Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Debate between Lord Coaker and Lord Green of Deddington

Committee stage
Wednesday 14th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Green of Deddington (CB)]

I do not think that anybody has any idea of the answer to that. That is one of the difficulties. I am pointing to the social difficulties that will also follow. Therefore, we must give the Government some space in order to make an impression on the future inflow of cases to this country.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I also pay tribute to the quality of the contributions that we have had from so many noble Lords in the debate on this group. I recognise some of the shortcomings of my Amendment 29, as the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, pointed out, but it is an attempt to discuss refoulement. I will come back to that.

The amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, which the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, spoke to, have much to commend them about ensuring the role of the courts, as does my noble friend Lady Lister’s amendment, supported by the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, and the noble Lord, Lord Cashman. Indeed, so do the other comments from the noble Lords, Lord Deben, Lord Clarke and Lord Purvis, and many others. I will put those amendments and our discussions in the context of something that we have heard much talk about: the importance of the unwritten constitution on which our country functions, and the role and importance of the House of Lords.

I do not believe that what I am going to say is true of the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, or his colleague, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart. But it is true that something was published on Monday evening— I did not see it until this morning, when it was sent around as part of the House of Lords Library summary of press cuttings that are sent to many of us, if not all of us. It said that the Prime Minister of our country

“challenged Labour and the House of Lords to back the bill, saying: ‘We are committed to getting it through parliament, but unfortunately, we don’t have a majority in the House of Lords’”.

A vote was lost in this House of Lords. Whatever the rights and wrongs of it, a vote was had and His Majesty’s Opposition officially did not support it, and we have never talked about blocking or delaying the Bill. We are discussing these amendments today, so why is the Prime Minister saying that we are talking about blocking and delaying it? I would have thought that if we are talking about the constitution, we have a perfect right to stand up in here. All Members of this House, from all the different parties, have made different contributions with respect to the Bill to try to ask the Government to think again and revise what they are doing. What is unconstitutional about that? We might as well pack up. What is the point of our debates and discussions—the brilliant speeches we have heard today and a couple of days ago? Even if we disagree, what is the point of it, if all the Prime Minister of our country says is that we are being deliberately destructive and trying to block the Bill, when we said quite categorically that we are not going to?

To continue:

“Everyone else right now as we speak is lining up to do deals”—


this is the Prime Minister—

“in the House of Lords to block us … We’ve already seen that in the Commons”.

Does it make any difference what anybody says? The amendments that the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, spoke to on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile; the comments that the noble Lords, Lord Clarke and Lord Deben, made; the comments that the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, made the previous day—do they make any difference? Are we just going through a rubber-stamping process here? What is the constitutional position of the House of Lords if the Prime Minister of our country is saying that none of the amendments that we are discussing—in this group, the last group, the next group and the groups that will come next Monday—means anything?

The worst thing was when I read in the Sun that all 93 amendments that have been tabled are “wrecking amendments”. That goes for the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, who was in his place a moment ago. He has tabled an amendment, as has the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope. They are not “wrecking amendments”. They are doing the proper job of this House to say to the Government, “Have you really got this right? Do you really not think you should think again?”.

I ask the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart, and through him the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, and the others: when we have these debates, do they go back to the department and say, “Coaker got up and had a real go at us about something. Did he have a point?”. The noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, or the noble Lords, Lord Deben and Lord Howard, said this, and the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, said that. My noble and learned friend Lord Falconer said this, and my noble friends Lady Chakrabarti and Lady Lister tabled these amendments, including those we have today about torture. Is it worth bothering? Is the Prime Minister saying that this is just them trying to stop the Bill, when people in this Chamber have the integrity and belief that it is their job to question the Government? That is the constitutional role of this House of Lords, and we should be proud of it and stand up for it. We will not be intimidated or bullied by a Prime Minister into just accepting that we have no right to question the Government because he says it. Will the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart, take that back to the Cabinet? Will the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, take it back to the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister?

