Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 10th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[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.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I will say a couple of words in support of these amendments from my noble friend. As the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, just remarked, it is not as if these changes would be difficult to make: the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, referred to them as simple improvements to the process. My noble friend referred to the current summit: to be honest, I have not seen the results, as I was in meetings all morning. Are there any yet? It has obviously been widely trailed that President Macron will talk about improving the reception by this country of applicants for family reunion. It would be perhaps a little ironic—well, there would be a nice coincidence of efforts—if, from this side, we are proposing simple improvements in process and we also have an ally in President Macron, who is saying, “Please simplify and streamline your family reunion efforts”. That would be a nice entente amicale.

I will make a point that I am not sure any of the other speakers have, which is made in our briefings. Families often become separated, so not only does a family together have to make possible multiple journeys but dispersed members of a family, including children, might have to make multiple trips from different locations. So you are multiplying the risks and the possibility of violence and distress. I think my noble friend referred to one in five families saying they had to resort to using smugglers to reach the visa centre. Well, surely one of the major purposes of the Bill, which we all support, is to try to put the smugglers and people traffickers out of business. Here is a government policy that is helping to give people smugglers more business—we regret it, but it is the reality—which you could avoid by the simple shortcut of making biometrics collectable other than at visa centres and not requiring at least two journeys. The thought of a lone woman or a family with children having to expose themselves to all the threats to safety that we can imagine and are told about is really unconscionable, when it really would not take a great deal of effort by the Home Office to keep people safer, streamline the process and satisfy President Macron, as well as us, all at the same time.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, whether or not President Macron is tuned into our debate today and supportive of what noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, has just said, she will be glad to know, as I was, that the British Red Cross says:

“Extending the relevant clause to include refugee family reunion would ensure families, including children, were able to provide biometrics outside a visa centre and significantly reduce the risks encountered to reach visa centres”.


That was the point that my noble friend Lord Kerr was making during his very good speech—his remarks were eminently sensible, as always—and the invitation to try to extend that provision is long overdue.

The Red Cross interviewed 215 people—100 families. I will summarise just three things that it found:

“Just under half of the people found the journey difficult … 1 in 5 families said they had to resort to using smugglers to reach the visa centre … Just under 60 percent of families were displaced before or during the application process.”


The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, gave an example from Iran. I will give an example, if I may, from the Red Cross, from Sudan. Between 2003 and 2005, I travelled to Darfur. During that genocide, 300,000 people were killed there and 2 million people were displaced. Here we are in 2025 with the war in Sudan, which is often overlooked because events in the Middle East and in Ukraine are so high on our agendas. It has been appalling to see the horrific number of deaths and displacements again in Sudan. It is not surprising, therefore, that Sudan is probably top of the list of those who end up in the small boats trying to cross the English Channel.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 10th July 2025 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Ludford]

100: After Clause 36, insert the following Clause—
“Requirement to produce an annual report on cooperation with Europol(1) The Secretary of State must, within one year of the passage of this Act, lay before Parliament an annual report on cooperation between UK law enforcement agencies and Europol.(2) A further report must be published and laid before Parliament at least once per year.(3) An annual report under this section must include—(a) actions taken during the previous year to cooperate with Europol,(b) progress in reducing people smuggling and human trafficking, and(c) planned activities for improving future cooperation with Europol.”Member's explanatory statement
This new clause would require the Government to provide an annual report to Parliament detailing the UK’s efforts to cooperate with Europol, its progress in reducing levels of people smuggling and human trafficking, and its plans to improve future cooperation.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, Amendments 100 and 101 are in my name and that of my noble friend Lord German. I will also speak to Amendment 206, tabled by my noble friend Lady Hamwee, with me and the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool, as signatories.

These amendments are all about co-operation with Europol in various ways, and I hope they are pushing at a very open door with the Government. They try to put some flesh on the bones of various aspirational texts of the last five years and to give some practical and operational content to what has remained a bit declaratory so far. Maybe the Minister will be able to give some information about what is going to happen to implement the reset document of 19 May.

Amendment 100 asks for the Government to produce an annual report on co-operation with Europol, the idea being that if the Secretary of State is required to produce an annual report on co-operation between the UK’s law enforcement agencies and Europol, that will provide an impetus to have something to report on. New subsection (3) in Amendment 100 suggests that the annual report should include actions taken during the previous year to co-operate with Europol, progress in reducing people smuggling and human trafficking, and planned activities for improving future co-operation with Europol. It would not just be a report for its own sake—I am sure Home Office civil servants have quite a bit to do as it is—but it would be in order to say, “Oh golly, we’ve got to produce that annual report, so let’s do something”.

Amendment 101 would require the Secretary of State to seek to establish a joint taskforce with Europol for the purposes of co-operation, which are set out: disrupting trafficking operations, enhancement of law enforcement capabilities, specialised training for officials involved in border security and immigration enforcement, and of that ilk. It takes two to tango, so obviously the amendment does not expect the UK Government to establish a joint taskforce with Europol on their own, so it says “seek to” establish a joint taskforce.

Amendment 206 is a request for a unilateral obligation on the Government, saying:

“The Secretary of State must provide adequate resources to law enforcement agencies”—


that is, the national crime agencies, the police forces in England and Wales and the British Transport Police—

“for the purpose of enhancing their participation in Europol’s anti-trafficking operations … The resources … must include technology for conducting improved surveillance on, and detection of, smuggling networks”.

