s response, particularly her words about the importance of settlement and citizenship being earned. The Opposition are excited to see the immigration White Paper, and particularly any data and fiscal impact analyses that it may contain. I apologise if this information is already publicly available and I am not aware of it, but can the Minister tell us when the White Paper is due to be published? Can she also set out a scenario in which it would be preferable for a foreign criminal to remain in this country after having been convicted of a crime, and why she considers the new clause to be unworkable?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  We have spoken many times today, and over the course of this Bill Committee’s proceedings, about the fundamental principles of fairness upon which we believe that our immigration system should be built. We have also spoken extensively about the generosity of the British state, and how much it costs to support those who, according to our rules, cannot support themselves. But that generosity, while admirable in what it says about our approach to our fellow man, costs the British taxpayer dearly. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton West set out, it costs many billions of pounds a year. It also causes additional pressure on infrastructure and public services, which is not covered by what we suggest here. We consider that new clause 37, which would introduce the asylum support repayment scheme, is a totally fair way of proposing that people who come to this country are responsible for contributing for the services that they receive. That includes the accommodation that they live in. We do not see any reason why that should be viewed as a negative change, and we really hope that the Government include it in their Bill.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  The Minister says that foreign criminals should be deported whenever it is legal to do so, but the purpose of our amendment is to make it always legal to do so. Why does she not feel that that would be helpful?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  Might the Minister, for clarity, lay out what the Government consider the purpose of the Bill to be and, by implication, what its purpose is not?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I will happily come to the second question in a second, but I am a little confused. Is the hon Gentleman suggesting that I did not write my speech myself?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I am a little confused by the Minister’s stating that several of our amendments should not be debated with this Bill. I fully concede that she is more experienced than I am, but my understanding is that any amendment considered in scope can be tabled, debated and voted on. Given the fact that these amendments were considered in scope, I am interested in why she thinks it is not appropriate for us to discuss them today.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  Throughout our long history, Britain has been an unusually compassionate place. From time to time, people have come to this country to seek sanctuary from tyranny and authoritarianism elsewhere in the world. My county of Kent became home to many of the Huguenots who fled religious persecution in France in the 16th century. Indeed, Canterbury cathedral still hosts a French-language service every Sunday, in honour of those who came to this country in search of tolerance and religious freedom. My grandmother came to Britain in 1937 at the age of 13, as a refugee from Germany. Her grandfather was a state senator and a fierce critic of the Nazis. When Hitler came to power, the whole family were stripped of their citizenship and several were arrested. After years imprisoned and various daring prison escapes, the family first made it over the border to Czechoslovakia, where they set up a resistance radio station broadcasting back into Germany. One night, that was raided by the SS and one of the operators was shot dead. They then fled to England and to freedom. We should be proud of our history. There are so many Brits like me who would not be here and would never have been born without the past generosity of this great country. But as I said earlier, we must also be realistic about the very many ways in which our system can be exploited by the cynical and the sinister. There are, of course, people who come to these shores legitimately seeking asylum, but we must also be honest about the fact that not everyone who comes to this country and applies for asylum has a legitimate case for doing so. We can see that evidenced in the fact that not all claims are approved. Too often, asylum is used as an immigration route for those who otherwise would not be able to come here. Our compassion is therefore exploited by those who are in no real danger at all, a sad truth made clear by the fact that many would-be asylum seekers regularly return home without issue. The bar to claiming asylum should rightly be high. People should be in serious danger in their home country to qualify. Government Members are right to say that the new clause might cause difficult and, in some instances, heartrending situations, but that in and of itself does not make it the wrong thing to do. Last December, as I mentioned earlier when discussing our human rights legislation, a Turkish heroin dealer was allowed to stay in the UK after first seeking asylum here in 1988. Despite claiming that he would be persecuted in his home country, the man had returned to Turkey at least eight times since arriving in Britain. On one of those trips, he even got married to a woman with whom he had been having an affair, despite already being married with children in the UK. Nevertheless, he escaped deportation, as it was ruled that deporting him would interfere with his right to a family life. That kind of scenario is clearly wrong and contributes to the persistent feeling that so many ordinary British people have that our asylum system is broken and unfair.