Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard

Committee stage
Thursday 10th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, I welcome Clause 37 very warmly. For some of us it is the best bit of the Bill. I am really pleased, for once, to be able to unequivocally support my Front Bench and my noble friend the Minister.

My noble friend the Minister did not have the pleasure of sitting through the debates about the Rwanda Bill in this House; I do not really want to put him through it all again, because it is like a nightmare in my mind and it is quite difficult to recall everything that was said at the time. But I remind the Committee that, on a number of occasions, your Lordships’ House rejected key bits of the Bill, and it went through only because of the majority in the Commons. We had ping-pong, ping-pong, ping-pong, and eventually we had to give in. To now try to resurrect it through this clause stand part device seems a bit perverse.

I will just remind noble Lords why we were so opposed to the Rwanda Bill. First of all—I have to see whether I can read my notes here—there was the failure to meet the concerns of the Supreme Court. Saying Rwanda is safe then and for always does not make it safe. I can remember noble and learned Lords and others on the Cross Benches—one of whom may well want to speak today—saying, “We’re being asked to say that night is day and put that into legal form”. It was ridiculous. So, for the lawyers among us, it was really quite distressing that we were having to put our name to that.

The United Nations High Commission on Refugees had concerns, at the heart of which was the belief that the Act was not compatible with international refugee law—the refugee convention. There was the disapplication of the Human Rights Act, highlighted by the Joint Committee on Human Rights—the current chair is no longer in his place, but I am sure he would agree with what the previous committee said. That committee emphasised the universality of human rights, which this piece of legislation rode a cart and of horses through.

There were particular concerns around the treatment of LGBTI+ people, who would potentially not be treated well, as well as concerns about children, which was one of the main issues that I took up during the passage of the Bill. On the treatment of age-disputed children, there were fears that they would be removed to Rwanda because they had wrongly been assessed as adults, and then there was a difficult provision, if they could prove that they were children, for them to be sent back to the UK, in effect as parcels. Many of us thought that was dehumanising of children and went against children’s rights.

I am sure my noble friend the Minister will be terribly pleased to hear that we will be debating age assessment later in Committee. But it is worth pointing out at this point that just yesterday, the i newspaper published the latest analysis by the Helen Bamber Foundation of FoI data. That found that in 2024, at least 678 unaccompanied asylum-seeking children were initially classed as adults but then found to be children by local authorities, and that was over half of those who were so referred. Had the Rwanda Act been in operation now, how many of those children might have been sent to Rwanda and got stuck there? That is the question that I would put. In addition, there was never a proper child rights impact assessment or anything like that.

Finally, the noble Lord talked about a deterrent. I seem to remember that, in all the paperwork we were given—it was probably an impact assessment or something—that there was a very clear reference to academic work which suggested that there was no evidence of a deterrent effect in this kind of legislation. The noble Lord also talked about us being a soft touch for illegal migrants. Please can we remember that most of those who come across on the boats, putting their lives at risk, are seeking asylum? They have an international right to do so. Please do not let us write them off as “illegal migrants”.

That is all I wanted to say. I warmly welcome that the Government have taken this step, because it is a very positive step in the name of human rights and international refugee law.

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

My Lords, I think the noble Baroness was a little unkind to the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, who made an admirable speech: gallantry in a hopeless cause is always extremely impressive. I thought Owain Glyndŵr was speaking to us. I was reminded of the gallant knight in “Monty Python”, who has all his limbs struck off, but bravely says, “No, no, it’s only a flesh wound”, and fights on. It was tremendous.

The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, also slightly abbreviated the history of the Rwanda Act in this House. It began with the Rwanda treaty, which this House recommended, on the advice of its International Agreements Committee, could not and should not be ratified until the various supervisory and legal constructs needed—and set out in the treaty itself—existed. Because they did not exist; they were to be set up. Various judges were to be appointed, courts were to be formed and supervisory monitoring procedures were to be put in place—none of that existed. This House recommended that the treaty should not be ratified.