Just to look at the history of, and aspirations for, co-operation between the UK and Europol, we started about five years ago—obviously, we were once extremely significant in Europol; I know that I have said this before in the Chamber, but it riles somewhat. For 10 years, Rob Wainwright, a senior British police figure, was the distinguished director of Europol—we were in “pol” position, you could say. However, we must make the best of what we now have, which is the trade and co-operation agreement.

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[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

It is probably best if I reflect on that, because although I know who is embedded in Europol, I do not know offhand, unless I can find some inspiration in the next few seconds—I fear that I may have to check. I say that simply because this Minister and this Government are responsible for National Crime Agency liaison; we are not responsible for the Europol aspect of liaison with us. Rather than give the noble Lord an unhelpful answer, if he will allow me I will reflect on that in due course and give him a specific answer in writing, post this very helpful set of amendments, which I still hope will not be pressed.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

I thank the Minister for that response. The tone and approach go very much in the direction and spirit of the amendments, even if their drafting is not entirely fit, in the Minister’s mind. He is right that they were designed to illustrate the very welcome change of approach of the current Government, who regard co-operation with Europol—and, indeed, with the EU generally—as important.

The noble Lord, Lord Davies, said that we must be driven by operational need, not ideological nostalgia. I do not think you could find anything in the drafting of the amendments which is not operational. To be honest, I take slight exception to any suggestion that they are driven by ideological nostalgia. If there is any ideology, it is coming from those on the Opposition Benches, who are still displaying an allergy to the European Union.

I have the pleasure of serving on the European Affairs Committee with the noble Lord, Lord Jackson. We are going to have some interesting discussions when we finalise our report on the reset. He referred to the leads from the National Crime Agency and the National Police Chiefs’ Council giving evidence to us a few months ago. I looked it up while he was speaking, and they referred to the more cumbersome, clunky and process-heavy post-Brexit arrangements. They were engaged in mitigation, so they were making the best—I am now using words they did not use—of a not great job. I am afraid that what is coming from the Benches to my right is a prejudice against working with the European Union.

[Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)]

I am listening very carefully to the noble Baroness. She knows that there has been cross-party support on, for instance, information-sharing in respect of the Schengen Information System’s second iteration, which we were members of in 2015, and it is incumbent upon this Government and the European Union to negotiate that information-sharing. We could ameliorate the clunkiness were the EU to be a little bit flexible, for mutual benefit, in sharing the SIS II data.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

There are all kinds of things we can aspire to. Unfortunately, the arrangements the noble Lord’s party negotiated have certain constraints in terms of the legal operation of the European Union, and he knows that.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am sorry to disturb the noble Baroness’s flow, but I want to place on record, in answer to the question raised by Members, that there are no Europol embeds in the UK. There is a Europol liaison unit, which is staffed entirely by UK police officers. I hope that is helpful.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord for that helpful information.

[Lord Harper (Con)]

Forgive me, but I just want to be clear, because I think the noble Baroness may have, I am sure inadvertently, misunderstood me. I am very supportive of us co-operating with Europol. We did when I was in government as Immigration Minister, we do now, and I want us to continue to. I also want us to co-operate with law enforcement agencies around the world. What I do not want to do is fetter either agencies or the Government by skewing priorities towards only one of them. I want them to co-operate with all relevant agencies and make those decisions based on the threat assessment and the operational need. I want to do all those things, but I am very supportive of our co-operation with Europol and always have been. I do not want her to run away with the impression that I am not.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord; I was coming to his remarks. In his original remarks, he said precisely that—we do not want to co-operate just with Europe; we want global co-operation. Of course I want global co-operation, but the fact is that something like Interpol is not operational. Europol is operational and it is our next-door neighbour. It is obvious, because of the routes that irregular migrants take, that geography means we have to co-operate particularly with our European counterparts on issues such as people smuggling and migrant trafficking. That does not mean we do not want to co-operate elsewhere, in particular with countries of origin, but we do not have the same operational possibilities as we do with EU institutions and agencies.

I was reminding the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, of the evidence we heard from senior police officers. They had to be diplomatic, and they are doing their best with the hand they have been dealt, but it is not ideological nostalgia to say that the TCA places serious limitations on those possibilities. One would not wish, frankly, to start from there. I hugely welcome the change of tone, the approach and the willingness—not this baggage or allergy to anything that has the word “Europe” in it. I know that the Minister personally and the Government want, within limitations that I do not necessarily endorse, to co-operate with the European Union and individual member states. It is not about politics or ideology; it is about whether we are going to catch major criminals. That is why we have to give our police and European police the tools to be able to disrupt the gangs—that is what we all claim we want. We must not allow ideology to impede that co-operation.

I conclude that I am grateful for the reply from the Minister. I will reflect on whether I can submit something on Report that is more to his and the Government’s taste, but I welcome the positivity in his remarks and intentions about how we need co-operation. With that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 100 withdrawn.

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[Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)]

My Lords, I support the excellent amendments in the name of my noble friend Lord Swire. I begin with a confession, which I think is shared by most of my colleagues on these Benches, that we were all whipped in 2006 or 2007 in the other place when in opposition to oppose identity cards. It was a period when there were serious concerns about the infringement on civil liberties of identity cards. Tony Blair, our former Prime Minister, got a lot of things wrong over the years, but he was absolutely right on identity cards. If I were to go back in time and vote again, I would support identity cards, for many reasons. We are talking almost 20 years ago and the world has changed significantly in terms of transnational travel, patterns of serious organised crime, and the challenges of large numbers of people moving across the world, a minority of whom are doing so for nefarious reasons and for criminal enterprises.

