Zarah Sultana MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 12 Mar 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  Q11. In October 2023 in an interview with LBC, the Prime Minister said:“I think Israel does have that right”,when asked whether cutting off power and water to Gaza was appropriate. For 11 days now, Israel has blocked the entry of vital goods and aid into Gaza, subjecting over 2 million people to collective punishment and starvation. Israel’s decision to cut off electricity to a plant supplying drinking water to half a million people is yet another blatant violation of international law, and further evidence of genocide against the Palestinian people. In the light of these facts, does the Prime Minister still maintain that Israel is not committing genocide?

• 10 Feb 2025 · Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill · Hansard source

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  Hon. Members might not realise it from some of the speeches that we have heard, but this Bill is actually about people—people fleeing war, persecution and unimaginable hardship. The repeal of the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Act and parts of the Illegal Migration Act is welcome, because those cruel, unworkable policies undermined our international obligations and put lives at risk. This Bill still falls short, however, because it retains harmful provisions, such as section 59 of the Illegal Migration Act, which deems asylum claims from countries such as Albania, Georgia and India inadmissible. Those are not universally safe countries—just ask the LGBT community in Georgia, journalists in Albania, or Kashmiris and religious minorities in India. Survivors of trafficking and torture from those nations seek refuge here, so denying them asylum based on nationality alone is unjust and risks returning them to danger. Section 29 of the Illegal Migration Act is equally appalling. It denies protections to victims of modern slavery if they have a criminal record, ignoring that many are coerced into crime by traffickers. Punishing victims for their own exploitation is not just cruel; it is a failure of justice. Section 12 further weakens judicial scrutiny of immigration detention, letting the Secretary of State determine what constitutes a reasonable period. That strips away legal safeguards and allows indefinite detention by ministerial order. Sections 12, 29 and 59 also risk breaching the European convention on human rights and should be repealed. The Bill also introduces new offences that could see refugees prosecuted simply for seeking safety—a deeply troubling approach. In reality, these measures will punish desperate individuals rather than the smugglers who exploit them. Let us be clear: no one risks their life crossing the channel in a flimsy boat unless they have no other choice. Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, put it plainly: “Criminalising men, women and children who have fled conflicts in countries such as Sudan does not disrupt the smuggling gangs’ business model. When a refugee is clambering into a boat with an armed criminal threatening them, they are not thinking about UK laws but are simply trying to stay alive. The most effective way to break the smuggling gangs’ grip is to stop refugees from getting into the boats in the first place, which means giving them a legal way to apply for asylum in the UK without crossing the Channel.” Yet this Bill fails to do that. The Bill continues to treat desperate people as criminals rather than addressing the reasons that they are forced into dangerous crossings in the first place, and it fuels toxic rhetoric that breeds hate and division. We have all seen the consequences of that: asylum hotels named by MPs in this Chamber have been targeted by far-right rioters who set them alight. I have said it before and I will say it again: the enemy of the working class travels by private jet, not migrant dinghy. When politicians and the right-wing press deliberately stoke anti-migrant sentiment, they distract us from the real issues: a system that prioritises profit over people, that slashes our public services, that gives tax breaks to the wealthy and that allows inequality to flourish. This Bill could have ended the hostile environment, but it doubles down on the same failed policies by criminalising refugees, denying protection to survivors and failing to provide safe routes. As an MP representing Coventry, a proud city of sanctuary enriched by generations of immigration, I demand better. We need a system that upholds human rights and international law and is built on fairness, compassion and humanity, not more failed, punitive policies. We need safe, legal routes for asylum seekers, family reunification and protections for trafficking survivors. This Bill, however, entrenches injustice instead of ending it.