The Bill itself had three fundamental problems for this House. First, as the noble Baroness said, there was the fundamental “Alice in Wonderland” absurdity that we can, by so voting, change facts: we can make Rwanda safe by declaring Rwanda safe. The noble Lord, Lord Clarke of Nottingham, spoke powerfully on that subject.

Secondly, there was the problem of our international commitments. It was impossible—in the view of this House, which voted several times on it—to reconcile the Bill and the treaty with our international commitments. We were telling people, “You may never have your claim for asylum heard in this country. You may claim asylum in Rwanda. You may claim from the Rwanda Government the right to become a citizen of Rwanda. But you may never claim the right to become a citizen of the United Kingdom. We are going to send you to Rwanda, we are never going to let you come here and we are never going to hear your case”. To make that fit with the refugee convention is impossible—that is what this House determined. Keeping the Rwanda Act on the statute book would be absurd. If we mean what we say about a rules-based, legal global order, we really need to pay attention when what we are doing ourselves is clearly in breach of a central plank of the rules-based order.

That is completely different from what this Government are, as I understand it, seeking to do with offshoring the exercise. Although I do not like that—it is a very bad idea that people’s claims should be considered abroad, because it will be harder to ensure that they get appropriate legal advice and age assessment, if their asylum case heard in a foreign country—it is completely different from what we were going to do with Rwanda. With the Rwanda Act, we were not just offshoring but offloading; we were putting on the Rwanda Government the responsibility of considering the future of these people. We were saying, “It’s absolutely nothing to do with us and we refuse to touch it”. That simply will not do.

We have to applaud the noble Lord, Lord Davies. I note that his Scottish colleague was cunning enough to disappear before we came to the question of whether Clause 37 should stand part. I am a Scotsman and know that there are some battles that it is best not to fight. It is very gallant of the noble Lord to be here to make his case, but it would be absurd if he were to succeed.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard

Committee stage
Thursday 10th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

My Lords, I support these two amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, for the very reasons she gives. Clause 34 is very welcome and I am very glad that the Government have put it in, but it is very narrow. There is a considerable overlap between family reunion cases and evacuees, and this is about evacuees. I would like to bring the two together, as the noble Baroness said. The top five countries from which family reunion cases come are Syria, Sudan, Iran, Eritrea and Afghanistan, so we are in exactly the same territory of facilitating evacuation. It does not work very well at the moment, for the reasons that the noble Baroness spelled out.

The double journeys point is really worrying. To collect the visa, you have to go to a visa centre. In the top five countries I have listed, there are no visa centres, for obvious reasons—in most of them, there is no embassy—so you have to cross a frontier. When we are talking family reunions, more than 50% of those involved are children. Are we asking them to cross a frontier and go somewhere that could be a very long way away to get their visa? No, we are not; it is worse than that. We are asking them to go twice: once to give their biometric details and, secondly, to collect the visa—they cannot get it the first time. Could they not have the biometric details taken when they pick up the visa, when the family reunion case has been established and they are going to be let in? They would then need to make only one journey. It seems to me that this simple improvement to the process would save a lot of heartache and probably a lot of lives, in cases where it has been decided by the system that family reunion is appropriate and should be facilitated.

I support the two amendments ably moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, but I hope that the Government will go a little further and think hard about changing the procedure for the collection of the visa so that the biometric details could be given at the time the visa is picked up and thus the double journeys could be avoided.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly in support. I, too, am supported by RAMP, and that is in the register—that is done for Committee now. I warmly welcome Clause 34 as well, but the amendment being proposed is a very modest one, which would not be difficult for the Government to accept. The case has already been well made and I will not reiterate it, but I will give an example from the British Red Cross, which I think has made a very persuasive case to Members of the Committee. It gives the current example of Iran:

“The visa centre in Tehran has been temporarily closed since 15 July 2025. This visa centre was the base for many Afghans and Iranians to submit their family reunion applications. Now families are unable to access the centre and will need to take a dangerous journey to a neighbouring country just to submit their biometrics and have their application processed … This amendment would allow biometrics to be taken at different locations within Iran where people could travel to safely rather than crossing borders”.


