Immigration and Nationality (Fees) (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2023

Lord German Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Altmann (Con)]

My Lords, I too congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, on her persistence, her perseverance and her dedication to this issue. She has raised it time and again, and I hope that my noble friend on the Front Bench will listen carefully, particularly to the contributions that we have just heard from my noble friend Lord Moylan and the noble Baroness, Lady Primarolo, on the specific matter of citizenship and charging citizens a fee at such a high level for a right that they already have.

But I agree that being British is a hugely valuable commodity, and the Government are right to say that those who can afford to pay for that privilege should be asked to do so. Of course, one would ideally like to cover only the cost and not to have some excess revenue from this source. But if there is an opportunity for some people who can afford it to be asked to pay, and contribute to the general well-being of the Exchequer, in such circumstances where they will receive this valuable right, I believe that is okay.

I am also delighted that there is a fee waiver scheme. I congratulate the Government; I think they recognised the need for this. The problem, as we have heard, is that many people either are unaware of their entitlement or find the process extremely complex. It is also somewhat narrow in scope. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chichester and the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, pointed out the ways in which we might identify children who will be severely disadvantaged by the extraordinary level of fees that someone who cannot afford this kind of money is expected to pay.

The problem is that there is such a huge disparity between the cost of the current proposals and the fee waiver scheme, which potentially has zero cost. Covering the cost is important. Could my noble friend tell me if the Government would consider some kind of in-between category at a reduced fee rate, which covers the cost without the excess, in certain circumstances? It would not be the full fee or full waiver for certain groups, especially for some of the children who might manage a lower amount.

I would be grateful if my noble friend could give us updated estimates of the excess revenue the Government expect to bring in, in excess of the cost of administration, from this scheme. What is the Government’s latest estimate of the potential damage to business from the current proposed level of fees? I agree that we need to make reasonable charges for applications to grant citizenship and migration and nationality rights, but I hope my noble friend takes on board the strength of feeling expressed around the House about the possibility of some off-setting or mitigating measures.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, these Benches are grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, for bringing these issues to us and discussing them. Particularly important is the impact on younger people and those who have no way of making that payment, and the poverty into which some of these people will fall.

I will give noble Lords some indication of the size of this SI and what its impact will be. The Government have been very honest about it; it is in paragraph 12.2 of the Explanatory Memorandum. I quote:

“The impact on the public sector is also likely to be significant—a net benefit to the public sector in the order of hundreds of millions of pounds per year, predominantly due to increased revenue being generated”.


We are talking about a huge amount of money, which is being generated not just to fulfil the costs of the scheme, but to add to the Exchequer and the volume of money coming in.

One of the people who objected to this and who wrote to the SLSC posited that these fees were some of the highest in the world. In reply, the Government said that it is very difficult to make judgments but

“we believe that UK visa fees are broadly competitive when compared with comparable countries globally”.

That is an assertion, as was the statement by the other group in the other direction. However, for the Government to say this, they must have some working out. When you do a maths sum of that sort, there must be some working out. Will the Minister provide for the House some of the indications that give the Home Office the right to believe that the fees are broadly competitive so that we can understand them? There are two factors here: a huge increase, worth hundreds of millions of pounds to the public sector, and an assertion that they are high compared with everywhere else.

I reiterate and amplify the points about this House’s 21-day rule made by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, at the beginning. It is a discourtesy to this House that the rules we apply to the Government have not been followed—not just once or twice but three times in the last month. It strikes me that the SLSC’s polite language is really saying that the Home Office’s procedures are rubbish, because it is discounting this Parliament’s view in observing and looking over the legislation before us. That stands in direct opposition to the Minister’s Statement to this House two weeks ago, on the treaty that the Government were negotiating with Rwanda, which said that the full details of the treaty and the full time that this House requires to examine it would be allowed and provided for. I am grateful for that assertion, because that means that the rules will be followed, but I think that we in this House would like to know whether the Home Office will in future follow all the rules that this House lays upon it.

On the waiver scheme, I note the points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, and the noble Baroness, Lady Primarolo. I will look particularly at fee waivers for applications for limited leave to remain. There may be questions about their effectiveness, but I raise with the Minister the fact that fee waivers for applications for indefinite leave to remain for young people on the five-year route to settlement are not satisfactory. This is a cohort of people who either are under the age of 18 and have lived in the United Kingdom for at least seven years or are aged between 18 and 24 years old and have spent half of their lives in the United Kingdom.