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  In that case, I am happy to reassure him that I wrote every word. The short answer to the question about Albania is yes. We think that would be completely appropriate. Why would Albania refuse to accept one of its own citizens that should, by our rules and our laws, be returned to that country? If it refuses to do so, we would absolutely consider that to an appropriate trigger for that response. To continue what I was saying, new clause 40 amends section 70 of the Nationality and Borders Act, and it expands the Act to cover both nationals as well as citizens. We consider that it should be a basic and fundamental principle that we should be able to remove from this country those who break our rules. That is harder than it might sound, particularly when individuals are determined to lose their documents and obfuscate their identity and origin in every way they can. What we propose here will align other countries’ incentives with our own. It will create substantial pressure on other nations to co-operate with us to secure our border, and we strongly hope that the Government will consider adding it to the Bill.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I will make a little progress. The concept of universal rights is clearly a good one. It is one of the great gifts to humanity of the Judeo-Christian tradition to recognise that every human life has inherent worth, and every human being should be treated with the dignity that that inherent worth confers. But any set of rules that people might write over time can be distorted or abused, or exploited to take advantage of our society, our kindness and the British impulse and instinct towards trust, tolerance and generosity. Our rules and laws on human rights, and the organisations to which we belong that were created in the name of human rights, should be subject to scrutiny and debate no less than any other rules and laws. Lord Jonathan Sumption, the former Supreme Court judge, said that the United Kingdom’s adherence to the European convention on human rights “raises a major constitutional issue which ought to concern people all across the political spectrum.” It is right for us to interrogate our rules. Indeed, that is arguably our main job and the fundamental reason we have been sent here by our constituents. None of our laws should be above repeal, replacement or disapplication, and that must include the Human Rights Act. We are among the luckiest people in the world in that we live in a democracy, and one that I believe has the world’s greatest people as its voters. When the British people see repeated activity that contravenes our national common sense, politicians in Westminster must acknowledge that and do something about it. If the Government do not wish to disapply the Human Rights Act and interim measures of the European Court of Human Rights in matters of asylum and immigration in order to control the border and put a stop to the perverse cases and decisions we are seeing relentlessly arise in the courts, what is their solution? How will they restore common sense, fairness and the primacy of public safety to the security of the border?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  There are few things in life and in human nature more powerful than the desire to be with those we love. To be separated from a husband or wife by a national border is no small thing. Indeed, for those it is happening to, it can feel like everything. But the role of Government is to determine what is right for the country, not for any one person, couple or family. We must place this discussion in its national context. For too long immigration has been too high, and the spousal visa route is increasingly being used by those who would otherwise not be able to come to Britain. Over the past few years we have seen the number of dependent visas balloon. As of December 2024, 51,000 migrants, bringing 130,000 dependants with them, had come to Britain via the health and social care route over the previous year. That is over 2.5 dependants per health and social care worker—dependants who will access public services in their own right, including our already overstretched NHS. The dependant route for health and social care visa holders has since been restricted, but I mention it because it indicates the huge level of demand and desire there is for family members to come to Britain.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  The new clause maintains the Home Secretary’s ability to judge whether or not a country is being unco-operative. If it is unable to help, that is different from being unco-operative in the way that we would define it here.