Safety must be one of the criteria that we use in thinking about displaced people. It is a very modest amendment and I hope that my noble friend will be able to look kindly on it.

Immigration Detention: Brook House Inquiry

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard

Thursday 11th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords—

Illegal Migration Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard

Committee stage
Wednesday 24th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

The noble and learned Baroness makes a very strong case and I give her my full support.

My name is on Amendments 80 and 91 in this group. Amendment 91 is concerned with victims of human trafficking, but both fall at the hurdle of retrospection, as has been explained by the other signatories, in particular, my noble friend Lord Carlile, and by the noble Baronesses, Lady Chakrabarti and Lady Hamwee. I have the luxury of being able to add virtually nothing to the arguments already made.

I think the best description of the case against retrospection is in my noble and learned friend Lord Hope’s explanation of Amendment 39, which

“seeks to give effect to the principle that, unless for good reason, legislation should operate prospectively and not retrospectively”.

What is the conceivable good reason? What are the very exceptional circumstances that the Constitution Committee suggested might excuse retrospection?

The noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, suggested that the Minister might try to say that stopping the boats is so exceptional as to justify retrospection. But there are a lot of other ways of dealing with that; for example, the safe passage visa argued for at Amendment 130. The Minister might say that that it is the cost of housing those who have come across the channel or in the back of a lorry and have been apprehended. But the costs of detaining and deporting those declared inadmissible under this Bill will be much higher.

That is the point the Refugee Council made in its impact assessment and estimate of the costs. It estimated a cost of £9 billion over the first three years. The Minister says that he does not recognise those numbers. That is not a sufficient argument. He needs to tell us what is wrong with those numbers and what his numbers are. It is not good enough just to sit there and say, “Well, I’m not going to engage in this debate because I don’t recognise the numbers”. I think retrospection is fundamentally unacceptable.

A few years ago, when I was driving up Headington Hill in Oxford, I forgot that, eccentrically, the set speed limit there is 20 miles per hour. I was required to present myself in Milton Keynes four months later for a speed awareness course, because I had been travelling at 27 miles per hour. Eccentrically, because I am a very eccentric person, I failed to ask my wife to see whether I could have a personal course. Nevertheless, I would have been very taken aback if, when I got to Milton Keynes—it was extremely hard to find the place and I was driving rather fast trying to find it—I had been told on arrival, “Actually, we have changed the penalty and we are going to export you to Rwanda”. I would have objected, and I object to retrospection.

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, I agree with everything that has been said so far, but I will focus on the opposition to Clause 2 standing part of the Bill. This clause is, in many ways, the nub of the asylum ban to which the Bill gives effect. To place a duty on the Home Secretary to remove virtually all those who seek asylum through irregular routes is an unprecedented step going far beyond simply giving her the power to do so. Here we are talking about those arriving not only by boats but by any irregular route; the boats are used as a justification for the Bill, because the Government know that we all want to see an end to those very unsafe journeys. The fact that it is a power only when it comes to children is a small mercy, given that they will be removed when they reach the age of 18. However, I will leave the treatment of children to a later debate, because there is still a lot to be said about the impact on children.

Calling those affected “illegal migrants” does not alter the fact that the majority are exercising their right in international law to seek asylum. That goes back to the point that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chelmsford made earlier. In the words of the UN rapporteurs that I quoted earlier,

“the act of seeking asylum is always legal, and effective access to territory is an essential precondition for exercising the right to seek asylum”.

When she first introduced the Bill, the Home Secretary accused critics of naivety in suggesting that

“everybody coming here on a boat is a genuine asylum seeker fleeing for humanitarian reasons. The reality is that many of these people are economic migrants who are abusing our asylum system, and that is what this Bill aims to stop”.—[Official Report, Commons, 7/3/23; col. 174.]