The Minister knows that I have great respect for him. I know he serves in the greatest tradition of patriots in the Labour Party who have served in government and he wants to do his best to protect our borders and the safety and security of our country. However, we can no longer have these slightly erudite debates about ID cards and civil liberties when we have so many huge challenges, particularly the threat of Islamist terrorism and other serious organised crime. If we look abroad, we see that other countries have taken this very seriously as well, including many English-speaking countries: Australia, Canada, New Zealand and of course the United States. What bedevils us is the lack of co-ordination and collaboration in terms of sharing data.

I have been nice about the Minister and now I am going to be nasty. I have asked him four or five times the same question—I dare say it is his officials’ fault, not his—about whether we collect data on students whose visas are rescinded as a result of criminal activity. For various reasons, he has had to answer that he cannot give me that information, telling me the Home Office does not collate that data, there are too many databases, or it would be too expensive to collect that data. I am not blaming him as such, but that is symptomatic of the difficulty of being able to properly co-ordinate data in the public interest to fight crime. Therefore, we should consider anything that can assist that, whether it is facial recognition—I know there are civil liberties issues and in China we see some very major infringements of civil liberties, so I do not want to go down that road—iris scans, fingerprints, et cetera. The ability to collect that data for people coming in—

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My noble friend Lord German is going to speak on the entirety of the amendments, but I did not want to lose the theme of ID cards. I have a question, because I genuinely do not understand. We have had big, long debates about ID cards in the past and maybe we will again in the future, but how are ID cards supposed to help in the case of irregular migration? Employers who are employing people illegally are presumably meant to be checking documents at the moment to make sure that people have the right to stay and the right to work. How does an ID card actually help?

If employers have the means to check whether someone has the right to work legally—that is an alleged pull factor, although of course the Migration Advisory Committee has always advised that that is actually not true—can the noble Lord explain to me what ID cards add as a supposed deterrent to irregular migrants, when employers should already be checking documentation? How do they add value to that particular issue?

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 26th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, my Amendment 18 seeks to introduce another criterion to the definition of what constitutes a threat to border security. We believe it addresses a crucial and glaringly absent dimension from the definition of threats to border security—harm to the economic interests of the United Kingdom.

As drafted, the clause defines relevant threats as those involving criminality, risk of offence, or harm to persons or property. All that is right and necessary, but to leave out the economic dimension is to ignore one of the most significant consequences of border insecurity in the modern age. Illegal entry, organised immigration crime and abuse of our immigration system come at a cost, not just to public safety or border integrity but of real and measurable economic harm. This includes the burden placed on housing, healthcare and social services, and extends to the impact on wages, labour market distortions, the exploitation of workers and loss of public confidence in our immigration system.

These are some of the effects of illegal immigration which people across this country feel most keenly. We must ensure that we reflect this in our assessment of the threat which illegal immigration poses to us. If individuals are entering the UK unlawfully in ways that undermine legal labour markets, displace lawful employment or distort local economies through illicit practices, surely that is a matter of national interest. Surely that is as much of a threat to border security as any physical or legal risk. If our legal framework cannot even acknowledge that reality, how can it ever be expected to address it? This amendment would ensure that this important consideration is included in the Bill, in recognition of economic harm being one of the most serious effects of this issue.

I take this opportunity to speak to some of the other amendments in this group. Amendments 6 and 14, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, address an important and often overlooked issue. Illegal meat imports present a genuine risk to our agricultural sector, as we have heard, and affect our food supply chains and public health. The potential introduction of diseases such as African swine fever or foot and mouth through contaminated meat would be catastrophic, economically and environmentally. Biosecurity is a key part of our national security. The Government need to take action to ensure that this threat is addressed.

The amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, raises a matter that I hope the Government will clear up in their response. Cybersecurity is an important responsibility of the Government. I am not quite sure how it relates to border security and asylum, but this is none the less a probing amendment that I hope that the Government respond to. I share the noble Baroness’s concerns about cybersecurity. We have seen a number of high-profile and extremely damaging cyberattacks in recent months. Ministers will be aware of the urgent need to tackle this. The noble Baroness is right to raise this issue. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s reply.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I will add a couple of points to the excellent points that have been made by previous speakers. My noble friend Lady Hamwee’s point about the opportunism that is evident in the kinds of product that criminals can switch between was well made: they might one day smuggle people and another day smuggle contaminated food products, including meat.

The amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, concerning the impact on the economic interests of the UK very much ties up with the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Deben, in particular, and with trying to persuade the Treasury that the costs of foot and mouth, BSE and bird flu are important. You would think that this was self-evident, even to the Treasury. I would like to say that I was surprised at hearing that it was not, but maybe I was not.

You do not have to be a countryman to think that. I admit that you could not get a lot more metropolitan than I am, but like my noble friend I listen to “The Archers” and care about the countryside. It is not true that all of us who live in cities do not care about the countryside, but we must care about biosecurity as consumers, as well as about the impact on farmers. I absolutely support that idea, but I look forward to the Minister’s response on whether it should be part of the functions of border commander. It certainly needs to go much higher—I was going to say “up the food chain”, but that would be a bad pun—up the profile of government priorities to protect the country from biosecurity threats.