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time. This is a probing amendment tabled by the Father of the House, my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), to tease out what he feels are important issues to discuss in the context of the Bill. I would like to make it very clear that the Opposition are neither supporting nor opposing this new clause. Ideally, my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire would have spoken to this new clause, but she has Parliament-related business elsewhere today, so I am standing in. The background to the new clause is that various international treaties impose, or have been interpreted as imposing, an obligation on states not to send people back to a country where they would face harm. This is known as non-refoulement. However, not all non-refoulement obligations are the same, and there are important differences. The new clause seeks to tease out the differences between the ECHR on the one hand, and the refugee convention and torture convention on the other. One key difference is whether there are any exceptions to the principle of non-refoulement, which is to say: are there any circumstances in which someone can be sent back to a country where they would face a real risk of relevant harm? Under the refugee convention, the obligation not to refoul is not absolute; it is subject broadly to two exceptions. The first of those is the article 1F exclusion from protection of the refugee convention. That exclusion applies to those who have committed war crimes, crimes against humanity, serious non-political crimes abroad and acts contrary to the purposes of the United Nations. The second exception is provided for in article 33(2), which concerns those who pose serious risk to the security of the host country and those who have been convicted of particularly serious crimes, and therefore pose a danger to the community of the host country. As the UNHCR said in respect of article 1F exclusions, the rationale is that certain acts are so grave as to render their perpetrators undeserving of international protection as refugees. The Court of Justice of the European Union has said that its purpose is to maintain the credibility of the protection system, and as Professors Hathaway and Foster have noted, the realpolitik reason was that the drafters of the refugee convention were persuaded that if states parties were expected to admit serious criminals as refugees, they would simply not be willing to be bound by the convention. The same is presumably true of the article 33(2) exceptions. It would be surprising if states would have been willing to sign up to a duty not to refoul if there were not that exception for those who were a threat to their countries. In 1987, the UN convention against torture came into force. It now has 173 states parties. Article 3 of the torture convention provided for an absolute non-refoulement rule in cases of torture. Although the convention also dealt with cruel, inhumane and degrading treatments, states were careful to limit the absolute non-refoulement rule to torture. The result is that even if an individual falls in the scope of article 1F or article 33(2) of the refugee convention but would face a real danger of torture, they cannot be removed. It was felt by states that torture was such an absolute evil that the credibility of the international protection system would be undermined by preventing the removal of such individuals if they faced torture. While the refugee convention and the torture convention both explicitly addressed non-refoulement, the ECHR did not. It prohibits states from engaging in torture or cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment, but it says nothing about refoulement. That is not surprising, as the ECHR was drafted at the same time as the refugee convention, and arguably it was felt that those issues were best addressed by the refugee convention. None the less, in the late 1980s, the Strasbourg court interpreted article 3 as prohibiting refoulement. It did so not just for torture, but for all forms of treatment contrary to article 3, and it held that the rule was absolute. As the court put it: “The conduct of the person concerned, however undesirable or dangerous, cannot be taken into account.” The consequence is that the protection afforded by article 3 is broader than that provided for in articles 32 and 33 of the 1951 United Nations convention relating to the status of refugees. That interpretation by the Strasbourg court completely negated the careful balance struck by the international community with the refugee convention and torture convention. The new clause posits that that interpretation threatens the legitimacy of international human rights law and that the conclusion by Strasbourg is the means by which that happens. The KM case provides a good illustration. KM was a police officer in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He entered the UK illegally in 2012 and applied for asylum. His application was refused by the Home Secretary on the grounds that he had been involved in torture. The upper tribunal upheld that finding and held that he should be excluded from protection under article 1F of the refugee convention. However, because of article 3 of the ECHR, as interpreted by the Strasbourg court, he could not be removed. There are many more cases of serious criminals and terrorists—people who are a threat to those who live in the UK—who could be deported under article 33(2) of the refugee convention but cannot due to article 3 of the ECHR. In Saadi v. Italy, two Strasbourg judges wrote that they would not be surprised if some citizens of Europe “find it difficult to understand that the Court by emphasising the absolute nature of Article 3 seems to afford more protection to the non-national applicant who has been found guilty of terrorist-related crimes than to the protection of the community as a whole from terrorist violence.” Indeed, the Father of the House, were he here, would say that he suspects that the vast majority of Britons and Europeans would be baffled by that conclusion. That is also precisely the reason why the drafters of the refugee convention saw fit to include exceptions for criminals and terrorists: they knew that with rights come responsibilities, and that those who act in this way completely violate the social contract and cannot properly claim its protection. The interpretation that Strasbourg has given has, in the view of the Father of the House—at least, he would like us to debate this—weakened the legitimacy of the international humanitarian protection