Could the Minister give us the evidence on which that assertion is based? It has been reported that the Home Office does not have that evidence, but, if it does, now is the opportunity to provide it.

No one is suggesting that everyone who comes here on a small boat has a genuine case for asylum, but we know that the majority are likely to have such a case. According to the Refugee Council’s analysis of official data, six out of 10 of those who crossed the channel in small boats last year stood to be recognised as refugees—yet they will no longer be able to make their case.

The Home Secretary has argued that the Bill’s critics

“ignore the fact that our policy does in fact guarantee humanitarian protection for those who genuinely need it”.—[Official Report, Commons, 13/3/23; col. 576.]

However, many of those whom she has given herself a duty to remove will genuinely need humanitarian protection. Yet there will be no mechanism for ascertaining whether that is the case before they are simply removed to be dealt with elsewhere, like a parcel marked “don’t return to sender”. To quote the UN rapporteurs again,

“any steps taken to legalize policies effectively resulting in the removal of migrants without an individualized assessment in line with human rights obligations and due process are squarely incompatible with the prohibition of collective expulsions and the principle of non-refoulement”.

The Government talk as if we take a disproportionate number of asylum seekers, yet the opposite is the case— that point was made earlier today, though it seems a long time ago now. As I asked earlier, what happens if other countries follow our lead and also put up the “no asylum seekers here” sign? The chances are that the numbers seeking asylum in the UK will go up, not down.

In practice, the general view, including that of the Law Society, is that removal of those deemed inadmissible will be very difficult in the absence of adequate third-country agreements, making the Bill, in effect, unworkable. The fear of the Refugee Council, the UNHRC and others is that it will mean many thousands left in semi-permanent limbo, at risk of destitution. As I said at Second Reading, the mental health implications are likely to be serious, as spelled out by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, which has many concerns about the Bill’s impact on mental health. For those who are removed to a third country, there is no guarantee that the country will be equipped to assess their asylum claim, so again they could be living in limbo, but out of sight and out of mind of the UK Government. How can all this be described as compassionate and humane, as Ministers repeatedly do?

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Baroness Lister of Burtersett and Lord Kerr of Kinlochard

Wednesday 14th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)]

My Lords, I cannot claim the knowledge of Northern Ireland of many other noble Lords who have spoken. However, I wanted to contribute to this debate and have added my name to Amendment 218 because 25 years ago I was privileged to be a member of the Opsahl commission, an independent commission or citizens’ inquiry into the future of Northern Ireland. I have also been very much influenced by the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition; it practises what I called in my academic work the politics of solidarity in difference, and had an influence on the wording of the Good Friday agreement which I do not think is always sufficiently recognised.

Earlier in Committee, I repeated a question that I asked at Second Reading: how is the requirement in the Good Friday agreement for an equivalent level of human rights protection in Northern Ireland and the Republic to be maintained if the citizens of the former could no longer look to the European Charter of Fundamental Rights? I noted that in his helpful letter to Peers, the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, pointed out that the agreement preceded the charter and, as the charter is not referenced in the agreement, the Bill should not affect our obligations to it. However, the point is about equivalence. If the charter now applies in the Republic and not in Northern Ireland, with the loss of various rights in the latter, how, I asked again, will that equivalence be maintained? But answer came there none, so I would very much appreciate it if the Minister could give an answer to that today, especially as, since then, I have read of the concerns of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission on this score, and that of a number of human rights organisations and academics in a recent letter to the Irish Times. That letter argued that we need greater clarity on how the restated commitment in the European Commission’s draft protocol to no diminution of rights in Northern Ireland will be achieved in the absence of the charter. Can the Minister explain that?

By the same token, while the,

“total, steadfast commitment to the Belfast agreement”—[Official Report, 12/3/18; col. 1414.]

given by the noble Lord, Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth, on Monday, was very welcome, it is difficult to see how that agreement will not be undermined if the charter is removed and nothing is put in its place. As a briefing by the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission underlines, equality and rights provisions are central to the agreement. It is no wonder that people in Northern Ireland are not worried about its future. A number of organisations, including the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, are now arguing, in the light of these risks to the human rights framework, that this is a key moment to renew discussions on a Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland. Will the Minister undertake to consider that?

