UK Migration

Lord German Excerpts

Thursday 9th July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

We keep that matter under review. As the noble Baroness will know, we introduced an immigration Bill in the House of Commons last week, which will bring significant changes. This Government are trying to get control of migration and citizenship issues across the board, and we are doing our best to, dare I say it, rectify some of the difficulties of the previous 14 years.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I declare an interest in that I am supported by the RAMP organisation. The Minister has rightly put the contribution that migration brings to this country at the forefront. It is in all our interests to make sure that people integrate into our society as rapidly as possible, so can the Minister tell us what the Government are doing to speed that process up and make it more accessible? Perhaps I might refer him to the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Burry Port, who has just produced a report on such matters, including the role of diasporas in the United Kingdom.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord. I have not yet had a chance to read my noble friend’s report, but undoubtedly, I will read it—because he will send it to me if nobody else does. We have to recognise that we are a multicultural society. The people who, historically, have come to the United Kingdom have had ties to it through many Commonwealth countries. The people who are coming here are bringing skills and making important contributions to our society; we should recognise that, and we should celebrate and respect their differences and their different faiths. Through my noble friend Lord Lemos, who is Faith Minister, the Government are trying to ensure that we recognise that contribution, and it is a constant challenge to make sure that we do so. One of the great challenges is making sure we have a strong, managed migration system, so that people can see that it is transparent and fair.

Safe Refugee Routes for Students

Lord German Excerpts

Wednesday 8th July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

We intend to set out details of the scheme very shortly, which will, hopefully, provide clarity on what the Government are intending to do with the safe and legal routes. As my noble friend said, it is also important that the universities themselves are involved in, and at least have some discussion with the Government on, the implementation and design of the scheme. I will feed that back to colleagues who are dealing with this directly.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I declare an interest that I am supported by RAMP. What advice would the Minister give to Afra Elmahdi, a cancer specialist from war-torn Sudan who has secured a master’s place to do cancer science research at Oxford University? That post, that job, that relationship, has ended. What message would the Minister send to her? She seeks to be able to diagnose cancer more swiftly in a country that is torn apart by civil war.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

As I as have said, the Government are examining safe and legal routes. However, at the moment, we have temporarily suspended the issuing of visas to those from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan. We have done that because there has been an increase of over 470% from 2021 levels, and over a third of asylum seekers have previously entered the UK on a visa. We are trying to put safe and legal routes in place. We will look at that scheme, and the noble Lord and others will be able to facilitate that scheme, with effect from autumn next year.

Immigration and Asylum: Appeals

Lord German Excerpts

Monday 29th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for raising that point. If she will allow me, can I reflect on it? The issue is self-evidently important, but I cannot answer her question right now. I will make sure that the appropriate policy Ministers in the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice examine those issues in detail.

However, I can tell the noble Baroness that we are doing this because the demand for adjudications is far outstripping what we can currently offer. We have around 26,000 additional funded places for sittings this year, so the backlog of over 151,000, which I mentioned earlier, is simply unsustainable. We have to take action on that. The backlog has not just appeared from nowhere; it has appeared through the inaction of the previous Government. We are committed to restoring it and that is what the Bill to be produced tomorrow will begin the process of doing.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, following the last question, I declare my interest: I am supported by the RAMP Project. Can the Minister tell us whether the adjudicators will need to possess specific legal qualifications or accreditation in asylum and human rights law? On the process of getting the adjudicators in place, how long will the training programme take?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

We are moving at quite a pace. The Bill that establishes the new authority will be published tomorrow and has to make its way through both Houses of Parliament. The principle behind it is that there will be a body that is fully independent of the Government and staffed by professional trained adjudicators, with safeguards to ensure high standards, so that appellants are able to receive impartial and independent redress, as is required under our obligations. We intend still to meet our international obligations as part of this change, which I hope will give comfort to the noble Lord. He will have an opportunity to see the Bill when it is published tomorrow. At some point, this House will have the opportunity to examine it in detail. For the moment, I suggest that he waits for the Bill to be published.

Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules

Lord German Excerpts

Tuesday 14th April 2026 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord German]

That this House regrets that the Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules (HC 1691), published on 5 March, fails to provide a credible plan for bringing down the asylum backlog and closing asylum hotels, including the provision of safe routes for refugees to enter the UK; risks increasing the bureaucratic burden on the Home Office and costs for taxpayers; further disincentivises proper integration of refugees; will force vulnerable asylum seekers into destitution and rough sleeping; and will place significant financial and operational burdens onto already overstretched local authorities.

Relevant document: 56th report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee (special attention drawn to the instrument).

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I must declare my interest: I am supported by RAMP. That has always been a mystery to some people. It is the Refugee, Asylum and Migration Policy, so that Members can understand.

This regret Motion concerns a statement of changes to the Immigration Rules laid before the House on 5 March. I do not expect that this debate will be quite as well-natured as the previous one because this piece of secondary legislation has resulted in one of the most excoriating reports from our Select Committee that I have ever seen. Its 15 pages can be summed up in a few words: piecemeal, ill thought-out and lacking in evidence. Add to that the financial assertions made by the Government that have now been blown out of the water and we have a policy for which we will surely pay a sad and unnerving price in both financial and human capital terms.

The Government may have pushed back implementation, but the start date of 2 March in this legislation and the retrospective laws that lie behind it are already on the statute book. The statement of changes represents a fundamental shift in the way that this country provides sanctuary to people in need, yet it has been introduced without meaningful parliamentary scrutiny. It risks placing additional strain on an already overburdened Home Office system but, critically, at the same time it takes a less humane approach to protection.

These changes, by a piece of secondary legislation under the negative procedure, will affect more than 1 million people in this country, and I must say that that is a conservative estimate. Many of these are working people contributing to the economy of our country and many are children, yet, despite the scale of these changes, the statement offers no credible plan for tackling the asylum backlog or preventing dangerous journeys. The changes do not expand safe routes for refugees. They also undermine integration by denying those granted protection the certainty needed to rebuild their lives.

Our Select Committee and others have warned that, in making these changes to the Immigration Rules, the Home Office is introducing measures before their impact can be known, so avoiding a more complex legislative process and the scrutiny that comes with it. Changes of this scale deserve proper debate and examination by Parliament, particularly where they affect the security and stability of individuals who have been recognised as being in need of refuge. These Motions are a poor substitute for scrutiny, especially as key information is either being withheld or not available. If the Government are serious about clearing the asylum backlog, the focus should be on improving decision-making capacity, reducing unnecessary procedural barriers and ensuring that claims are processed quickly and fairly. What we are seeing here, though, risks achieving the opposite.