It is good to see the Government Chief Whip here and I hope that she will make those representations as well, because it is really important. It does not matter which amendment we are talking about. This Chamber deserves that respect from the Government: to listen to what is said and to make the counter-argument if they do not agree with it. It is perfectly reasonable for the Government to do that as well.

I could not believe what I read this morning. I am sure it is an opinion shared by the majority in this House that even if people disagree, they have the right to be heard and have what they say considered by the Government of the day. That is the constitutional position our country has existed upon, and a constitutional arrangement of which we should all be proud. Nobody is trying to block or wreck the Bill, but we have a perfect right to stand up and say whether the Government have got it right.

The amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, were spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson. What can be more important than asking whether the Government are seeking to undermine the role of the courts in determining whether the rule of law is being upheld? Is it not reasonable to ask the Government that question, and to table amendments to that effect? Is it not reasonable for my noble friend Lady Lister to ask whether torture is a factor? The Government are perfectly entitled to say that amendments are unnecessary, but these are legitimate questions, and they cannot simply say, “We’re going to ignore them. This is the Government’s position”. Real questions have been asked about the rule of law, and the Government are just saying, “We’re going to overturn the Supreme Court judgment not through an argument or opinion, but by simply changing the facts and ruling that Rwanda is safe. It doesn’t matter what the Supreme Court determined —we’re going to do that”.

I turn to my own Amendment 29 and will read from the JCHR report. The main reason it gives is that

“the Supreme Court, after considering all the evidence placed before it, held that Rwanda was not a safe country because of the risk that individuals sent there would be subjected to refoulement”.

My amendment therefore seeks to address the Supreme Court’s concern that there was a risk of refoulement. The Minister will no doubt respond by saying that the Government have dealt with that, because Article 10(3) of the treaty provides the mechanism to do so. The heart of the problem throughout is that the Government are saying that Rwanda is safe, whereas all the various amendments say that, as the Supreme Court and the International Agreements Committee recognise, it may be that Rwanda becomes safe. What cannot be simply stated is that Rwanda is safe now.

Article 10(3) states:

“The Parties shall cooperate to agree an effective system for ensuring that removal contrary to this obligation does not occur”.


Can the Minister tell us what that effective system is? Is it already in operation, and if not, when will it be? What is the timeline, and what do we know about it since? It is through Article 10(3) of the treaty that the Government seek to address the problem the Supreme Court identified.

The Minister, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart, will no doubt say, as the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, did on the previous set of amendments, that this is necessary because of the deterrent effect. The very helpful briefing on the Bill provided by the House of Lords Library reminds us that the Permanent Secretary required ministerial direction to carry on with respect to deterrence, because of the lack of evidence that the Rwanda policy had any deterrent effect. The Home Secretary of the day provided that letter.

I finish where I started. I ask for an assurance from the Minister that our amendments are not seen as wrecking amendments by the Ministers dealing with the Bill, and that they take them back to their departments and consider whether some Members of your Lordships’ House may actually have a point. Rather than blocking the Bill or even delaying it, many of your Lordships are trying to say, “Even though we oppose it, we are trying to improve it”. This House deserves, at the very least, that respect from the Government.

Illegal Migration Bill

Debate between Lord Coaker and Lord Green of Deddington

Report stage
Monday 3rd July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Green of Deddington (CB)]

My Lords, I hope that the Minister when he speaks in a moment will explain what this is intended to deal with. It is only specific to these circumstances; is it that a certain number of lawyers are making a certain amount of money and he thinks that that is not helpful to the policy that the Government intend to put forward?