Like my noble friend Lord Browne of Ladyton, I am particularly concerned about the implications of withdrawal for children and young people in Northern Ireland, which I mentioned briefly when we debated the protection of children and their rights at an earlier stage in Committee. The Children’s Law Centre in Belfast—this links in with what the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, said—consulted children and young people and found that they were angry and frustrated that they had no influence on a decision which has particular implications for them in terms of their childhood and their future. The report of the conference to which my noble friend referred, which was organised by children and young people themselves, details their concerns. Has the Minister read that report? If not, will he undertake to do so?

Some of us attended a recent meeting with some of the children and young people held in your Lordships’ House. Talking to them really brought home to me what a hard border means in terms of everyday life. It is about not just goods and lorries but about how everyday lives are lived across the border. For example, what happens when separated parents live either side of the border? What happens when your school is the other side of the border? When this question was put at the conference to the Secretary-General of the Department of Children and Youth Affairs, he responded, “I can confidently say I don’t know, one of many areas that we don’t know yet and have to work out”. That was not very reassuring. What happens if you need specialist health treatment on the other side of the border, or if the nearest emergency health treatment is the other side? These are the kinds of concerns the young people raised with us and they point to a real threat to their social right of access to services and to their right to family life.

The Government have not yet managed to convince anyone that they have a realistic answer to the problem of the border between Northern Ireland outside the EU and the Republic inside it. Talking to these children brought home to me the damage this could inflict on their rights and well-being. This amendment would address some of those concerns. What reassurances can the Minister give to these children, because they are listening?

[Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)]

I support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, and that of the noble Lord, Lord Browne, to which I have added my name. I do not need to say very much in support of the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, because he introduced it so clearly and fully, except to say that I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey: I cannot see any reason why the Government cannot accept the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, tonight. It seems to me that it sets out very clearly the commitments made by the UK Government, which we all agree are very important. In its second paragraph, it provides for the possibility that there might be something in the magic solutions to the border. If there were, that would be taken into account in the wording of the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Hain. I therefore hope that the Government will accept it.

Turning to the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Browne, my only point is that the extraordinary linguistic fudge in December is very hard for the lawyers to construe. It has been construed by the Commission lawyers in the 118-page draft withdrawal treaty, which was published on 28 February. It has been construed as requiring “a common regulatory area” in Northern Ireland and including Northern Ireland in the EU’s customs territory. Many in London have denounced these solutions; many in London and some in Northern Ireland find them unacceptable. However, they have at least tried; they have produced a draft treaty with draft clauses explaining how they think that fudge could be construed and turned into treaty language. We have not done so: all we have done is make another speech, including the same two suggestions that were made last summer, one of which the Secretary of State for Exiting the EU immediately dismissed the day after as blue-skies thinking. We still seem to be at the stage of blue-skies thinking, but next week in the European Council, we will be confronted by a draft treaty that provides a solution acceptable to some in this country but not acceptable, perhaps, to all in this country. It is half way there. I really worry that if we stick to speeches and do not produce drafts, it is very hard to see how this negotiation will reach a conclusion.

I very much support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Browne, and it is in the spirit of that amendment that the Government should be thinking very hard of producing the legal language that they want, and then a real negotiation could start in Brussels. Personally, I do not think that it is possible to find the legal language that matches the Mansion House speech. I believe that the only solution that is likely to be acceptable to all parties in Ireland and in this country is continuing membership of a customs union for the United Kingdom as a whole, which is, of course, what the CBI, the TUC and manufacturing industry want, and we all want for other reasons as well. We do not all want it, but on my side, we do all want it. I think that that is where it will end up. But if the Government think there is another way to go, they really need to produce the language and put it on the table in Brussels quickly.