I begin with the change to the length of protection granted to refugees, reduced from five years to two and a half. Sadly, the reality is that warfare is often protracted. The brutal civil war in Sudan is now in its third year, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is in its fifth and the war in Syria lasted more than 13. Conflicts rarely end after 13 months, and it can take many more years before infrastructure and capacity allow for large-scale voluntary returns.

Introducing temporary protection for refugees would therefore leave families in a state of fear and limbo, with worrying consequences for being able to integrate. Temporary protection is likely to have an acute impact on the well-being of refugee children, who need stability as they recover and rebuild their lives. Repeated reviews will disrupt educational attainment and the ability to secure home tuition fee status. Temporary protection is also likely to delay family reunion. This could push more families towards dangerous journeys, given that 90% of refugee family reunion visas were previously granted to women and children.

This uncertainty has tangible effects. Although the United Kingdom rightly provided a vital lifeline to those fleeing the war in Ukraine, evidence from the British Red Cross found that the temporary nature of their status meant that Ukrainians were turned down for jobs, even when they were well qualified, because employers were concerned about the short duration of their visas. Landlords were reluctant to offer longer-term tenancies and displaced Ukrainians have remained significantly more likely to become homeless than the general population. Significantly, tightening the settlement rules in Denmark—the Government have taken some view on the success of that—has in fact reduced refugees’ employment levels.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord German, and my noble friend Lord Dubs for tabling their regret Motions. It is always a pleasure to discuss matters in the House, even at 10.32 pm. Important issues have been raised, and I will try to respond to them as best I can—even with my croaky voice, on which I hope the House will bear with me.

I will start by giving some context on why we are here. This Government were elected in July 2024, and they inherited a considerable series of challenges that they have been trying to address. After the election, there was a high backlog of asylum claims not being processed by the previous Government. There was a level of abuse that is higher than it is now. There was a high level of hotel use of some 400 hotels that were paid for by the Government of the day, costing the taxpayer a fortune. There was no real control over the level of migration and indeed those abuses. There was no safe and legal route defined to the extent that it is defined now. I start with that for the simple reason that that is the background on which the Government have tried to take some action. I welcome the support tonight from the noble Lords, Lord Murray of Blidworth and Lord Davies, but that is the inheritance that we have had to try to deal with.

The Motion from the noble Lord, Lord German, says that the Government

“fails to provide a credible plan for bringing down the asylum backlog”.

Let me start with that. The Government have put in place around 1,000 extra staff—paid for by the scrapping of the Rwanda scheme—to improve the performance of the asylum system and the review of asylum backlogs.

There is a plan, because the Government have produced an immigration White Paper, which, as the noble Lord, Lord Kerr of Kinlochard, indicated, was trailed by the Government. The Government have an immigration White Paper and have made statements on how we intend to deal with those issues. The Motion in the name of the noble Lord, Lord German, talks about failing to bring down the asylum backlog. I will come to that in a moment. It refers to “closing asylum hotels”. I will come to that in a moment. Indeed, it refers to

“increasing the bureaucratic burden on the Home Office”.

Well, I will come to that in a moment.

My noble friend Lord Dubs’s Motion makes a valid point about the equality impact assessment, which I will come to in a moment.

The noble Lords who have spoken today—my noble friends Lady Royall, Lord Dubs, Lady Lister, Lady Andrews, Lord Smith of Finsbury and Lord Davies of Brixton, the noble Lords, Lord Kerr and Lord German, the noble Baronesses, Lady Teather and Lady Ludford, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Southwark have all challenged some of the points that are here today, and I will try and respond to those issues.

The Immigration Rules changes were laid on 5 March. They were trailed in the White Paper. Three statutory instruments were laid concurrently: the Asylum Seekers (Reception Conditions) (Amendment) Regulations, the asylum regulations on failed asylum seekers and the Asylum Support (Amendment) Regulations. Some of those were SIs, and the immigration changes set out in the new approach to refugee and humanitarian protection include a new core protection offer.

The position that we find ourselves in now is that there have been changes in some of the very areas that the Motion from the noble Lord, Lord German, is critical of. For example, there has been an asylum decision issue, where the number of people waiting for an asylum decision has fallen by 48% in the past year. That is positive, but it is not reflected in the Motion. We have returned 58,538 people in the past 12 months who had no right to remain, including foreign national offenders who should not have been here.

On the issue of asylum hotels, which he mentioned, there was a high of 400 asylum hotels in the summer of 2023. Today, there are fewer than 200 operating, and there will be announcements in the near future on how we can reduce that number still further. We have a commitment to close asylum hotels before the end of this Parliament. We also have, as laid out in the statements that have been made, plans to ensure that in that new reform we improve safe and legal routes, provide more structured and targeted support for refugees, speed up decisions through simpler appeals procedures and tackle exploitation through illegal working and visa abuse, which harm both vulnerable people and local communities. So, there is a plan.

I challenge the claim in the Motion of regret from the noble Lord, Lord German, that there is no plan. There is a plan to speed up asylum claims, provide targeted support and ensure that we meet our international obligations, ensure that we reduce hotel use and ensure that we do that in a fair and appropriate way.

The Home Secretary has set out—yes—the most sweeping reforms to tackle illegal migration in a generation. Yes, the Immigration Rules changes mark a major step towards a fundamental reset of the system. Yes, there is a new core protection offer for refugees. Yes, there are changes planned to ensure that new asylum claims made after 2 March will be for 30 months rather than for five years. It does not mean that those asylum claims are not going to be maintained if there is still a need for the asylum claim after 30 months, but it is important that we make those changes, because we have to improve the performance of the system. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Murray of Blidworth, that we have to do that.

In answer to my noble friend Lord Dubs, the equality considerations are at the front and centre of our work. As required through the public sector equality duty, Home Office officials are currently considering wider equality impacts, and the impacts that asylum reforms will have on those with protected characteristics is no exception.

In our modern and complex world, we must recognise that changes are required; countries of origin can and do change, and refugee status should be reviewed accordingly to reflect that. I think that is fair.

A number of noble Lords mentioned the visa brake and Chevening. The Government have introduced a visa brake on student visa applications from nationals of Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan. The reason they have done that is that those nationalities present some of the highest proportion of asylum claims to visas issued, and the number of claims is consistently high—again, a point that the noble Lord, Lord Murray of Blidworth, made. By introducing these temporary changes, the Government hope to reduce the strain on the asylum system and strengthen public confidence in the immigration system as a whole.

I must stress that these immigration changes are part of that wider programme of work. We are looking to work with local authorities for their support in delivering supported accommodation for asylum seekers. We are looking to maintain and develop further safe and legal routes, such as the Hong Kong British national route and the Homes for Ukraine route that are here today. On the suspension of family reunion, we are keeping that under review as a whole.