system. The new clause, tabled by the Father of the House, seeks to find a solution to the problem—one that he says will restore common sense. The first step of the new clause would put a duty on the Secretary of State through careful litigation before our courts to identify cases of individuals who could be deported under the refugee convention and torture convention but would be blocked under the ECHR. He sees cases such as KM, which I discussed, as exemplars of that. The new clause would disapply the duty on the Secretary of State to comply with the Human Rights Act in such cases. That is to ensure that the Secretary of State can proceed to deport such people, and if they want to challenge their deportation, their recourse will be to bring a case to Strasbourg. I know that the Father of the House would be comfortable with putting a duty on Ministers to still deport such individuals even the face of a Strasbourg judgment or rule 39, but he knows that the firm commitment that the Government have to international law mean that they will refuse to do so—although he also said that we should ask why they would privilege the ECHR over the refugee convention. Instead, the new clause would allow the Government to comply with Strasbourg, while requiring them to argue with Strasbourg that it is wrong to interpret article 3 in a way that negates the provisions of articles 1F and 33(2) of the refugee convention. Were Strasbourg to apply the principle of lex specialis properly, it should conclude that it cannot be unlawful for states to rely on articles 1F and 33(2) of the refugee convention in order to deport criminals. The Father of the House would be interested to hear from the Minister whether the Government would be interested in running such an argument before the Strasbourg court. Even were we to lose in such efforts to be reasonable, he feels that the new clause would allow the Government still to decide to comply with the flawed jurisprudence from the Strasbourg court; however, it would require that, were they to do so, they must be transparent with the British public and publish a report telling us who the criminals are whom we could have deported under the refugee convention, had the Strasbourg court’s flawed interpretation of the ECHR not prevented us from so doing. I will not press the new clause to a vote, and I repeat that I did not table it, but I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  As the hon. Gentleman can read in the new clause, the wording does not state that the caps have to be set and cannot be revised; it is more than possible to come back to Parliament to change them. If such a situation arises—he is totally right to say that many of them are emergencies and may have been unforeseeable—there is no reason why that case should not be made to the British public and the cap changed. We are talking here about the need for that case to be made to the British public and for there to be transparency. Some Labour Members have mentioned my time at the Home Office, where I was a special adviser. I worked primarily on national security, not on legal migration, but it was very clear to me from what I could see of the problems that all my colleagues were facing that most of Government—most Departments, and the Minister may be experiencing this now—are geared for higher levels of migration. For example, it is helpful for the Department of Health and Social Care to have high volumes of health and social care visas issued, or for the Treasury, which issues gilts based on our overall GDP, to have as many people here as possible. The purpose of the cap would be to bring those conversations out into the open. If those Departments and Ministers wished to justify to the public, to the British people, why those numbers needed to be higher, that conversation should be had where the British people can hear it.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  Will the Minister give way?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  I thank the Minister for responding to me earlier. The Opposition’s view is that the various ways by which people come here illegally and stay is fundamentally important to smashing the gangs, and that leave outside the rules and the ways it may be abused are a big part of that. That seems to us to be part of the fundamental point that we are discussing. Will the Minister comment on that?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  New clause 36 would give access to asylum accommodation centres to our immigration enforcement officers. Members of the public may be surprised to learn that this power does not already exist. It seems to me common sense that when a person has come here illegally and is being housed by the state, immigration enforcement—an arm of that state—should be able to enter that accommodation to carry out their work. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton West rightly set out, these accommodation centres exist because the volume of those coming here illegally is such that it is not possible to hold everyone in immigration detention. There are therefore substantial numbers of people on immigration bail, and a reasonable number of those are held in accommodation centres. Immigration decisions are made elsewhere, but this is the criterion set out in current legislation. In our view, this is a quirk of the current system, and not how one would design it if starting from a blank page. These sorts of accommodation centres did not exist when our rules were written, and we think that this corrects that quirk. I echo the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton West: does the Minister think that this would be of operational benefit to immigration enforcement officers? If so, will she include it, and if not, why not?