There has been a lot of concern about whether post-Brexit controls are being implemented. I am not a world expert, but the can has been kicked down the road time after time on those controls. There is also concern about whether Border Force and port health authorities are being given enough resources to stamp out illegal meat and other contaminated food imports. The Minister’s colleague, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, was given a grilling by the EFRA Select Committee in the other place early last month; I do not know whether there has been any product from its evidence sessions, chaired by my friend in the other place Alistair Carmichael, but that committee is showing how importantly it takes these issues. We have noble Lords with experience of senior government posts in this area—the noble Lords, Lord Rooker and Lord Deben, and the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey—so I hope the Minister will give us a positive response.

Lastly, the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, mentioned the role of trading standards, which has been so underfunded, sadly. We know what pressure council budgets are under. As a consumer, trading standards is not even on my radar, these days. Where do you go if you have a consumer complaint? I have no idea. Was it not batted off to Citizens Advice a long time ago? Anyway, we know about this function: you have the border and then you have the inside the country attention to these matters. Probably we ought to be aware that they all seem to be quite underfunded and a bit fragile in places. We know that there are so many issues that the police are unable to deal with these days, in this whole area.

There is a lot of press coverage of things such as illegal meat imports, so it would be good to hear from the Minister that the Government—not only Defra but across government—understand and will take action on the very real threats that have been raised by the amendments tabled and discussed in this group.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to all contributors to the debate. I begin by saying, straightforwardly, that the importance of biosecurity and of securing our borders on biosecurity is vital. The Government make the commitment to ensure that we prevent contaminated goods entering this country, for the very reasons that the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, the noble Lord, Lord Deben, and my noble friend Lord Rooker mentioned—as indeed did the noble Baronesses, Lady Hamwee and Lady Ludford.

I will start with the amendments that seek to ensure that the Border Security Commander has regard to specific threats, namely those posed to UK biosecurity by illegal meat imports, as tabled by my noble friend Lord Rooker. It is absolutely right that that will be a key issue for the Border Security Commander. I reassure my noble friend that the threats posed to UK biosecurity by illegal meat imports are implicitly included within the definition of threats to border security in Clause 3. The commander will and does work closely with colleagues in Defra and Border Force through his board to ensure that the strategic priorities for border security are tackled.

I remember the foot and mouth outbreak of 2001. In fact, I am old enough to remember the foot and mouth outbreak of 1967, when I was a child. I also remember—who can forget?—the BSE issues that the noble Lord, Lord Deben, dealt with as Agriculture Minister. My noble friend was the Minister for Agriculture in Northern Ireland and I know, from sharing time with him, that he put a great emphasis on the issue of bushmeat and on biosecurity generally, for the very reasons that noble Members have raised: it has a financial cost, a health cost and a border security cost. Criminals will get involved in this if they see profit but, as the noble Lord, Lord Deben, also mentioned, people may bring back something from their holidays that they think is appropriate or they may have dropped a sandwich. We therefore need concerted efforts on organised biosecurity issues, but need also to be aware of the individual who breaches regulations.

I know that the National Farmers’ Union has recently written to the Border Security Commander, Martin Hewitt, asking for an increased focus on biosecurity issues, and he has been able to reassure them in some ways, including that sniffer dogs are operational at certain ports in the United Kingdom and that X-ray scanners at Dover are consistently used to scan vehicles that are selected as part of an intelligence-led model. There will continue to be a central focus on biosecurity by the Border Security Commander, working closely with Defra and Border Force colleagues, to ensure that we tackle the strategic priorities that noble Lords have mentioned.

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[Viscount Goschen (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendments in the name of my noble friend Lord Cameron, which seek to flesh out what the role of this organisation is to be and to put more detail on objectives and functions. If one looks at the functions of the commander, one sees that the meat of this is really in two points made over four and a half lines, so it is very thin indeed. It is an organisation that has already been established, as we know, and there is already an incumbent, so I think it would help the Committee a great deal if the Minister were to explain what the organisation is really going to look like. We talk about the border commander as if it is an individual, and indeed that person is an individual, but then we go on to talk about the command—the organisation.

The Minister has talked in terms of hundreds of millions of pounds, potentially, at the disposal of this organisation, or if not at its disposal, then it would have a high degree of influence over it. These are very considerable sums of money when one considers the overall budget, for example, of the Border Force, so will the Minister set out what the actual border commander’s organisation, the BSC, will look like? On what sort of scale will it be, in terms of staff, for example? A figure of £150 million was mentioned that will, in essence, be put at the disposal of the commander. What does that mean? What is the operating budget of this organisation going to be? Can the noble Lord help us? To look at this as an organisation rather than as an individual, £150 million gets you a lot of co-ordination. Can we hear more about the structure, the functions, the skills of the staff that will be working there, the type of experience, the operating budget and what returns are sought on the budgets that are being put forward?

I welcome the opportunity for the Minister, in response to my noble friend’s amendments, and indeed the others that have been discussed, to come forward and help the Committee establish what type of organisation we are talking about. He might care to illustrate it through an example of how the new organisation will interact with the Border Force. Who is going to be, in a sense, holding the strategic priorities? Which organisation is going to have influence over the other? I am sure it would help the Committee a great deal if the Minister were able to do that.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 71 is in my name and that of my noble friend Lord German. I had expected that it would be grouped with my mine and others’ amendments about Europol. Those are in later groups, but this one got bounced up, I guess for understandable reasons because it is about a duty on the border commander, so it makes sense to group it either way, as it were. That means there is going to be a slightly disjointed discussion on Europol, but I am delighted to raise the issue sooner rather than later.