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, we support my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti in her defence of the rule of law and interim relief in cases involving the alleged expulsion of people to unsafe places. The Government were happy to support the court’s decision not to grant such relief in the current Rwanda cases, but now they want to take away this jurisdiction, forcing more applicants to Strasbourg pending a final UK judicial determination. If the Government are right that Strasbourg interim measures are not binding, Clause 54 is unnecessary. If the European Court of Human Rights is correct that they are binding, our amended Clause 1 should be enough to safeguard international law. With respect to those comments, I urge my noble friend if she is so minded to test the opinion of the House on her Amendment 152, which we would support rather than Amendment 153.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Debate between Lord Coaker and Lord Green of Deddington

Lords Hansard - Part 2 & Report stage
Wednesday 2nd March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I will be brief, because we had a long debate on this issue in Committee. It is, however, an issue that goes to the heart of the Bill—changing the definition of the offence to one of arrival rather than entry. I am, therefore, very pleased to move Amendment 55 and to speak to Amendment 58 in my name and those of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and my noble friend Lord Blunkett. This is a fundamental change to immigration law that many of us are worried will criminalise asylum, full stop. One can only imagine what effect a similar law would have in Poland now, with people fleeing across the border. No doubt the Minister will say that it does not apply in those circumstances, and so on. The fact is, however, that the Bill changes the offence from entering to arriving, which raises serious issues and has serious consequences for us all.

For example, aside from those seeking asylum, would this provision apply to a person who arrives in the UK with the wrong paperwork? They have arrived and they have broken the rules: would that be a criminal offence under the Bill? The Home Secretary has presided over this situation for a number of days but has just recently announced that people can safely bring elderly relatives and parents from Ukraine into this country. On the basis of this clause, would those elderly parents be considered criminals if they arrived here without the right paperwork? The Government’s proposed legislative changes have real consequences for real people, as highlighted by the recent horrific events in Ukraine.

This clause should be removed from the Bill on both principled and practical grounds. I have guidance that the CPS has announced, in consultation with the National Crime Agency, the Home Office and the police, which says that those seeking asylum should not be prosecuted under existing offences of entering the UK illegally. That is in recognition of the fact that it is not in the public interest, and that asylum seekers

“often have no choice in how they travel and face exploitation by organised crime groups”.

That is in a press statement from the CPS. The Government are asking us to widen the offence to include arrival when the CPS and Border Force do not believe that the existing offence should even be used. Similarly, the Government’s answer has been that the powers will be used in only exceptional and limited circumstances, such as where a person has breached a deportation order—in which case, we should pass a power for those circumstances.

It is not right to ask the House to pass these powers —on the basis that the Government’s own agencies say that they will not use them—or to criminalise a person who arrives in the UK to ask for asylum from war and persecution. It is late, but this change in the offence will have serious consequences for the way our asylum and refugee system works. I beg to move.

[Lord Green of Deddington (CB)]

My Lords, this is more important than it looks. Frankly, it is rather absurd that people can turn up in their tens of thousands on our beaches and there will have been no offence. That is not to say that they should be charged, but there must surely be some legal impediment to people just turning up.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Debate between Lord Coaker and Lord Green of Deddington

Committee stage
Tuesday 8th February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Green of Deddington (CB)]

I entirely agree about the appalling conditions in these refugee camps and the huge number of refugees that are being dealt with. The question that I and others ask is: how can we best use the resources that we can give to the people who really need it? How much more effective would it be to get aid, food and medical attention into these terrible camps, rather than spending huge sums of money on children here who cost the same as a term at Eton?

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

Of course that is right. That is why there was such a row about the cut in the aid programme. It is why we all believe that of course we have to try to prevent war, famine and all those things. Not to do that would be ridiculous. The sources of many of our problems are war, famine and disease, and all of those things, so of course we have to prevent them.

However, it is also important in the debate we have in this country about asylum and refugees—not immigration—to stand up to the view that “We take the lot”. The idea that it is this country that has to deal with the situation, no other decent country in the world does it, we are the country that has to take them all and we are the weak link in it all is just not true, however unpopular it is to say so. Sometimes the way that you change public opinion is by arguing with it.

