Immigration Bill

Debate between Lord Bishop of Norwich and Lord Judd

Wednesday 3rd February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd]

My Lords, having heard my noble friend and others, it is clear how important these amendments are, and I am sure that the Minister will take them seriously. I will make just one point. Those who are behind these amendments are probably the people in the House who are the most experienced in depth about the issues with children that we are discussing. Their commitment to effective work with children cannot be doubted. It would therefore be outrageous if the Committee did not take seriously what they feel is important to put forward as amendments.

The one thought that strikes me is our failure to think ahead, to think in a wider context and to make connections. We agonise about the rising evidence of mental illness. We agonise about delinquency, extremism and terrorism. What are we doing with this younger generation? Are we actually trying to generate mental illness? Are we trying to generate recruits for extremists or, at a lesser level, gangs? Do we really want to build healthy citizens? These children are going to go somewhere, and they are either going to be positive, creative citizens or they are going to be deeply damaged youngsters with all kinds of negative consequences. We really need to bring our thinking together on social policy, health policy and all the policies necessary for a stable society and, indeed, for protection against extremism. These amendments are highly relevant to the imperative of that wider thinking.

[The Lord Bishop of Norwich]

My Lords, I do not want to detain the Committee because we have heard the significance of these amendments, to some of which I have added my name. I want to follow what the noble Lord, Lord Judd, has just said because we all know that the consequence of not providing for these young people when they leave the care system is serious because they are going to remain in this country.

Given that these young people are likely to remain here and to go under the radar, I simply ask the Minister to comment on the figures in relation to removal directions served on former unaccompanied young people in 2014. As I understand it, 245 removal directions were served on former asylum-seeking unaccompanied young people, but only 15—less than half of 1%—were forcibly removed. What I cannot see is how any of the proposed legislation is going to do anything other than make that situation worse and make those young people more destitute. The Children’s Society has plenty of evidence of those young people ending up sleeping on buses and selling the currency of their bodies to have somewhere to stay. I cannot think that that is the sort of response that we in this House want or the sort of society we want to create.

I will not go through the list of cases that the Children’s Society has given me of people who have now reached the age of majority and are receiving some support in education and training, putting themselves in a position where they can make a contribution to our society. But if we implement a system whereby they do not get support after the age of 18, as others do, we are storing up enormous trouble for ourselves and huge financial as well as emotional costs.