I am hoping for a positive response from the Minister, because when the UK-EU summit on 19 May produced the so-called common understanding—it is a slightly awkward term, but it is the reset result, and a good result it was—there was, in particular, a point on internal security and judicial co-operation, and that referred back to doing better work on Part Three of the trade and co-operation agreement. In case noble Lords do not have the document under their eyes, Article 567 of the TCA is about the scope of co-operation with Europol. It talks about “the exchange of information”, including

“specialist knowledge … general situation reports … results of strategic analysis … information on criminal investigation procedures … information on crime prevention methods … participation in training activities”

and

“the provision of advice and support in individual criminal investigations as well as operational cooperation”.

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[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

In reply to the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, he seemed to suggest that the amendments from my noble friend Lady Hamwee would somehow be unusual in criminal law. She is obviously saying that, rather than to require the person to prove a reasonable excuse as their defence, the prosecution would have to prove “without reasonable excuse” as a component part of the offence.

I was looking at driving offences. I admit that this appears to be an AI overview, subject to correction by my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, but, apparently, careless driving is

“driving without due care and attention”

or

“driving without reasonable consideration for other road users”.

Presumably the prosecution has to prove that you were driving without due care and attention or without reasonable consideration for other road users. It is not, at least in the first instance, for the driver to have to prove that they were taking due care and attention or that they were showing reasonable consideration for other road users. I forget any criminal law that I learned many moons ago, but I know that there are circumstances in which the burden can shift. But, overall, the prosecution has to prove the component parts of the offence.

What my noble friend is trying to achieve is the normal rule in criminal offences, where the burden lies principally on the prosecution. I query the suggestion from the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, that my noble friend somehow wants to be out of line with the normality of the criminal law in what she suggests in her amendment. I think that it is the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, who, not for the first time, wants to be out of line.

[Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)]

I take that in good heart, as the noble Baroness and I are members of a committee of the House in which we share rumbustious debate. I am sorry that noble Lords have stumbled into “immigration law for dummies”, because neither of us is an expert on it. However, I think she is comparing apples and pears, because the example that she uses of dangerous driving is actually a strict liability offence, where mens rea is not an issue; in other words, it is not presumed that you would wilfully desire to get into a car and drive drunk in committing the offence. It is not necessary to prove it.

I am not saying that the noble Baroness is doing or saying anything out of line; I am merely demonstrating that one has to address wider issues in this policy area. For those reasons, the amendment is unhelpful in meeting the Government’s strategic objective to reduce illegal immigration.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 2nd June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I join others in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Harper, on an entertaining maiden speech—although, like my noble friend Lady Brinton, I stand fully ready to vote to abolish myself.

I was as disturbed as many others were by the Prime Minister’s warning that without strong migration rules,

“we risk becoming an island of strangers”.

Of course we need a well-managed asylum and immigration system. But not only is that kind of inflammatory language alarming and unhelpful; neither recent political statements nor any measures in the Bill do anything to promote the integration that would seek to make newcomers well-settled residents and contributing citizens. I much appreciated the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Warsi.

Indeed, much alarm has been created by the heralding of tougher requirements for obtaining both settlement and citizenship, as the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, described. I will never understand why, having allowed people to legally reside, any Government think it useful to make it harder for them to convert that into permanent settlement and then citizenship, which anchors their belonging here.

I would love to say more about other parts of the Bill, but I want to concentrate on European aspects, and my noble friends are well covering other topics.

The common understanding which resulted from the UK-EU summit two weeks ago pledged to reinforce co-operation on law enforcement, including through Europol, on analysis of threats, and on exchange of information and operational action.

Although we cannot yet go back to the golden era of British pre-eminence in Europol, when one of our nationals held the directorship of that agency for a decade, we can encourage maximum exploitation of these opportunities, and I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, about seeking access to SIS II. My Benches will table some amendments on Europol, such as equipping the National Crime Agency and police forces to participate in Europol’s anti-trafficking operations, establishing joint taskforces, and requiring the border commander to meet the director of Europol.

I want mainly to talk about Clause 42, on EU citizens, and I welcome the intention to clear up some of the muddle of the past caused by the way in which the EU settlement scheme was devised and implemented. But I fear that further confusion may lie ahead—even another Windrush—due to the Government’s reluctance to jettison the whole of the baggage of the past.

The problem comes because Clause 42 holds back from declaring that everyone given EU settled status actually comes within the citizens’ rights provisions of the UK-EU withdrawal agreement and the EEA and Swiss equivalents, such as the ability to rely on the direct effect of those rights. It says only that all those granted the right to stay under the UK’s EU settlement scheme will be treated as if they had such rights.

The UK’s EU settlement scheme was in one sense generous, in that it swept up EU citizens simply because they had been living in the UK for the requisite time. But in doing so, successive UK Governments acted on a presumption—although this is contested—that some did not have rights under the withdrawal agreements because they had not been, in the jargon, “exercising their treaty rights”, which broadly involved being a worker rather than a non-employed person.

