Immigration Bill

Debate between Baroness Williams of Crosby and Earl of Sandwich

Thursday 3rd April 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Crosby (LD)]

My Lords, I very much hope that the Minister will have a deep discussion with his colleague, the noble Earl, Lord Howe, from the Department of Health, not necessarily about every single word of this quite lengthy amendment but about the general questions that it raises. I have in my hand a letter from the president of the Royal College of Physicians, Sir Richard Thompson, which was not one of those colleges mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Masham, but which raises serious questions about the public health implications unless we can look very carefully at them in the short while before Third Reading.

I think the noble Baroness, Lady Jay, who has played a crucial role in the whole area of sexual diseases, particularly AIDS, would bear out the argument made by Sir Richard. The major point he makes, and it is a very important one, is that there is considerable evidence that people who are invited to clinics, particularly the Doctors of the World Clinic in east London, to be tested for very dangerous and infectious diseases such as AIDS and drug-resistant tuberculosis—which is growing rapidly and now becoming a significant international threat to the good health even of people in relatively healthy countries such as our own—will see even relatively limited financial barriers as reasons not to attend. One of the prime difficulties is that when somebody attends a primary care facility, which is still generally available, or an A&E clinic and is referred on for testing to a hospital or another A&E clinic the real danger is that they will find this a reason not to attend. One has to accept that many people do not want to know what may be wrong with them. They are frightened of learning the results so any kind of hindrance is used as an excuse for not going.

The House will know, because it has had many discussions on infectious diseases and among its Members contains many experts in the field, the lethal consequences of people with AIDS or drug-resistant tuberculosis moving among the community where they live without being aware of the very serious, often lethal, consequences of passing on that infection. Sir Richard points out in his letter to me that one experience of that east London clinic is precisely that. There is a very rapid multiplying consequence of people not knowing what they have or knowing it and continuing to act as if they do not have to be treated. I simply plead with the House, from a non-partisan point of view, to look very closely at this amendment and consider what can best be done about it, in the interests of every citizen of this country and overseas visitors, to ensure that every possible step will be taken to ensure that highly infectious diseases are not passed on to innocent passers-by, friends or members of the family.

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on speaking so powerfully on behalf of a vulnerable group. This is an important amendment. I spoke on this issue at Second Reading and I am sorry to have missed the Committee stage, when I think the noble Earl, Lord Howe, gave another response, but I am still not satisfied that the Government have taken a serious interest in this. When I spoke at Second Reading the report of Médecins du Monde seemed to me very compelling. Has the Minister seen it? The noble Baroness quoted several authorities and I will not repeat them but I think this has serious consequences, not only for that group but for the population at large, especially in the field of mental health.

Immigration Bill

Debate between Baroness Williams of Crosby and Earl of Sandwich

Monday 17th March 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Crosby (LD)]

My Lords, my name, too, is attached to this amendment, and I very strongly support what my noble friend Lord Roberts and the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, have already said on this matter.

We have a very strange system in this country, under which an increasing amount of public expenditure sustains asylum seekers and people who are in detention but we do not enable ourselves or them to take any adequate steps to reduce that burden of public expenditure, nor to give the moral and responsible possibilities that detainees and asylum seekers very badly need. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, put it very well: there is nothing more demoralising than stopping people from working and at the same time keeping them under various kinds of restraint and control.

I am a patron of the Gatwick detention centre. It is one of the most successful detention centres, for the straightforward reason that it has a very substantial group of volunteers who continually meet and talk to asylum seekers and others in order to sustain morale. They would certainly support what my noble friend Lord Roberts said about the steady demoralisation that occurs with every month that passes, when somebody is unable to contribute to their own family or their own well-being, or to find ways to work.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said, it really is not necessary. We are one of the few countries that creates such a long wait before somebody is given permission to work. In the course of that long wait, the sense of responsibility—the sense of obligation to the society where one is—begins to melt away, to the point where people become totally demoralised and have no strong sense at all of where their future lies or how they can make it better than it is at present.

There are two major motivations for asylum seekers. One is primarily individual: the woman who is escaping from something like female genital mutilation or the young man who is homosexual in a society that is passionately opposed to that. Those are individual motivations. But there are also among asylum seekers some who are seeking what one can describe only as universal values: the Aung Sang Suu Kyis and Nelson Mandelas who are seeking asylum because of what they have done in their own societies. Some of the finest people I have ever come across are asylum seekers who have fought for democracy in a tyrannical state or fought for freedom of speech in a state that does not permit it. We are constantly missing the contribution that they can make.

We all respect the very great commitment of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, to trying to make things better for people in this situation. I hope that he will call on the Home Office to reconsider whether this strange policy of expensive detention followed by very long periods of almost complete loss of hope on the part of those who are detained or who are asylum seekers can be addressed in a more constructive way. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, put it very well: it is really hard to believe that the combination of extreme poverty and detention is the best way we can find to deal with people who are genuinely seeking asylum.

I hope very much that the Home Office will consider softening its present policies somewhat in order to enable genuine asylum seekers to have the opportunity to work and to support their families on more than £5 a day. None of us would find it very easy to live on that kind of sum, let alone sustain and keep families and children on the tiny amounts of money that are made available by the state. Noble Lords referred to charitable contributions, and there are some charitable contributions. I can think of much better reasons for those charitable contributions to sustain the children of asylum seekers than because their parents are unable to work to sustain them themselves.

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, I, too, pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Roberts, for bringing this amendment back and for making a powerful moral case, and to the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister and Lady Williams, for supporting him.

This is not a new amendment. This amendment has been around a long time. We have waited a long time. The right reverend Prelate will remember that Christian Aid and the churches were backing this as a major campaign, and we have seen it again and again in different incarnations throughout various immigration Bills. Governments of both parties have decided more or less to ignore it. When I was on the Independent Asylum Commission, we recommended it. Governments do not like it because of the administration involved. This Minister may see this old chestnut coming back and may be able to address it in a new way. Perhaps he will consider the argument about assimilation that was made by the noble Lord, Lord Roberts. Genuine asylum seekers who want to belong to our society should be given encouragement after a minimum period, which in this amendment is six months.

The Minister heard the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, make the point about the motivation of young asylum seekers and how quickly they adapt, while the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, reminded us of the terrible phrase “enforced idleness” in that Guardian article. Surely if we recognise the contribution of migrants and asylum seekers, we should open up opportunities early on and increase the chances of their integration in future.

I am also sympathetic to Amendment 72 with regard to bail proceedings. Asylum seekers suffer a lot while awaiting bail, and as patron of the visitors at Haslar in Portsmouth I recognise very much what the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, said about the people who work with asylum seekers knowing about this. We must listen to them, because £36 a week is not a great deal.