A lot of issues and concerns have been raised today by individual Members. I will go through Hansard tomorrow with a fine-toothed comb; we will pick out all the points that have been made by noble Lords; we will respond to those points, having consulted my colleague Ministers who have a direct responsibility for these areas in the Home Office; and I will make sure that those points are answered.

There will be opportunities to address other issues in legislation, undoubtedly post the potential King’s Speech —there will be other areas. However, the Government have to deal with the issue of getting asylum under control, meeting our international obligations, reducing hotel use, and trying to stop that pull factor which noble Lords have mentioned. This is a series of measures which the Home Secretary has brought forward and which I believe are an appropriate start on these issues.

I understand the concerns that have been raised; they were raised in the House of Commons also. The Government will continue to keep these matters under review, but I say to noble Lords today that the regret Motion does not address the issues that I believe the Government are trying to achieve. It does not give credit to the Government for the challenges they face and does not acknowledge the strong efforts that we are making to reduce some of the real challenges that are a cost in our system. We are trying to reduce asylum backlogs and reduce hotel use, and we are trying to look at where there is abuse, to make sure that we still meet our international obligations but at the same time ensure that we have a tighter system to restrict that abuse. I know there are concerns and sensitivities, and I will look at the points made in the debate today, but I ask the noble Lord not to press his regret Motion. I say to my noble friend Lord Dubs as well that the equality issues are central to what the Government are trying to examine in the processes that we are looking at. We will keep those equality issues under review, and I am open to challenge in this Chamber about how the system is developing in due course.

I hope noble Lords will bear with me because my throat and the winter pressures are catching up on me, but I will look at those points and respond accordingly. I thank the noble Lord for his contributions today.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I first thank the Minister for his remarks—not that I agree with them, as your Lordships would expect, but to persevere through a croaky voice is not easy at the best of times. All I can say to him is that the Chief Whip has arrived; I think he has something special in his cupboard which he can help the Minister out with at the end, and if he does not, I ask him to please let me know because we can make that very public.

Seriously, however, at this point in the evening, I thank everyone who has contributed to this debate; everyone has spoken with passion and with conviction, and most people have also spoken with great concern. If this were to be a scoreboard for a football match or whatever, the score would be 13-3. I say to the Minister, “Be aware of who your friends are in this matter”, because it seems that the alliance between the Labour Government and the Conservative Party and what lies beyond them is somewhat frightening for those of us who believe in a more humane society.

One of the things that has come out of this debate, from all my colleagues and everyone else who has spoken, is that somewhere we have got the narrative wrong about what migration is about. Your Lordships must remember that the OECD says of the United Kingdom that properly managed migration is a benefit to our economy. If that is the case, we need to say something positive about the people who are with us and doing things with us. The concern that I generally pick up is that we are not respectful enough or giving enough sense of humanity about the society in which we want to live.

Asylum Accommodation

Lord German Excerpts

Tuesday 16th December 2025 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord German]

To ask His Majesty’s Government how, in expanding the use of large-scale sites for asylum accommodation, they will ensure that lessons learnt from the operation of Napier Barracks and the RAF Wethersfield sites will be applied to new facilities from the outset.

[Lord German (LD)]

In begging leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper, I draw attention to my interest in that I am supported by the RAMP organisation.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

The Government are confident that the level of due diligence carried out on sites has improved since 2024 and that value-for-money assessments now take place at the appropriate stage. I can assure the noble Lord that lessons have been learned from large site acquisitions that occurred under the previous Government and are now being implemented to inform our future accommodation procurement.

[Lord German (LD)]

I thank the Minister for that Answer. A previous Permanent Secretary to the Home Office told a Select Committee of the House of Commons that there were a thousand lessons to be learned. I am not going to ask the Minister to outline the answers to all those thousand lessons, but can I specifically ask him about the practice of transporting people long distances to Croydon and other places, simply to have video conferencing interviews? It is an absolute waste of money; surely provision could be provided on-site.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

One of the improvements that the Government intend to make is to ensure that interviews take place on-site. That is good for cost, for the people being interviewed and for the taxpayer as a whole.

Immigration Skills Charge (Amendment) Regulations 2025

Lord German Excerpts

Thursday 4th December 2025 Grand Committee

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

My Lords, these regulations were laid before Parliament on 15 October 2025.

The immigration skills charge was introduced in April 2017. Its aim is to incentivise UK-based employers to take a long-term view of investment and training. It is designed to address historic underinvestment in the training of domestic workers by UK employers and to deter some from turning to immigration as a cheaper alternative. The skills charge is currently paid by employers looking to sponsor skilled workers for visas lasting more than six months; it also applies if they wish to extend the employment for a further limited period. Senior and specialist workers also pay the charge unless they are an EU national coming to work in the UK for less than three years. The increase will not prevent service supply by intra-corporate transferees continuing as it does currently, in line with our international trade commitments.

The charge, which is paid up front by employers, has raised approximately £2.7 billion since it was introduced. That income is providing financial support to help maintain existing skills budgets across the whole of the United Kingdom, which is important for a range of reasons, including ensuring that immigration is not seen as the sole solution to deal with skills shortages. As education and skills are devolved, the income raised is helping to maintain funding levels for each of the devolved nations; it is distributed between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland under the Barnett formula.

These regulations give effect to a government commitment in the immigration White Paper, published on 12 May, to increase the immigration skills charge by 32%. That is in line with inflation and takes into account the period since the charge was introduced, when no increases have been effected. This will mean that, from 16 December 2025— a few days from now—medium and large employers will need to pay £1,320 per person whom they sponsor per year. There will continue to be a reduced rate for small and charitable organisations of £480 per person per year. As I mentioned, the money raised will continue to support skills programmes across the country.

Upskilling workers already here in the UK will also help us fill future jobs in our country. It will reduce the need for businesses and organisations to rely on recruiting international workers. The Government have been clear that the levels of net migration have been too high and must come down.

As is currently the case, there will continue to be exemptions from the charge, such as where an employer is seeking to recruit people into PhD-level occupations; where they are recruiting a person who is switching from the student route; or where the person is being recruited for less than six months. These regulations also make a minor update to the list of exempt occupations to reflect the latest occupational codes from the Office for National Statistics. Crucially, they do not add to or remove any occupations that are currently exempt, but, in some cases, they reflect where occupations have been separated from groups.

We have set out a comprehensive plan to restore order to our broken immigration system. We must ensure that the system strikes the right balance. The immigration skills charge is designed to ensure that employers contribute to our continued investment in skills. These regulations support the Government’s ambition to reduce overall net migration and to aid our resident workforce in finding high-quality jobs through skills training. I commend them to the Grand Committee and beg to move.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I declare my interest: I am supported by RAMP. Inflationary increases are recognised as an appropriate way to deal with charges of this sort. I will return to the amount and what has been happening since 2017 in a moment, but the core policy intent of the charge remains the same: to encourage employers to look at training resident workers rather than recruiting internationally.