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  My hon. Friend clearly said that judges are doing the best they can with the rules and precedents that they have been set. I have described our judges as unaccountable to the public. That is not a criticism: it is a fact.

• 18 Mar 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

  More

  New clause 34 prevents any foreign national who is convicted of any offence from remaining in the UK. It should be a fundamental principle of our system that immigration never makes the British public any less safe. Unfortunately, however, many of those who have come to the UK in recent years have broken our laws. According to Ministry of Justice figures, a staggering 23% of sexual crimes in the UK—almost one in four—are committed by foreign nationals. The overall imprisonment rate for foreign nationals is 20% higher than that for British citizens. Of course, the trend is not uniform: some nationalities are more heavily represented than others. Albanian migrants are nearly 17 times more likely to be imprisoned than average; those from Algeria are nearly nine times more likely and those from Jamaica nearly eight times more likely to be imprisoned than average. Those who seek to harm this country, to break its laws and to undermine what we hold to be fair and right should not be allowed to remain here. As the Government are well aware, our prisons are already overcrowded. We must not allow foreign criminals to continue exacerbating this problem and we must not endanger the British public by allowing foreign criminals to stay in this country. Under our current system, too many of those who break our laws are being allowed to remain in the UK. Often, Home Office attempts to deport foreign criminals are blocked because of absurd and ever expanding human rights rules. In the interests of public safety, we must not allow foreign criminals to remain in Britain; that includes by making sure that the Human Rights Act cannot be used to prevent us from deporting those who break our laws. How, specifically, does new clause 34 do that? It amends section 32 of the UK Borders Act 2007, which we have already mentioned today. Section 32 would be amended from its current form, which defines a foreign criminal as a person who is neither a British nor an Irish citizen, who is convicted of an offence that takes place in the United Kingdom and who is sentenced to a period of imprisonment of least 12 months, or is a serious criminal as defined in section 72 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002. What would replace section 32 would be much simpler; it would instead say that a foreign criminal was anyone who is neither a British nor an Irish citizen who is convicted of any offence in the United Kingdom, and explicitly include within that anybody who has been charged with or convicted of an offence under section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971, which sets out the situations in which a person can be considered to have entered this country illegally. That includes if they do so in breach of a deportation order; if they required leave to enter the United Kingdom and knowingly came here without that leave; or if they required leave to enter the United Kingdom and knowingly stayed here beyond the time conferred by that leave, among other specific conditions. New clause 34 also seeks to ensure that the rules will be upheld in all circumstances and asserts therefore that the principle of removing criminals from this country is of utmost importance and must be prioritised above other legislation. That includes human rights legislation, for the reasons we have already set out. I turn to new clause 42, which requires the Secretary of State to use a visa penalty provision if a country proves to be unco-operative in the process of removing any of its nationals or citizens from the UK. Such a lack of co-operation may arise in verifying their identity or status or it may pertain to the process of removing people whose identity and status has not been established. New clause 42 seeks to do that by amending section 70 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022. That Act set out the idea of a visa penalty provision, effectively allowing the Home Secretary to suspend visa applications from countries that do not co-operate with the activity that the Government are trying to take to secure and protect the border. The new clause would strengthen that Act by changing that from an option for the Home Secretary to a duty and by adding explicitly the point about countries that are not co-operating with the process of verifying the identity or status of individuals whom we consider likely to be nationals or citizens of the countries in question.