Scheduled Mass Deportation: Jamaica

Lord Clark of Windermere Excerpts

Tuesday 1st December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

Perhaps I can turn to my noble friend’s last question first, because he is absolutely right; my noble friend Lord Lancaster also alluded to this point. To conflate this flight, which contains some pretty serious criminals, with the people of the Windrush generation who came to this country to rebuild it after the war is an absolute insult to the Windrush generation, so I absolutely agree with my noble friend.

On the second point about the percentage of deportations, he is absolutely right. It is tiny: in terms of deportations to Jamaica, it is some 1%. Thirdly, he is absolutely right about the legislation: the UK Borders Act was passed in 2007 under a Labour Government.

[Lord Clark of Windermere (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the noble Baroness was unusually unforthcoming about the age of people coming to this country and their deportation. Will she look into this, because it does seem very fair to the Windrush generation that it applies to anyone who came to the UK before they were 12? That seems a very decent thing to do. Will she look into this and see if it can be put in a more formal arrangement?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I would say to the noble Lord that nobody due to be on that flight is of the Windrush generation—that is number one. In terms of the age of people coming to the UK, I keep saying that the provisions of the UK Borders Act 2007 still stand; I hope that that answers that question. I will go back and confirm that those provisions still stand and that, no matter what age someone came to this country, if they have committed a serious crime and have been jailed for more than 12 months, they will be under the provisions of the UK Borders Act 2007.