• 3 Feb 2025 · Public Authorities (Fraud, Error and Recovery) Bill · Hansard source

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  I will focus on the powers in the Bill that force banks to trawl through our private financial data, scanning for indicators of fraud and error—indicators that are not publicly disclosed —and flag those individuals to the Government. These powers will allow the Department for Work and Pensions to seize money directly from bank accounts without due process, suspend driving licences and even search properties and personal devices. They are not the hallmarks of a free and democratic society but the tools of an Orwellian surveillance state. Let me be clear: we all agree that genuine fraudsters should be held to account, especially multimillionaire tax avoiders, organised criminal gangs and the dodgy companies that exploited covid funding. However, the Bill goes far beyond that. It will subject millions of innocent people—disabled individuals, carers, jobseekers, pensioners and parents—to unwarranted financial surveillance, treating them as suspects by default, simply because they receive state support. It is deeply unjust. The Government already have extensive powers to investigate suspected fraud; under existing legislation, they can access bank accounts where there is reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. However, the Bill removes the need for suspicion altogether. Put simply, this is mass surveillance. There are significant risks. We have already seen the devastating consequences of automated decision making in the Post Office Horizon scandal, where faulty software led to hundreds of wrongful prosecutions. The Bill risks repeating that injustice on an unprecedented scale, and we should not have to wait for an ITV drama to expose it in the future. The DWP has already made mistakes in accusing benefit claimants of debt. Last July, The Big Issue reported that a disabled woman had her disability benefits stopped and was accused of owing the Government £28,000, which the DWP later admitted was its mistake, while a single mother was accused of a £12,000 debt when the DWP actually owed her money. Algorithm-driven financial surveillance will inevitably result in errors that will disproportionately affect the most vulnerable in our society: the elderly, the disabled and those already struggling to make ends meet. Even a 1% error rate in the AI system used by banks could lead to thousands of benefit recipients being wrongly flagged, unfairly investigated and forced into lengthy appeals. Moreover, the Government’s own impact assessment suggests that these measures would recover just £146 million annually, which is less than 2% of the estimated annual loss to fraud and error. In contrast, £23 billion in benefits and support goes unclaimed each year, while £3 billion in claims is underpaid. Yet the Bill does absolutely nothing to address those injustices or to build a security system based on dignity and respect; instead, it targets those who can least afford to be wrongly flagged as fraudsters. This legislation represents a rushed process with little scrutiny. At 116 pages long, the Bill was scheduled for Second Reading just seven working days after First Reading. It is an attempt to push through mass surveillance powers with minimal debate, bypassing the necessary checks and balances that should apply to any policy, especially one that affects millions of people’s fundamental rights. The powers are also legally questionable, with privacy experts warning they could breach article 8 of the Human Rights Act 1998. The Bill risks creating a two-tier justice system—one for the very wealthy, who will never face this kind of intrusion, and another for those on benefits, who will be subject to constant scrutiny, automated checks and the threat of their money being seized, perpetuating harmful stereotypes about so-called benefits cheats. It will therefore also distract attention away from the millions of households that are legitimately supported by a social security system that exists to support every single one of us when we need it. Civil society groups including Amnesty International, Big Brother Watch, Disability Rights UK and Age UK have all condemned the powers, warning they will entrench discrimination against the poorest and the most vulnerable. We cannot allow that to happen. We cannot allow the Government to turn our banks into agents of the state, spying on their customers and reporting back to Whitehall; we cannot allow the presumption of innocence to be eroded by a culture of suspicion and surveillance; and we cannot stand idly by while the most vulnerable in our communities bear the brunt of this overreach. This is not the change people voted for. I therefore urge the Government to remove clause 74 and schedule 3 from the Bill.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Sudan and Eastern DRC · Hansard source

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  According to UN experts the UAE has been providing arms and support to the Rapid Support Forces through its networks in Libya, Chad, the Central African Republic, South Sudan and Uganda. Those arms and supplies have reportedly been disguised as humanitarian aid, raising serious concerns about the UAE’s role in exacerbating conflict and suffering in Sudan. The UAE is one of the UK’s largest arms buyers, with billions of pounds worth of defence exports licensed in recent years. Given the gravity of those allegations, and the UK’s obligations under international law, will the Government commit to ending all arms sales to the UAE unless it can be unequivocally verified that they are no longer supplying the RSF?

• 16 Jan 2025 · Middle East · Hansard source

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  Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for crimes against humanity and war crimes, including targeting civilians and using starvation as a weapon of war. The British public deserve clarity, so I will ask again: will the Foreign Secretary confirm that should Benjamin Netanyahu step on British soil, he would be immediately arrested—yes or no?