No actual test was applied, even though the withdrawal agreement allowed that, so EU citizens were never told their legal status. As the Independent Monitoring Authority, the watchdog for the rights of EU citizens in the UK, described it in initially welcoming Clause 42:

“There are people who have status under the EUSS who may not be entitled to rights under the Agreements. This is a complex area”—


you are telling me—

“but there is a lack of clarity as to who has rights under the Agreements and who does not … The concern is that there could be potential instances where it would matter whether a citizen with EUSS status does have rights under the Agreements or not. In these situations, citizens who are within the true cohort”—

I think your Lordships gather what that means—

“might need to re-prove they were residing in the UK in accordance with EU free movement rules at the end of 2020. As time goes by it may become more and more difficult for citizens to find the relevant evidence, such as payslips, to prove they met the free movement rules at the end of 2020. We do not know what implications this could have in the future for these citizens or future generations of citizens.”

Are your Lordships getting echoes of another scenario?

I imagine that the IMA thought that Clause 42 would wash away the relevance of this distinction and the possible need to go back and establish rights from years ago, but the absence of legal clarity identified by the IMA remains. Despite good intentions, past gremlins could pop up in future and catch people out precisely because the legal position has been left as unclear as it was in 2020.

That is no doubt why the Independent Monitoring Authority now seems to have had a bit of a rethink, commenting 10 days’ ago in regard to the Immigration White Paper that

“the vast majority of the proposals that the government is consulting on should not affect the majority of citizens with EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS) status who have rights under the Agreements.”

Quite a few caveats there.

I have to finish, but as Sir Humphrey might have put it, it is not only unwise but brave, Minister, to risk recreating the Windrush miscarriage of justice. I suggest that the Government should take the wiser course, even if it goes against every instinct of the Home Office, and junk past practices and start with a clean sheet. Hence, my Benches will be tabling amendments, which I hope might be signed by others, to try to get the Government to do just that.

Immigration System

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Thursday 15th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

We will make changes to the Immigration Rules relating to the social care sector during the course of this year, but we are also putting in place a transitional period. There is a need to ensure that we try to meet any shortfall in social care requirements from within the existing UK workforce—that is the objective of government policy. I am happy to discuss with my colleagues and the social care sector how we improve recruitment and other issues, and we will do that through other government departments. The key thing is that we cannot rely completely on overseas labour to fill the UK social care sector.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, the Statement and the White Paper both refer to illegal and irregular migration, which is better than what we have heard recently—lumping them both into illegal. Can the Minister confirm that it is legal to enter a country to seek asylum—although, obviously, if it is refused then the person must leave? Can he also clarify the Government’s understanding of the difference between illegal and irregular migration?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The noble Baroness again presses me on that issue, which is absolutely her right. We are trying to ensure that people who have an asylum claim or seek refugee status can have that claim assessed within the United Kingdom or with our partners in the European Union. We are having great discussions as well with the French, Belgians, Dutch and Germans about irregular and illegal migration.

There is a real difference. If somebody claims asylum, that needs to be considered and processed—and, if processed, that needs to be given, if approved. If it is not approved, that person needs to be removed. That is a reasonable and fair thing for Governments to do. Irregular migration, as the noble Baroness will know, is also an issue that the Government will examine, because a whole range of people are seeking refugee status or other things—and there are people trying to enter illegally across the channel. We are having to try to address all those issues.

The Government are putting more rigour into that formal border control at the channel to stop small boats, and we are putting those measures in the Bill that will be before the House very shortly. We are also trying to speed up asylum claims so that they are processed much more quickly to remove people from hotels. At the same time, we are trying to make sure that we continue to meet our international obligations. No one has said that that is easy, but I hope that the White Paper gives some new direction and routes to how we can do it more effectively.

Citizenship Applications

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Government are not going to withdraw from the convention. The Government support the convention and believe that the proposals referred to in this Private Notice Question are compliant with it. Nothing in the proposals today stops any individual applying for British citizenship, however they have arrived in the United Kingdom. But the presumption is that those who have arrived illegally will find their application turned down, unless they can provide a range of circumstances which are exceptional, compelling and mitigating, and where the Secretary of State may therefore choose to apply discretion to grant citizenship on an exceptional basis. I believe, as does my right honourable friend the Home Secretary, that that is compliant with our international obligations and, at the same time, examines what is an illegal route to the United Kingdom.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, is not this Labour proposal almost worse than the shocking Tory legislation that we spent three years opposing, in that people are going to be lulled into a false sense of security? The Tories tried to stop people getting refugee status; Labour is going to allow them to get refugee status and, as my noble friend Lady Hamwee said, start to contribute to and integrate into British society, and then, down the line, they will be told, “Oh no, we don’t want you as a citizen”. How can such a fundamental change be made through Home Office guidance rather than through primary legislation?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The guidance is there and the ability of the Government to change that guidance is there. We have made a Statement to the House of Commons in relation to that guidance being changed.

There are many individuals who reside in the United Kingdom who live, work and enjoy the benefits of living in the United Kingdom and who are not British citizens. The right of citizenship is a different issue. As I said to my noble friend Lord Boateng, individuals can apply for citizenship, but the presumption is that they will be refused if they have entered illegally, unless there are compelling, mitigating circumstances. That is our position. That it is not worse than the Rwanda scheme—we are repealing the Rwanda scheme. We are changing the immigration scheme through the immigration Bill, which will come before this House in due course. The noble Baroness will know that there are major steps in that Bill to end the pernicious trade of people trafficking, to stop the wasteful Rwanda scheme, and to ensure that we place immigration and migration on a proper footing. Further, there will be an immigration White Paper later this year, which will cover a range of issues, including the needs of society and the need for immigration for the British economy and growth.

