Professional Qualifications Bill [HL]

Lord Foulkes of Cumnock Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 14th June 2021 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

39: Clause 7, page 4, line 41, at end insert—
“(d) publish advice and information about immigration requirements for entry to the United Kingdom for purposes of practising a regulated profession.”

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, there have been a number of interesting debates today, and this is an important one. This amendment requires the Secretary of State to make arrangements for the assistance centre to give information about visa and work permit requirements. In a previous debate, the noble Lord the Minister—the noble Baroness the Minister is answering this debate—told us that the assistance centre is up and running. Clause 7 provides for the assistance centre, which is there to facilitate transparency on the recognition and regulation of professional qualifications in the United Kingdom, to provide advice and assistance to UK qualified professionals who want their publications and experience to be recognised overseas, and to publish certain advice and information.

I agree with the Law Society of Scotland, which drafted this amendment for me, that it would be important for the assessment centre also to provide advice and information about visa and work permit requirements for entry to the UK for employment and other related purposes. At present, the UK Centre for Professional Qualifications—UK CPQ—which is managed by Ecctis, provides advice and information across the UK on recognition of professional qualifications in an international context in the UK and abroad. Clause 7 provides the statutory basis for that service.

The UK CPQ does not provide advice or information about visa and work permit requirements for entry to the UK; nor does it signpost to relevant advice and information on immigration matters. There is another body, the UK national agency for international qualifications and skills—UK ENIC—which is also managed by Ecctis. Visitors to its website, who wish to see information about visa and nationality matters, are directed to the Home Office. I do not need to tell the Committee that that is not the most helpful advice to give to anyone. That there is a choice of bodies with similar names operating in the same sphere and run by the same entity must be confusing to an individual from abroad who wants to have their qualification recognised but also to obtain the basis for employment in the UK; namely, a visa or work permit.

I agree with the Law Society of Scotland’s view that it would be much better and more cohesive were the assistance centre more of a one-stop shop, in respect of the benefits of offering a joined-up service to nationals of other countries seeking to requalify and potentially establish themselves in the UK. This amendment will help achieve that. I agree with the Law Society’s view that the Long Title of the Bill is broad enough to bring such functions within the ambit of the assistance centre. Perhaps between now and Report, the Minister—who I know is a very helpful Minister—could make inquiries about whether such a provision could be included in amendments later in the Bill’s passage. In the meantime, by making this point, I hope that the Government will agree that there would be practical and reputational benefits of offering comprehensive advice and assistance to international colleagues.

That deals with Amendment 39. Amendments 44 and 50 are also in my name. I will not press them, because we dealt with the same principle on a previous amendment. Members who were there will recall that I passed on the responsibility to my friend, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, who sadly cannot be with us today. What he explained then applies to this amendment equally well. The points made by the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, were helpful, particularly the Minister’s assurance that the regulator is not required to make the disclosure if that would contravene the data protection legislation. It was very helpful to have that clarified. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and I put on record our thanks to the Minister. I beg to move.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow my near namesake, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, and endorse his words. This group contains a number of different amendments. I will focus on Amendment 43 in my name, but that does not indicate that I do not support elements of the others.

I have done what the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, advises against, which is to table an amendment to one element of this clause in order to speak to a larger confusion that I have. This is a probing amendment, but the real point is: what is this centre for and why will it operate as it does? We have established a few facts at Second Reading and through previous amendments, so we know that the Government foresee one overarching centre rather than four national ones, and to do this, the Minister has painted a picture of two people and a website—a landing page. Forgive me, but this is a website requiring 48 lines of primary legislation, so it must have some importance in the mind of the Government to go to this much trouble when it replaces what was a sentence in an EU directive, which is the previous assistance centre. So much for red tape. We have 48 lines of primary legislation to establish a website run by two people.

My amendment leaves out Clause 7(4), which deals with disclosing information. Clearly, it reinforces that certain information cannot be disclosed, but to whom will this information be disclosed? It paints a picture of the collection and dispersing of individuals’ data, so what is the point? Why is it there? What data is it—whose stuff? I do not understand what it is for. I understood that it was to point people in certain directions. This is saying that it is a requirement to disperse data, but what data, and to whom? That is the central reason why I have put my name to this amendment. Of course, if it is collecting important data, it would be nice to know that it is doing so properly, so the terms of this subsection are of course correct, but we need to know why this centre is being set up as it is and what on earth it is for.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

Providing a statutory basis for the continued existence of an assistance centre places a duty on competent authorities to co-operate with it. This is to ensure that the assistance centre has the necessary information to help support the delivery of its functions, rather than relying on voluntary information-sharing arrangements. In a practical sense, it provides a signposting system through its website. It also has a telephone answering service, which dealt with my question this morning about the need for English language skills for particular professions. It answered the question very carefully and properly by saying that that was not part of its remit and I needed to talk to the visa requirements section. The centre is at least directing you to where you need to go for your questions to be answered.

The legislation also requires that the assistance centre provides information to the Secretary of State when requested. As I said, this is not onerous information, but it is an important requirement, as the Secretary of State has a responsibility for the wider recognition of professional qualifications principles. Lastly, its existence in legislation helps validate the credibility of the assistance centre for engagement with its overseas counterparts.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, a lot of interesting things have emerged during this debate. The noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, my noble friend Lady Hayter and the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, seem to have set up a new all-party group—friends of Google. I warn them to be careful and alert them to the fact that if you Google something you will find at the very top of the list people who have paid to come top of that list. If you look, for example, at getting a Covid test, you will find that the ones that you pay for are right at the top and the free ones are down at the bottom. Beware of Google—and other equivalents—because they do not necessarily give you the best advice.

The Minister has been very helpful in her response. However, some things still need teasing out as far as the assistance centre is concerned. I would argue still that the visa and admission regulations that I am suggesting would enhance its role. It was suggested by the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, that the functions it is dealing with now might be better dealt with at a devolved level. As she knows, I am a very strong devolutionist. Immigration, visa regulations and other regulations are not devolved. Therefore, that would give the assistance centre a little more credibility.

However, my noble friend Lady Hayter has a good point: does it need to be statutory? I think you can have an assistance centre working very effectively without it having to be on the face of the Bill. Often, we argue strongly that things should be on the face of a Bill, and we get rebuffed, but I am not sure the case has yet been made for it to be statutory.

When I was a Minister, I used to tell officials and civil servants to go back and think again from time to time. I ask that both Ministers—the noble Lord, Lord Grimstone, and the noble Baroness, who has replied so eloquently to this debate—perhaps have another look afterwards, in the cold light of tomorrow morning, and go back to the department and say, “Wait a minute. Some valid points have been raised”. That is what these sessions of Committee and Report are about—going back to the department. Perhaps it could be arranged for some of us to be given more information and some direct contact with the centre. There are things that can be done between now and Report that would make the Bill much better and make it more likely for us to get consensus when we get to Report. I hope the Minister will be able to do that. She is nodding nicely to me as always. With that, I will withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 39 withdrawn.