People will say, as no doubt the Minister will, “We won the election and therefore this is what the public think”, but on asylum and refugees there is an argument for saying, “Of course we don’t want open borders but there is a need for us to act in a way that is compassionate and consistent with the values that we have always had”. Sometimes that costs you, as I know, but that does not mean you should not do it. Public opinion can therefore be changed, and the subject is debated. Indeed, policy and opinion can change in this Chamber, which is the point of it. In the interests of time, I will stop there.

Amendment 114 is exceptionally important because of the need for international action. To apply it to our own situation here, we will not deal with the migrant crossing problem in the channel without co-operation from France and the rest of Europe.

I want to talk about the importance of Amendment 113, and I take issue with the noble Lord, Lord Green, on this. It is not an open invite to everybody to pile their children—I paraphrase, but if I get it wrong then no doubt the noble Lord will correct me—into the EEA because that means they can all then come to the UK. The amendment clearly lays out that it is about people who already have a family member present in the United Kingdom. It is about family reunion and trying to ensure that unaccompanied children in the EEA who have a family member in the UK get the opportunity to be reunited with them.

I will finish with this point, which I know the Minister will agree with. The problem we have is that sometimes Ministers have to speak to Governments, to the computer and to the Civil Service and say, “This bit of the Bill is wrong. It does not work.” Both Ministers have done it before on other Bills in other places where the Bills were wrong. On this issue of family reunion, the Government have got it wrong; they are not right. Nobody thinks that children who are unaccompanied in other parts of the EEA, for example, should not be able to reunite with their families in a way that is consistent with the values of this country, and it beggars belief that the Government would stand against that. It is not about an open door; it says quite specifically who should deal with it. I think if that were explained to the people of this country, and debated and argued with them, they would support it, because they are compassionate and decent, and in the end the compassionate and decent side will win. I think the Ministers are compassionate and decent, so let us have a Bill—in this aspect of it—that reflects that.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Debate between Lord Coaker and Lord Green of Deddington

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Thursday 3rd February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Green of Deddington (CB)]

I do not see the relevance of that question.

Let me conclude, if I may. As we discussed earlier in this debate, the Government’s asylum workload has tripled from 40,000 cases in 2012 to 120,000 cases in 2021. Furthermore, nearly half of all cases awaiting an initial decision have been waiting for 12 months or more. In the present situation, they would in any case get permission to work. However, it is vital for these delays to be tackled. On that point, the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I are agreed. It makes no sense to me to adjust the immigration system to encourage delay. This Bill contains some useful measures designed to speed up the asylum process, and they should be supported.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to support Amendment 64 and 65. Before I specifically speak to them, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Green, that at some point in this Bill we are going to have to have a debate in this Chamber about the idea that this is a debate between those on the side of the public and those of us who are some kind of middle-class liberal elite who do not care about the opinions of the public—who believe that we need a draconian system to try to deal with this—because that is not what this debate is about. It is a caricature of the Government’s position and of those of us who oppose what the Government are doing.

We are saying that many of the policies being put forward by this Government to deal with the problem as they see it simply will not work. They go too far sometimes and compromise some of the principles every Member of this House would agree on. That is the clash. At some point we will have a debate about this, although perhaps there are other groups of amendments where it is more appropriate. I say again, there will have to be debate between those who—to be fair to the noble Lord, Lord Green—think they represent public opinion on this, and people like me who think he has got it wrong.

As part of the middle-class liberal intelligentsia—maybe not the intelligentsia, but the elite—let me say that I very much support that. Let me say why. As we stand here now, debating this, there are tens of thousands of asylum seekers who have applied for asylum in this country who have been waiting for a decision for more than a year. There are so many statistics sometimes you drown in them and are not sure which are actually right, so I will quote the Joint Committee on Human Rights, as it is slightly different to my own statistics. It says:

“approximately 65% of asylum applicants awaiting initial decisions had been waiting more than six months and that the average time to make an initial decision is now more than a year”.

That means tens of thousands of asylum seekers are waiting to have their application determined.