The impact assessment accompanying the regulations suggests that the increase will have only a small disincentive effect, putting off “less than 1%” of sponsorships that would have occurred without the higher charge. The overall package of immigration measures, including the ISC increase, is estimated to reduce net immigration by between 1,000 and 2,000 people per year. I am sure that noble Lords will recognise that this net effect is very small in relative terms as compared to the number of people in this country: it represents about 0.3% of long-term immigration figures.

Although the Government aim to reduce reliance on international recruitment, the job needs are exceeding training provision. In any case, there are the implications of the increasing need for jobs as we face the growing older demographic—a subject to which I will come in a moment. For employers, the ISC is simply a mandatory fee that must be factored into hiring budgets, and there is no direct benefit or service provided in exchange for the outlay; the fee cannot be passed on to the sponsored worker.

For us, a significant point of contention is the application of the increase to the health and social care sector. Increasing the charge for the health and social care sector is a mistake in our view, because this penalises hospitals and care homes attempting to hire desperately needed staff. The increase transfers money from the National Health Service to the Home Office, when GPs, hospitals and hospices desperately need funds. The Government are trying to ensure that the public sector, like the private sector, recruits from the British workforce, but transitioning takes time, and estimates of posts required are far outstripping the provision and recruitment to training opportunities in order to fill those posts.

The ISC rates have not changed since the charge was introduced in 2017. The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee noted that, when asked why the charge had not increased previously, the Home Office responded only that

“there have not been any substantive reviews of the ISC”

and, importantly,

“Ministers had not sought to make changes”.

I am not suggesting that it was the current Minister, but somebody somewhere was asleep on the job. Perhaps the Minister can inform us why that has not happened in the intervening years and why businesses will therefore now be subjected to a large increase because we did not continue with the proper process of increasing with inflation each year.

The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee also considered the Home Office’s replies on plans for future timely reviews of the charge to be “unhelpfully vague”, so it remains for the Minister today, I am afraid, to be encouraged to ensure that the ISC will be kept under regular review to ensure that it retains its real-terms value and to avoid large step changes in the amounts payable in the future.

The SLSC says that the Home Office “did not respond” to it regarding consultation on these increased charges. The SLSC says that, if no consultation was undertaken, it regretted that and suggested that that would continue a trend of “inadequate consultation” on many immigration policies. Can the Minister correct the committee? Alternatively, will he take into account its criticism of what is happening inside the department? The Home Office deemed a formal public consultation unnecessary, arguing that it would be

“disproportionate given the nature of the changes”.

A 32% increase is not a disproportionate amount, so some form of public consultation should have been undertaken.

I have five questions. First, I want to concentrate on the impact upon the health and social care sector and the transfer of money from the NHS. I do not know whether the Government plan to undertake a study of what impact this has on the NHS and our care services, but if they wanted to find out how much cost falls upon the National Health Service, it would be difficult to track down. The Budget produced last week—these are documents from the Budget—says that, between now and March, £48 million will be raised from these charges. In the year from next April, it will be £180 million. Altogether, that is a substantial amount of money in the next 15 or 16 months. It is necessary to understand how much of that charge falls upon the National Health Service, because taking with one hand and giving with another is not a way of ensuring that we get appropriate transparency of public funding. The documents produced for the Budget say that the £180 million next year will be offset by increased DEL expenditure, but we have just heard from the Minister that the DEL expenditure is going on training.

My main question is: if they are putting this money towards training, to achieve the objective set out by the Minister at the outset, getting domestic employment rather than none, it is important to understand how much of that charge is being taken from the NHS budget. According to the statement just made by the Minister, it is certainly not transferred back into the National Health Service, as far as we can understand it. This is really a question about how we can measure that impact and whether, if there is a negative impact, the Government will try to reduce the rate for the National Health Service to the charitable small organisation rate, so that we can at least minimise the hit upon that service.

The impact assessment estimates that the increase in the immigration skills charge will deter less than 1% of sponsorships. Does the Minister believe that this modest impact is sufficient to address the stated objective that levels of net migration—I am talking here about illegal migration for work—have been too high and must continue to come down? That impact is quite small compared with what I suspect the need is.

Migration: Settlement Pathway

Lord German Excerpts

Tuesday 25th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, this is the second set of changes to immigration policy announced this year, on top of the Bill we have just passed, and the changes to the asylum system; it is fair to say the Government are feeling the pressure. But, as with the asylum Statement last week, I welcome many of these measures announced by the Home Secretary.

The Government are proposing a scheme whereby the default length of time for settlement is 10 years and, depending upon a person’s situation and circumstances, time will be either added or subtracted from those 10 years, meaning some people will qualify for indefinite leave to remain much sooner, and some much later. I am particularly supportive of those who receive benefits for more than 12 months having to wait for 20 years before qualifying for settlement. But this does raise the question of the degree to which foreign nationals are able to access public funds. It would be useful for the Minister to specify how this particular route would work. Surely, where a person is on a settlement route but not yet received settlement, they should not be able to receive any public funds.

I am interested in understanding how the Government have made the decision on the number of years they propose for each settlement pathway, as some seem to be rather odd. For example, the proposal is for a person who can speak English to degree level to be offered a nine-year path to settlement, while those who volunteer will be able to qualify between five and seven years. I understand that the volunteering pathway is subject to consultation, but what reasoning do the Government have for requiring a person who has degree-level English to wait for longer than a person who has done some volunteering? Furthermore, how will the Government ensure that the volunteering pathway does not lead to abuses of the system?

One concern I have about these proposals is about the settlement periods for illegal migrants. The consultation document states that illegal entry will add “up to 20 years” to the baseline qualifying period. It then says:

“We are consulting on whether this should be 5, 10, 15 or as high as 20 years”.


I ask the Minister why the Government need to consult on this. Why can they not make a decision themselves? Are the Government considering allowing scope for discretion?

On this, it somewhat beggars belief that the Home Office is actually considering permitting those who arrive illegally to still be able to qualify for indefinite leave to remain. I know I have made this point before, but I will keep making it until the Government absorb it and listen: there should be absolutely no route to settlement for those who enter illegally. Any person who commits a criminal offence by entering the UK without valid leave to enter and remain should be deported and never permitted to receive settlement. I look forward very much to what the Minister has to say in response.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, we recognise the issues facing communities and immigrants across the country, and we agree that faith must be restored to the immigration and asylum system, which requires changes to policy. We appreciate the commitment to maintaining the five-year pathway to settlement for partners of British citizens and British nationals overseas from Hong Kong, honouring our unique responsibilities to them. However, we are concerned that this overhaul overlooks key failures of past Governments.

