Immigration: Detention of Children

Lord Dholakia Excerpts

Monday 11th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

The emphasis of our policy is obviously on keeping families together. I trust that we will not be in a situation in which children are detained for any length of period at all; but certainly if they were, education would be a very important factor.

[Lord Dholakia]

My Lords, has the Minister taken a view on whether families should be deported to countries such as Somalia, Afghanistan, Sudan and Zimbabwe, and particularly on the impact, which could be considerable on those being deported, of sending families with children back to those countries?

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

My Lords, if there are security factors in place, those of course introduce elements which are not necessarily present in all other cases.

Biometric Passports

Lord Dholakia Excerpts

Tuesday 13th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

My Lords, I am unable to answer that question—I came here to talk about biometric passports—but I will write to the noble Lord.

[Lord Dholakia]

My Lords, is the Minister satisfied with the security of the country particularly in relation to people with dual nationality when one passport is used for entry into the country and another for exit?

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

That is indeed an issue, but we do not believe that maintaining the fingerprint database of the country will help the problem. However, we do have to combat passport fraud.