Baroness Sharples
Main Page: Baroness Sharples (Conservative - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Sharples's debates with the Home Office
(10 years ago)
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Lord Bates
I do not accept the premise that we are alienating people. People recognise that there are legitimate concerns here; if proper transitional arrangements are put in place, that can aid relations between both countries, such as the ones that we have used in the case of Croatia, which will remain in place until 2019.
Baroness Sharples (Con)
My Lords, is it not the fact that the number of children coming into school with English as their second language has risen from 6% last year to 16% this year?
Lord Bates
My noble friend is absolutely right, and that is one reason why we have said that it is a condition of immigration that the English language must be an important part of that.