Prior to Brexit and the removal of nearly all safe and legal routes, this country had a more rational and controlled approach to immigration. It is regrettable that the Government have not made quicker progress towards building stronger links with Europe in their work on getting control of our immigration policy.

Changes to settlement must be made giving due regard to the economy and public services, and with fairness to individuals. We are concerned about the chilling effect this policy and rhetoric could have on the economy. The UK is fast becoming a less competitive place for science and innovation. However, and moreover, the NHS is heavily reliant on non-British national staff.

The policy statement sets out that debt would limit an individual’s eligibility for settlement. What does that mean? Perhaps the Minister could tell us. Does it include credit cards or a mortgage? When consideration is being given to preventing access to public funds for those with settlement? What is the position of the state pension, which an individual would have contributed to over the years that they have been in the UK? If you take your pension, does that mean that you would no longer be eligible for that final route?

The Statement explicitly targets the cohort of lower-qualified workers who entered via the health and care visa, proposing they should wait 15 years before earning settlement, extending the pathway beyond the new 10-year baseline. Would that lead to a situation where care workers would be incentivised to volunteer in their community rather than work extra hours as a care worker? This proposal unfairly targets low earners and our carers. Why are carers not to be considered public service workers? What are we saying about the value of care? Care is a fundamental need in our society, especially as we are an ageing population.

Further, these proposals raise serious questions about those who are most vulnerable. The Government have committed to keeping some immediate short-route pathways for victims of domestic violence and abuse. Will the Minister explicitly reassure the House and survivors that these changes will not have the adverse, and perhaps unintended, impact of locking those survivors into abusive relationships?

The care sector in the UK is facing chronic staffing shortages, putting immense pressure on families and the wider social care system. Given that the Home Secretary has proposed that public service workers could qualify after five years, what assessment has been made of the risk that some essential public service workers will leave the UK? That was shared by the nurses’ union. What credible plan are the Government making to develop domestic talent in the health and care sector, especially in the short timescale that is available to them?

The Ukrainian people continue to resist Russia’s war of aggression, and many families who have sought refuge in the UK face further uncertainty over their visa status, causing significant instability. Will the Home Office and the Minister consider establishing a pathway to indefinite leave to remain for Ukrainians who have integrated into life in the UK and wish to remain long-term?

How does this policy relate to the family unit? It would seem that we could have a situation where people within the same family unit are on different routes to settlement because of their individual salaries on the one hand and caring responsibilities on the other —for example, a husband on a three-year route and a wife on a 10-year route. How might this disproportionately impact women, who often work less as a result of childcare?

The Home Secretary stated in the other place that fairness is central to these immigration changes. Is it fair to change the rules for an individual who has come to the UK on a legal route, with certain expectations, and move the goalposts midway through their route to settlement? While no one disputes that people coming to the UK should integrate, how will the Home Secretary and the Home Office ensure that the new mandatory measures, such as making sustained national insurance contributions above the personal allowance threshold and demonstrating English language proficiency to A-level standard or more, do not impose unworkable red tape on people who have come here legally?

Finally, how will these arrangements and changes be implemented? Will some of it be in primary legislation? Will some of it be in secondary legislation? Will some of it just be changes to the Immigration Rules? I understand that it is a tricky and detailed answer that I am expecting from the Minister, but if he cannot give me the exact details now about the legislative route for these proposals, perhaps he might like to write to me on these matters. I appreciate that I have asked a significant number of questions, but I hope that I can get answers to some of them.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to answer questions in this House on the Statement made by my right honourable friend the Home Secretary.

Let me start by saying to the noble Lord, Lord Davies, that the Government are not feeling the pressure on this issue. The Government are responding, as any sensible Government would, to some of the challenges we have inherited after 14 years of his Government. There was a large build-up in a range of asylum issues, and they did not tackle the issue of earned settlement that we are looking at now. The last change on earned settlement was in 2006, and this is the most fundamental change in over 40 years. Settlement is a privilege, not a right. We are trying to have a discussion, so I would welcome formal consultation from both noble Lords on the points they have made. We are trying to solve some of the problems and challenges for the future.

The noble Lord, Lord Davies, talked about issues to do with the different years of earned entitlement, up and down. We have made judgments on that, but it is open to consultation. He can make representations, if he thinks any of the decisions that we have come to in the initial document are wrong. We will look at his representations on those issues. We have settled on degree-level English as being an important benchmark. For the core narrative and the four main criteria, the English requirement is A-level standard, which is the B2 test of the common European framework. I think that is reasonable.

The noble Lord, Lord Davies, mentioned illegal entry. We have set very high bars on the punitive elements of additional years before any consideration can be given. Again, that is open to consultation. There may be circumstances where somebody has arrived illegally who we wish to examine, and that is part of the reason for the discussion. All the areas the noble Lord has mentioned are subject to consultation, and I would certainly welcome his views.

I can tell the noble Lord, Lord German, that the anticipation is that most of this will be done via the Immigration Rules. The process, as set out in the Statement that my right honourable friend the Home Secretary made on 20 November, is that a consultation will be open until 12 February 2026, and we would hope to try to make some changes with effect from the next financial year, in April. Again, that will be subject to consultation and parliamentary consideration.

The noble Lord mentioned what the debt would look like for individuals. The three types of debt that we are looking at in the consultation are any outstanding litigation debt, tax debt or National Health Service debt. It would not be debt on a personal basis; effectively, we will be examining state debts. Whether pensions would be included is for the consultation. We are looking at issues such as jobseeker’s allowance and child benefit, but it would be open to discussion. I would welcome the noble Lord’s contribution to that.

The noble Lord mentioned the situation with health and care visas. There is considerable growth in this area, arguably because people are living longer and require more care. In 2028, we anticipate an additional 210,000 care workers coming to the UK, with the potential for long-term settlement. We are trying to ensure that we raise the level of training and are looking into recruiting UK-based citizens into that work. There will always be a need to examine that route, which is why we will maintain it, but there is a much longer period for final settlement.

The noble Lord, Lord German, mentioned Ukraine. We would not have anticipated the Ukraine scheme four or five years ago, but it is in place because we responded to a humanitarian need in what I and the Ukrainian Government hope is a temporary circumstance. The Ukraine route has never been a route to permanent settlement. It has now been further extended for around 18 months. We will keep it under review. Self-evidently, Russia is still present in Ukraine and bloodshed is still going on. The Ukrainian Government have our support in dealing with that, which is why we have maintained and extended the scheme into the future. The Ukrainian Government do not wish this to be a permanent route, so it will be kept under review. It is a separate scheme for Ukrainian citizens who have come to the United Kingdom for the moment.