It would be interesting to hear from the Minister about the Home Office’s assessment of how long this is. Are there thousands of people waiting two years? When I was a Member of Parliament, people would sometimes come to me whose asylum claim had been neither agreed nor disagreed. They had actually disappeared and were there, and had been there for years and years. Now nobody wants that system. It’s ridiculous; of course nobody wants a situation that works like that. The reason I labour this point is that it goes back to the debates on the last group. The key to this issue is speeding up the process. We cannot have a situation where people are languishing for months and years before a decision is made. To be fair, the Minister believes that what the Government are proposing will speed up the process. I hope that they are right, but I do not think that they are. This is what bedevils the asylum system; it is not fair to the country, the public or the asylum applicants themselves. That is the basis of it.

Then you are left with the question of how you deal with this problem and what you do about it. At the moment, the Government’s position is that you have to wait a year before you can apply to work and then, if you do, you can work in specific occupations and jobs. I go back to the point made by my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti—supported I think by the noble Lord, Lord Bethell. The problem then becomes the denial of the opportunity for asylum seekers to work unless they have been here for a year. The community cohesion impact of that is enormous. What happens is that people then look at it and say, “What are they doing?” Noble Lords know the things that people say. “They’re not working. They’re not doing anything. They’re living on benefits. It’s about time they got out and did something”. Yet that is exactly what they want to do. Then some of them go out and work illegally, and they undercut the wages of legal workers or are employed in various occupations that we know about. So the whole system is undermined. To be fair, the last Labour Government did it. We introduced it, actually. I say to the Minister that, working in the Home Office, if she ever comes to this side, she will find quoted back to her things that she agreed to. So I accept that, right at the beginning of 2002, I think, we introduced this legislation for the same reason: we were worried about it being a pull factor.

But, if you look at it, where is the evidence? It clearly has not been, because it has not stopped asylum taking place—in fact, it has gone up. I will be fair and honest about it. My noble friend Lord Blunkett has done it once or twice in here, to his credit. Sometimes you introduce a policy with the best intentions—but what do you do if it does not work? Carry on? Do you just blindly say, “Well, it hasn’t worked but we’re going to carry on with it”? In supporting these amendments, we are saying to the Government that we have a policy that undermines community cohesion and does not work.

We then have the ludicrous situation where we have a Statement made by the Minister in the other place where he will not even publish the evidence for why the Government will continue with the current policy. He just refuses to publish it. So the Home Office has a review and does not publish the evidence. Then its own advisory committee says, “You’re wrong—you should do, and the policy is wrong anyway”. So the Government then turn around and say, “That’s ridiculous. We don’t agree with you”. They do not say why—other than that it is the pull factor. But then they do not publish the evidence that says that it is the pull factor.

It is not only that. I looked to see whether there was anybody else and found out that the Independent Anti-slavery Commissioner said:

“As the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, I am aware of the harm caused to survivors of modern slavery and human trafficking unable to access training and work opportunities while they face delays in asylum status decisions.”


So the Independent Anti-slavery Commissioner is wrong as well.

So, to answer this, I say that the Minister does not want to penalise asylum seekers, but this is ridiculous. We have public policy that is not working and is undermining community cohesion and a government response that simply says, “We don’t agree with all the people who disagree with us but we’re not going to tell you what the evidence is to support that, because it’s the pull factor”—

[Lord Green of Deddington (CB)]

I am a bit puzzled. Although the precise numbers vary from year to year, it is quite clear that substantial numbers—30%, 40% or 50%, depending on which year you take—turn out not to have a case for asylum in this country. Surely that should be a factor. Surely the way forward is, as the noble Lord proposed when he first spoke, to speed this situation up so that we can get the answers within the six months, which would be much better for everybody. Surely that should be the centre of their policy.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

Can I intervene on an intervention? What is wrong if those people are allowed to work? If it is then determined that they have no right to stay, they would then have to leave—but, in the meantime, they are supporting themselves, perhaps using their skills and contributing tax. If they are then found not to have a legal claim to stay, so be it. I cannot see what the harm is in the meantime.