EU Settlement Scheme

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Thursday 24th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Elections Act 2022 preserved voting rights for individuals from the European Union who had settled status in the United Kingdom. They can vote and stand in elections in every way, with the exception of general elections, where they cannot vote or stand. This is a Cabinet Office responsibility, but I will ensure that the points made by my noble friend are brought to the attention of the Cabinet Office Minister. There is clarity on the Electoral Commission website to that effect, which gives the information that is required.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, the EU settlement scheme has generally been a success, but there are some problems with it, including those attracting legal action by the European Commission that raise the prospect of another Windrush. Will the new Government undertake an overall review of the scheme, including the impact assessment that has never been done of the denial of physical proof of residence rights and the imposition of digital-only status? That is to be extended throughout the visa system, but we have never had an impact assessment.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Government have been aware of both the court cases and the challenges that have taken place—that happened under the previous Government. We believe that we are now legally meeting the obligations of High Court judgments and of the status scheme that was implemented following the withdrawal agreement. However, obviously we keep that under review. We are also aware of the challenges mentioned by the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, on digitisation and we are working through to, I hope, meet our obligations to those citizens who have a right now to live, work and indeed in some cases vote in this United Kingdom.

Refugees (Family Reunion) Bill [HL]

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 18th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Hamwee and I have played a relay with Private Members’ Bills on this important subject of refugee family reunion. She has explained the history, going back seven years and now five Bills. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Sheffield noted, the sustained interest in this cause should tell the Government something. My noble friend’s expertise and commitment to this cause, and many others in the field of asylum and immigration, have inspired me and continue to do so.

The Bill would address some of the key gaps in eligibility and remove some of the existing barriers to family reunion. Notably, it would enable child refugees to sponsor their close family members—parents and siblings—as well as cautiously expand the range of family members that adult refugees are allowed to sponsor to include siblings, parents and adult dependent children. The core proposition is that families belong together and that we should do what we can to mend the effects of war and persecution that tear them apart. It is simply inhumane to keep families apart.

This Government are, thankfully, committed to the European Convention on Human Rights. What about its Article 8, on the right to family life? What about the Convention on the Rights of the Child? My noble friend Lady Walmsley asked why the Government are not prioritising the best interests of the child.

Family ties are a key reason why people risk their lives on dangerous journeys to reach the UK, so safe and legal family reunion routes provide a vital alternative to life-threatening channel crossings, as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick—still my friend—stressed. Restricting family reunion drives vulnerable women and children into the hands of ruthless people smugglers and traffickers, as the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, so forcefully reminded us. Family reunion accelerates refugees’ integration in the UK. Permitting a refugee to be with their family will greatly improve their chance of leading a stable and productive life, without threats to their well-being and mental health. Imagine trying to move forward with your life and work while worrying about the safety of family back home.

Family relationships can be key to the psychological recovery of a child refugee. The noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, referred to the grief of the Kindertransport children. As the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, reminded us, family unity may save the public purse; it costs £30,000 a year to look after a child in a residential home or foster care who might be supported by parents and other relatives if they were allowed to come to the UK—memo to Rachel Reeves.

In 2022, the previous Government demonstrated an admirable awareness of how refugees need their families by introducing the Ukraine family scheme, as has already been referred to, which allowed Ukrainians to sponsor a wide range of extended family members. This Bill suggests definitions of family that are not nearly as broad as the Ukraine scheme.

The previous Government defended the ban on child refugees sponsoring their parents or close family members to join them—in which we are an outlier in Europe, as the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, stressed—by claiming that it would act as a pull factor, encouraging more children to make dangerous journeys to the UK. As the noble Baroness, Lady Mobarik, and my noble friend Lord Oates cited, in 2016 the EU Committee of this House categorically concluded that there was no evidence provided by EU member states operating the family reunification directive, which permits children to sponsor family members but which the UK declined to opt into, that children had been exploited by being sent ahead for other family members to join them. Its report on child migrants said:

“We received no evidence of families sending children as ‘anchors’ following the implementation of the Family Reunification Directive by other Member States”.


The Home Affairs Select Committee in the other place reached a similar conclusion under the chairmanship of the right honourable Yvette Cooper, now Home Secretary. In any case, the deterrence argument assumes it to be morally as well as legally sound to block the right to family reunification in order to send signals to prospective immigrants to give it up. This is surely not going to be the new Government’s position.

It is important to note that, while the Bill would make a big change for the families able to be safely reunited, the increase in the number of refugee family reunion visas issued would be relatively small. My noble friend answered the noble Lord, Lord Murray, who made an intervention without a speech. The Refugee Council and Safe Passage have estimated that allowing children to sponsor close relatives could result in between 240 and 750 family members being granted visas each year.

Just over two years ago, during Second Reading on a similar Bill that I introduced, there was an important contribution from the then shadow Chief Whip—I will name him—the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, now the actual Chief Whip. He said:

“I support the Bill and hope that we will get a positive response from the Minister … This issue is not going to go away until the Government deal with the question of how we can have proper safe and legal routes and deal with the criminal gangs. This Bill is one attempt to deal with those problems”.—[Official Report, 8/7/2022; col. 1242.]


I rest my case. This remains the case in October 2024. If the new Government are serious about strengthening safe routes, supporting women and children, endorsing family life and tackling the smuggling and trafficking gangs, they will back this Bill. I sincerely hope that the Minister can give us a positive response today to this modest and doable Bill, as my noble friend says.