The noble Lord mentioned family routes and the potential for different family timescales. That area is potentially subject to consultation. We want to look at it so that we do not necessarily disadvantage families. I cannot read my writing, but I have written “transitional”. I will examine the noble Lord’s comments in Hansard and write to him shortly, because I have forgotten exactly why I have written it down.

We are taking this measure because there are currently 70 routes, 40 of them leading to settlement. Between 2026 and 2030, we estimate that between 1.3 million and 2.2 million citizens, under the current scheme, will be able to have a period of settlement. We need to take action. The immigration White Paper published in May 2025 set out that we will increase the default qualifying period for settlement from five to 10 years. We have put down some core criteria: the lack of a criminal record, the ability to speak English to A-level standard, three to five years of national insurance contributions and having no debt, as I defined to the noble Lord a moment ago. We wish to put those core issues as a base but, on top of that, we have put positives and negatives in terms of earned entitlement. We are doing that to ensure that citizenship is part of a commitment and is focused on no recourse to public funds, speaking English to degree level and other matters that I have outlined to the House.

I hope the House will not just look at the two Statements but participate in the consultation. At the end of that consultation in February, we will undoubtedly bring to both Houses a package that will be subject to parliamentary approval and that this House and the House of Commons can examine and question in detail.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Lord German Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments and / or reasons
Monday 24th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Oh, give over, please. The whole purpose of having this House and the other House discuss amendments and have ping-pong is to achieve a compromise between what this House wants to do and what the other House wants to do, and to try to find a solution. The noble Lord says that the Minister in the other place said X three days ago. Well, I am saying this today. If he does not want to accept it then we can have a discussion and he can press for a vote, and we can see how people this House vote and where we are.

Sometimes I despair. We are actually trying to move things on to meet the objectives of the noble Lords, Lord Jackson and Lord Harper, and he still does not want to accept the Christmas presents I am offering him. I am telling him today that we will, as I have said, provide information on student visas revoked as a result of the commission of criminal offences, the number of overseas students who have been deported after the revocation of their student visas and the number of overseas students detained pending deportation. That is what the information is. Work will commence immediately, with a view to publication by the end of the financial year. Should this work identify that additional time is required, an update will be provided.

We are trying to meet the objectives of the request from the noble Lord, Lord Jackson. I hope that the noble Lord will take this as a democratic parliamentary decision between the two Houses to achieve the aims of one small amendment at the end of a lot of consideration of the Bill to date.

[Lord German (LD)]

Before the Minister sits down, will he confirm that what he has said, and what I have heard from the Benches to my right, is that apart from the demise of the Minister, so that he could not carry out what he just described, there is no reason why, as the noble Lord, Lord Davies, said, they should not accept the Motion before us? We should take on board what the Minister says—and if I were the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, I would take it as a win. I think he ought to withdraw.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful for the support of the noble Lord, Lord German. I cannot guarantee that I will be here for ever—nor would I wish to be. I have done 13 years at various Dispatch Boxes over the last 27 years, and the 14 years I did not do were not my fault. I hope to continue.

I am giving a commitment on behalf of the United Kingdom Government which will hold for the term of this Parliament. I cannot commit future Governments to issues but, again, that is what parliamentary democracy is about—holding Government Ministers to account. Who knows who the next Government will be or what they will look like, but I am giving a commitment on behalf of the UK Government for those statistics over this period of time. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, will accept it.

Asylum Policy

Lord German Excerpts

Thursday 20th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, the Home Secretary’s Statement to the other place announced a number of reforms which are very welcome. When the Government bring forward strong measures, we will support them. The Home Secretary should be praised for accepting a simple truth—that Britain’s asylum system is far more generous than that of many other European countries.

It is a truth that, unfortunately, many Labour Back-Benchers cannot seem to grasp. The true test to these reforms will be whether the Government can face down opposition from within their own ranks and implement them.

There is another welcome truth that the Home Secretary has implicitly accepted: up to now, the Government’s measures to tackle illegal migration have failed. The Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, which we have spent many hours debating in this House, is woefully inadequate to deal with the issue. It is a shame that it took the Government so long to realise this, but we are where we are. We will have to have another immigration and asylum Bill next year because the Government were too slow to reach the logical conclusion that their plans are not working. These new announcements are at least a tacit acceptance that that Bill did not go anywhere near far enough to seriously tackle small boat crossings.

There are a number of proposals here that are very similar to amendments I tabled during the Report stage of the border security Bill—amendments that the Government completely opposed. It is heartening to see that they have finally come round, but it might have been easier for all of us if they had compromised earlier.

For example, the Government opposed my amendment to create third-country removal centres. The Minister criticised it for wanting to rehash the Rwanda policy, but that is a complete falsehood. The Rwanda policy would have sent illegal migrants to Rwanda, where their asylum claims would be processed. The amendments I brought to the border security Bill would automatically reject that asylum claim brought by an illegal migrant and then return them to either their home country or a safe third country. Their claims would not be processed in Rwanda because they would never be allowed to make a claim in the first place.

That amendment was about having safe third countries where we can send failed asylum seekers and illegal migrants who cannot be returned to their home country. Now, in their policy statement, the Government say:

“We will continue to explore the use of ‘return hubs’ which are safe third countries that failed asylum seekers can be sent to instead of their country of origin. Negotiations with a number of countries are ongoing”.


This is precisely what we were pushing the Government to do, and I am pleased that they have announced that they will look to send failed asylum seekers to safe third countries, but this all could have been much easier if they had come to this conclusion earlier.

The Government have also announced changes to the appeals procedure. The Statement says that the Home Office will

“create a new appeals body, staffed by professional independent adjudicators”.

However, it does not mention whether this appeals body will run alongside the First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) or replace it. Could the Minister please clarify this?

Would the Government run this new body alongside the judicial appeals tribunals? If so, how would they decide whose appeal is heard before which body? Or are they proposing to abolish the immigration and asylum tribunal and replace it with the Home Office review body? If so, then that was exactly what I proposed by way of Amendments 46 and 47 to the border security Bill. On Report on 5 November, 128 Labour peers voted against that. If they have changed their mind on this, it is very embarrassing to say the least; it is disappointing for them to vote against that proposal and then come up with something very similar.

The Home Secretary has claimed that she is following the lead set by Denmark, but this is only a partial truth, because Denmark requires asylum seekers to prove full-time employment for several years before they qualify for permanent residence.

The Government’s plans extend the waiting time to get indefinite leave to remain to 10 years once a person’s refugee status has been granted and if they entered legally. This would be 20 years for those who entered illegally, but this does not impose any conditions. Theoretically, a person could enter illegally, languish on benefits for 20 years and then be granted the right to indefinite leave to remain. While I am pleased to see asylum status become temporary, and for anyone whose home country becomes safe to be returned there, it is absolutely wrong that a person could enter illegally and still be allowed to remain, especially given the Government’s opening of new safe and legal routes. If we are to have legal routes for refugees, we absolutely cannot reward those who enter illegally. That would make even more of a mockery of the whole system. Why would a person bother to apply for the legal route if they know that they can board a boat and be allowed to stay here? The Government need to follow this plan to its logical conclusion and ban asylum, human rights and protection claims from any illegal migrant.

