Asylum Seekers: Students

Debate between Lord Christopher and Baroness Williams of Trafford

Wednesday 9th May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

Because of the nature of the Question of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, I can say that there may be cases that have fallen foul of a study restriction. As I said, it is not mandatory to impose a restriction on study, and it should be imposed only where appropriate. We are proactively looking at cases that might have been affected and are issuing new immigration bail notices.

[Lord Christopher (Lab)]

My Lords, I am not clear about the thought process involved in this. There may be a case to argue in individual cases, but what is it? What is the thought process that makes someone decide that Bill Smith should stop studying?

Immigration: Asylum Claims

Debate between Lord Christopher and Baroness Williams of Trafford

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I thank the noble Baroness for bringing that up. She will know that we produced statistics at the end of last year. Figures from charities and any information that could be brought to bear in this early stage of making those statistics robust are always helpful, but clearly, we would like to get to a stage where the statistics we produce are robust. I thank the noble Baroness for her part in this.

[Lord Christopher (Lab)]

My Lords, some of the cases we have read about in the press are almost unbelievable. The noble Baroness may not have the answer to this question in her briefing papers, but how many of the staff dealing with these matters have more than 12 months’ experience of them? How many have more than two years’ experience? At its peak, what was the size of the cut in the Home Office staff overall?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

The noble Lord is right: I do not have the precise figures on me. However, I can tell him that all people in the detention estate are trained in dealing with some of these very sensitive issues.

Local Government Finance Settlement: Transition Grant

Debate between Lord Christopher and Baroness Williams of Trafford

Wednesday 16th March 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, I apologise to my noble friend. This is about the transitional grant.

[Lord Christopher (Lab)]

In view of the reduction in business rates, should we assume that there will be a significant increase in council tax?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, it is up to local areas to determine what they raise in council tax and how that relates to business rate retention. Clearly, there will be some sort of smoothing of that process because we would not want areas to be totally disbenefited by the new system. But generally, councils in the last few years have been extremely responsible in setting their council tax rates, and we expect them to go on being so.

City Regions: Pension Funds

Debate between Lord Christopher and Baroness Williams of Trafford

Tuesday 23rd February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Christopher (Lab)]

My Lords, following what was an accurate answer to the noble Lord, Lord Tugendhat, what arrangements are made when various pension funds pool resources to ensure that the individual potential beneficiaries of the funds are looked after?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, the noble Lord makes a vital point. The job of a pension fund, first and foremost, is to maximise the returns for its investors—there is absolutely no doubt about that. However, in pooling the resources of a pension fund, for example, you could go to fewer fund managers, which cost a lot of money relatively, and therefore have more efficient pension funds than perhaps we have now in local authority schemes.