King’s Speech

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

I applaud the speech made by the noble Baroness and I look forward to seeing her Private Member’s Bill. I too warmly welcome the new Ministers.

I was as delighted to hear the Attorney-General yesterday promise that the new Government would respect and uphold the rule of law as I was to hear the new Prime Minister do the same in regard to the European Convention on Human Rights. The display last week at the European Political Community summit of the London treaty—the London treaty, note—which set up the Council of Europe, which hosts the convention and the European Court of Human Rights, sent a massive and very welcome signal of intent.

I also applaud the fact that not only have the Government scrapped the Rwanda scheme, but yesterday they made regulations to amend the ill-named Illegal Migration Act such as to ensure the processing of asylum seekers.

I very much welcome the proposed Hillsborough law to impose a legal duty of candour on public servants and authorities, although can the Minister explain how it will be enforced?

The London Victims’ Commissioner has reported on the inadequacy of action against stalkers—most of whom, although not all, are men—and the National Police Chiefs’ Council has called out an “epidemic” of violence against women and girls, as we have heard often today.

Sky News reports that misogyny, harassment and sexual abuse are even rife in the ambulance service, which is so utterly depressing as it should be all about keeping people safe. A young woman told the “Today” programme this morning that if an objection is made to boys quoting the extreme misogynist Andrew Tate, they are told, “Boys will be boys”, and, “You can’t take a joke”.

What are the Government’s plans to tackle this distinctly unfunny epidemic of violence, not only through the criminal justice system but socially and through an education system aimed at changing the behaviour of some men and boys with a warped perception of masculinity? Can the Government also look at the violence, threats and intimidation from supposedly trans rights activists—often very frightening men in black balaclavas—who have physically attacked women and threatened to rape and kill the TERFs? Has the police response been adequate? I do not need to refer the conversion therapy Bill, as I agree with the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott.

Women in the criminal justice system are described by the Ministry of Justice as among the most vulnerable in society, with complex needs that include trauma, domestic abuse, mental health and substance misuse problems. The fact that this trauma has been increased in some cases by male-bodied prisoners being placed with them shames those in charge of such decisions. I agree with my noble friend Lord McNally in calling on the Government to revisit, and hopefully accept, the recommendation of the 2007 Corston report on trying to avoid custodial sentences for women.

To continue on the subject of women, will this Government amend the Equality Act to clarify that “sex” means “biological sex” in order to resolve some of the problematic interactions between the Equality Act and the Gender Recognition Act?

I will cite in detail the Howard League’s recent valuable paper on options for a lasting solution to the prisons crisis on Friday, when we debate the report on community sentences by our Justice and Home Affairs Committee chaired by my noble friend Lady Hamwee. Wearing my European enthusiast hat I hope that the Minister’s plans will include looking at practice on community-based and diversionary schemes in the Netherlands and in Scandinavian countries. I also hope that the Government will try to get back into at least some of the EU justice and home affairs instruments and bodies, such as SIS II, which the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, mentioned.

I share the outrage at the IPP scandal, and I would like to hear more detail on the Government’s plans to expedite the safe release of post-tariff IPP prisoners. Will the Government set up a royal commission on the criminal justice system, as suggested by the Bar Council? Will they invest in a sustainable and resilient justice system recognised as a vital public service that truly serves the public? There is as yet no promise of more money.

My last remark is on the need to dig all those agencies supervised by the Ministry of Justice out of the 19th century and get them into the 21st century. Among them are His Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service, which includes the Probate Service, the Office of the Public Guardian and the Passport Office, which includes the General Register Office. Many of us only encounter some of those agencies on the death of a loved one, and we can have a very unhappy experience of bereavement bureaucracy, as I did, at a time when we need less stress, not more.

Illegal Immigration

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Monday 20th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I thank the right reverend Prelate for those comments. I agree with his point that it is obviously also morally wrong for criminal gangs to profit from this evil trade, and to ship people across the Channel at incredible risk to themselves. In fact, I think we are very close to the anniversary of that particularly unpleasant tragedy that happened in the Channel last year. As regards this problem of illegal migration becoming long-term, the right reverend Prelate is of course right. There are many drivers of this, and it therefore seems likely to me that the world will have to get together to address the various things that are driving these movements of people—what makes people so desperate to leave their homes—and try to do something about it. So far, it seems to have eluded the world, but I sincerely hope the right reverend Prelate is right, and that we can do something about it sooner rather than later.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I am not sure that the Minister fully answered the questions of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, and the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham. Will he now explain how a treaty or indeed legislation declaring Rwanda safe will solve the problem, given that the Supreme Court said that it was not the lack of

“good faith of the government of Rwanda”

that was the problem, but

“its practical ability to fulfil its assurances … in the light of the present deficiencies of the Rwandan asylum system”?

Presumably, they can make whatever binding commitments they like in a treaty, but the issue is the practical ability to deliver. Also, given that the Home Secretary says that the Government take their

“obligations to the courts very seriously”,

how can they change the law to “do whatever it takes”? What does “whatever it takes” actually mean?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I would not try to explain that. I do not know what will be in the new legislation. I do not know how it is worded; I do not know what the intention is for it, so I cannot answer any of those questions, for obvious reasons. I do not know whether it will solve the problem; I sincerely hope it does, for obvious reasons. One thing I would expect to be in a treaty—I am just speculating—is that it will be enforceable in some way. Whether that is through the Rwandan courts or through other international means, I really do not know. But we are going some way to try to address the Supreme Court’s concerns.