Finally, the plan to reform Article 8 is all well and good, but the Government have to know that this will not be enough. While we have the Human Rights Act in force and are party to the ECHR, we will face the same barriers to removals that we do currently. Reforming the interpretation will simply allow crafty human rights lawyers to find innovative new ways to circumvent it. Only a wholesale repeal of the Human Rights Act and withdrawal from the ECHR can finally remove the legal barriers to deportation.

The Government have started moving in the right direction. As my right honourable friend the Leader of the Opposition said, we will support the Government in making these changes. But I fear that they will not be enough and that the Government will end up coming back to us next year with further changes. If they simply accepted that now, and went even further with these changes, it would save us all a lot of time down the line.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I draw attention to my interests, and I am supported by the RAMP organisation. I am minded to think of the title of that great film, “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”; I am afraid that these proposals have all three within them. I will go through some of those.

Starting with the positive, we support the Government’s intent to bring order in the asylum system, and we welcome the announcement of new, capped, safe and legal routes for refugees. These pathways, with security checks and controls, are the correct way to fulfil the UK’s responsibility to those in need. Confirmation that the Government will not leave the European Convention on Human Rights is welcome, as is the recognition that early legal advice should be a core part of the appeal system.

Moving on to the bad, or impractical, the argument that asylum seekers should contribute is undermined when they are denied the means to earn their way. Denmark allows asylum seekers to work after six months. Why are the Government persisting in stopping asylum seekers from working when there is no evidence that this is a pull factor? We question the assumption of the UK as a magnet, given that we receive far fewer asylum seekers per capita than our European neighbours. Home Office analysis itself found that asylum seekers have little to no understanding of welfare policies before arrival. Shared language, diaspora communities and perhaps even colonial connections are the primary drivers for asylum seekers taking irregular routes to the UK. Can the UK Government provide evidence, rather than simple assertion, on this matter?

Revoking the duty to support risks creating more destitution and pushing more asylum seekers towards illegal working and exploitation. What assessment has been made of this risk? What action are the Government taking to avoid passing the financial strain onto already struggling local authorities? The use of immoderate language is also unhelpful and risks stoking division. Why do the Government feel the need to create a whole new asylum appeals structure? Why not simply expand the existing system?

The most severe criticisms target the core protection model and its administrative fallout. Core protection requires a status review every 30 months and delays permanent settlement for 20 years, which in our view is unnecessary and cruel. This prolonged state of instability will inhibit successful integration by making it difficult for refugees to secure tenancies, employment or higher education. The Home Office is currently struggling with a backlog, yet this policy would impose what has been called bureaucratic madness, requiring a huge increase in capacity to review the status of an estimated 1.45 million people by the end of 2035, potentially costing £872 million. Do the Government accept these figures or have they alternative ones to offer?

Scrapping the refugee family reunion route pushes children and spouses into the hands of smugglers, directly contradicting the goal of safe migration. Has this risk been assessed? How will the long-term separation from family impact refugees’ ability to contribute and reduce their reliance on state support? Will the Government be detaining and deporting children who were once accepted as refugees but will subsequently not be when their home country is deemed safe?

Given that Denmark’s temporary protection scheme clearly failed to result in returns for Syrians, how do the Government justify the massive cost and profound uncertainty imposed by the UK version? What is the timescale for these changes? When will they be implemented and what method will be used to implement them?

Finally, do the Government agree with the report in the i newspaper that deportations will be retrospective? It says:

“It means that, if a refugee has not already been granted indefinite right to remain before the Home Secretary’s new legislation comes into force, they will be deported if their home country is subsequently deemed safe by the Government”.


I look forward to the Government’s response to these questions.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, and I will try to answer his questions first of all. I am grateful for the welcome he gave to some of the Government’s proposals. I remind him that the reason we are undertaking these reforms is that we have inherited a very broken system: a system that has been in operation for 14 years, where the number of asylum claims has risen, where the backlog has grown and where the deportations have not existed where they are rightfully proposed to exist. We have a duty, on behalf of the British people, to take some difficult decisions to sort this out.

The noble Lord mentioned that the border security Bill, which has completed its passage bar one Commons amendment, has not been effective. Let me remind him that we have introduced a border security commander, who has negotiated deals with France, negotiated deals with Iraq, negotiated deals with the Germans and has been put on a legal footing by this Bill. We have put extra measures in place to support penalties for people smugglers, which will now, once Royal Assent is achieved, allow us to take some further deterrent actions against people smugglers to end that vile trade. We have put in place mechanisms to stop the manufacture and use of boats, to seize engines and to do other things which will take effect once Royal Assent is agreed. I do not, therefore, accept his contention first and foremost that the border security Bill, about which we have had many hours of discussion, is pointless.

I have to say to him, however, that the Government have to keep these issues under review because it is self-evidently a broken system, which is why we put in place additional people to speed up the backlog. The measures before the House today, outlined in the Statement, will be brought forward in legislation, subject to consultation. We will also look at a range of other measures we need to take to fix the system we have inherited from the noble Lord and his political party. He may not like that—I do not want to politicise that: I want his support for this—but we have had to take those steps because of where we are, and I think that is reasonable.

The support he has given for some of those steps is particularly good. He mentioned, for example, the tightened criteria. I think it is fair and proper that, if a country is deemed safe after two and a half years, the individual concerned is encouraged and supported to return to that country; or, as is in this proposal, they can apply for a different route through work or study to get permanent residence downstream. If the country is safe, however, it is perfectly reasonable to look at how we can remove that individual.

The proposals include tackling increased enforcement on illegal working. I think it is perfectly reasonable to put some pressure and heat into the system to tackle people who are being employed illegally, to look at increasing the right-to-work checks, to provide digital ID requirements—which I suspect he will oppose—to ensure there are mandatory right-to-work checks and collaboration to verify companies. I think that is reasonable. I think it is reasonable to look at return hubs: not Rwanda, not £700 million being wasted, not two people being removed voluntarily, but discussing proper return hubs for people who do not have safe countries but where their asylum claims have failed. It is perfectly reasonable to remove people whose asylum claims have failed because their asylum claims have failed. That is perfectly reasonable to do.

It is perfectly reasonable to do what we are doing in this proposal to speed up assessments and appeals. He asked about the First-tier Tribunal. We are going to put extra hours into the tribunal and we are going to ensure that we look at improving the legal system to get appeals dealt with and tribunals dealt with much more quickly. It is reasonable—and this is, again, where we will have a bit of blue and red water between us—to be committed to the European Convention on Human Rights, to be committed to legislation to uphold human rights, but actually to say that we want to look at how we can tweak that to make sure that it acts in the interest of our country, at the same time as being part of our international obligations, which is where we are. He wants to leave those conventions. I do not, and the Government do not, but we need to make sure we make them work in a better way to deal with this issue. I think it is reasonable for us to do all those things and I hope for and look forward to his support on them.

I welcome the welcome from the noble Lord, Lord German. It has been overlooked in this, but there are safe and legal routes that we want to develop, as we have done, for example, in our bespoke schemes for Ukraine and for Syria. There are bespoke routes that we can develop. There are safe and legal routes that we can look at. In this Statement, my right honourable friend the Home Secretary has said that we wish to look at doing that. We are committed to human rights, but we are committed to looking at these particular issues. We will encourage people to look at the work route, if necessary, for safe and legal routes, and we will ensure that a range of other issues are examined.

The noble Lord takes issue with the core protection measures that we have before us in this proposal. I think, again, that it is reasonable, given where we are, to look at how we can ensure that those people are assessed very quickly, within two and a half years, or 30 months. If the country is safe to return to, they can return. If not, let us get that asylum claim approved, or let us get that asylum claim rejected and the individual then returned. I think that is a reasonable proposal. It is reasonable that we look at family reunion, and the noble Lord asked about child deportations. I do not want to see child deportations, but what I want to see is, if people have failed their asylum claim or if they are a foreign national offender—of which we have many languishing in UK jails at the moment—we must find mechanisms to return those individuals fairly and properly to their communities if they are safe, or, if not, to look at the issue that we have talked about here of an alternative holding establishment. All of this will be consulted on.

The noble Lord asked about when and how this will be brought in. There will be legislation brought before both Houses of Parliament, at a point to be determined, and the consultation will take place. However, I ask all those noble Lords who may criticise the proposals: are they happy with the status quo? Do they think the status quo is a good place to be? I think nobody in this Chamber will say that the status quo is a good place to be. Therefore, my objective with the Home Secretary and the Home Office is to look at ways in which we can maintain our international obligations, welcome genuine refugees and asylum seekers, but also speed up a broken system to make sure it works effectively.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Lord German Excerpts

3rd reading
Monday 17th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

My Lords, before we conclude the Lords stages of the Bill, I wish to express my deep sadness following the news last week of the passing of the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove. On behalf of the Home Office, I praise her dedication and her work in supporting victims, drawing on her personal experience, as Victims’ Commissioner. I am sure that the whole House will join me in sending condolences and thoughts to her family and friends.

The Bill has been subject to many hours of debate across this House, and I thank all Peers for their contributions. It was introduced in the House of Commons back in January and is part of a serious and credible plan to protect the UK’s border security that sees the Government working very closely with our international partners and with colleagues across the country, so that we can ensure law enforcement and have the powers and tools that we need to identify, disrupt and dismantle organised crime.

The Bill is about protecting those who need it, swiftly removing those with no right to be here and cracking down on criminal gangs. It establishes landmark new offences which deliver our manifesto commitment on counterterrorism powers that will give law enforcement the ability to tackle those involved in putting lives in danger and threatening border security. It also establishes the new Border Security Commander, about which we have had much discussion.

During debate in this House, the Government have also introduced a new offence to criminalise those who advertise illegal migration services online and through social media. We have listened to your Lordships’ House, and to the Constitution Committee and the Joint Committee on Human Rights, and amended the new offences in the Bill where appropriate. These proposals, alongside the asylum policy statement being announced today by my right honourable friend the Home Secretary, are important matters. I thank all noble Lords who have tabled and spoken to amendments during the passage of the Bill.

I also thank the Ministers in the Northern Ireland, Scottish and Welsh Governments, who have seen and supported the relevant provisions in the Bill. We have had legislative consent from each of the relevant Parliaments and Assemblies. I also thank the Bill team, without whom this Bill would genuinely not be possible, and officials in my private office.

The passage of the Bill by this House is an important step to develop and strengthen the UK’s border security. I beg to move.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I echo the Minister’s thanks to the Bill team. I also thank him, because I cannot recall the number of meetings he has held with officials and Members who have raised issues during the passage of the Bill. That does not mean that those meetings resulted in satisfaction for all those who made those comments, but I think the fact that we were given those opportunities is respected across this House.

It would be foolish to say that the Bill marks the passing of an endpoint for the immigration and asylum services of this country. We are told that we are to have two Statements, one today from the Home Secretary and one on Thursday, which will take this matter further forward. It is rather like having the London bus come along, then suddenly you have more than one. This will probably end up becoming an annual event: a new immigration Bill. We expect that to happen.

Many of the issues that have been raised in the background to the Statement that is going to be made in the other place in, I think, a few minutes’ time have been raised in the debates on the Bill, so I ask the Minister: will any amendments be attached to this Bill on the questions that are being raised in the two Statements, to give some speed to its passage? I hope the answer is no and that we have dealt with the Bill before us in the proper manner.

I think we can safely say that three distinct approaches have been set out on the Bill. From the Labour Government, it is pragmatic, law enforcement-led control; the Conservative Opposition demand a policy of absolute deterrence based on previous legislation; and we on these Benches seek to balance necessary enforcement with safe, legal and humane routes, ensuring that international obligations are fully codified and respected—in essence, a policy of control and compassion, which I think go together.

At the outset of the Bill, we laid out our concerns that it dealt only with the supply side—the smugglers. As long as the smugglers have customers, that is the problem which this side of the equation deals with, but our belief—I hope that it will be proven with Thursday’s Statement, rather than today’s—is that the demand side also needs to be looked at appropriately. We are told that the proposals to be outlined today are that if you are harsher on those making irregular routes, this will stop people taking the dangerous journeys. That is what this Bill has been about: trying to reduce and put a stop to the dangerous journeys that people are taking. That debate will now proceed, because there are now points around the demand-side issues that I understand the Government are going to make.

In passing this Bill, it seems appropriate that we have all had learning experiences which are going to be useful for at least the next 12 months as we proceed to the next stage. Perhaps the Minister will say, but are we going to have one in the year after as well? I hope, given the strength he has demonstrated, the amount of time he has put in, and the amount of time he is having to put into another Bill, that at least he will have some respite over Christmas.

I also thank those on my side who have been helpful to us in making sure that the Bill has been debated fully: my noble friends Lady Brinton, Lady Hamwee, Lady Ludford and Lord Oates, and Elizabeth Plummer in our office here in Parliament. With that, I thank the Minister and the team behind him for the helpful way they have dealt with this Bill.