The Government have already recognised their specific position and offered them a more affordable five-year route to settlement, but this offer cannot be accessed by many—I note the age of this cohort—as they are unable to afford the indefinite leave to remain application fee. These are not incoming migrants; they have been accepted as having a right to settlement, and we need to give young people every opportunity to be and feel part of our communities, rather than putting barriers in their way. With the 20% increase in the indefinite leave to remain application fees, will the department give this matter further consideration?

Of course, if more people are unable to afford the indefinite leave to remain application, people will attempt to put in a waiver. Waiver schemes are available, but some people posit that, because they are so complicated, it is necessary to employ a lawyer to work your way through them. Of course, people cannot afford a lawyer, so they do not apply for a scheme and do not apply at all.

The Minister projects—and we heard the figures—that more people will be acceptable for waiver applications, so what is the projected cost of that additional workload for the Home Office from those who have waivers? We need to measure that against the hundreds of millions of pounds a year being sought and brought about by extra revenue.

On the cost to business in this country, the Government have again been honest, saying that, for the changes to the fees mentioned,

“the impact on business, charities or voluntary bodies is likely to be significant—we believe there will be a cost to business in the order of tens of millions of pounds per year”.

That is tens of millions of pounds that business will be asked to find. I thought that this Government were not in favour of increasing the taxes on business but, clearly, I have got it wrong. Could the Minister tell me whether that fact that they have placed in their document—that there will be tens of billions of pounds extra that businesses will have to pay the Government—is essentially another tax? The rate that they are asking is far beyond the increase we would expect to see with simply just the cost of living added to it. Any increase in costs, especially at a time when recruitment in specialised roles is already so difficult for many, will have the inevitable outcome, maybe, of driving companies as far as falling out of business. How will the Treasury reconcile lost revenue from small and medium-sized enterprises that are no longer able to afford the fees and recompense them so that they are able to sustain their business?

These are very complex regulations. We are grateful for the opportunity to have this debate, but we are in a position where significant amounts of money are being made from people who can ill afford it and businesses are being asked to fund part of this scheme in a way that will certainly not help the development of our economy.

Asylum Seekers: Deportation from France

Lord German Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I cannot anticipate what may or may not be in the Bill. Obviously, the Bill will be presented to Parliament in the usual way.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, what consideration has the Minister given to the views of the same Interior Minister from France that consideration will be given to giving legal status to undocumented people working in sectors with labour shortages? If the Minister were to give consideration effectively to that matter, surely that would help our relationships with the French Government and everything in the immigration system beyond.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I refer the noble Lord to my earlier Answer. I am not going to speculate on or discuss what the French legal system and the French Interior Minister decide about their own domestic policy.

Justification Decision (Scientific Age Imaging) Regulations 2023

Lord German Excerpts

Monday 27th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Scriven (LD)]

I will raise one point which has not been raised. This Chamber should not be legislating when legislation is not required, and the Government have not set out what the problem is and what the statutory instrument will solve. The Minister was very clear in describing the number of unaccompanied children seeking asylum, and he was also very aware of the numbers where there was a dispute over age. He then went on to say that by using the Merton assessment, nearly 49% were deemed to be adults and 51% children. That does not seem to be a system in disarray, but a system that weeds out those who deliberately try to deceive regarding their age.

The key question to determine the problem which the Minister has not answered, and which I would like him to answer, is: of that 51% since 2016 who have been deemed to be children by the Merton assessment, how many have then been found to be adults? That is a key question because if that figure is minimal, there is no need for the statutory instrument because there is not an age assessment problem to be solved.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, some things have been spoken of in this debate, but what is absolutely clear is that in every element the Government have provided more and more uncertainty. We have before us a set of regulations which are clearly down to a Government seeing themselves in a hurry to get things done in a way which might satisfy certain elements of its own party, but which is nothing to do with the case in question, which is about age assessment.

I just want to ask the Government four questions arising from the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which the Government have signed up to and to which we are party. First:

“An age assessment should only be conducted if it is in the best interests of the child”.


Perhaps the Minister in replying can explain to us why this is in the best interests of a child.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

Perhaps the noble Lord can explain why scientific methods are used to assess age in, among other countries, Sweden, Norway, Finland, France, Germany and the Netherlands.

[Lord German (LD)]

The information provided by the Council of Europe, which of course does not reflect the notifications we have received from the Government, describes the legal cases which have been taken against the proposals made by some of those states and which have in fact been found to be in contravention of the very convention I am talking about.

Secondly:

“Age assessment should not take place without the child’s and their guardian’s informed consent”.


How will that consent be provided and how is it meant to be independent?

Thirdly:

“Children undergoing age assessment have a right to be informed of their rights during the procedure, the purpose, steps and duration of the procedure, and to be assisted by a legal representative and/or guardian”.


What steps are the Government taking to provide that support for these children, so we are clear about it?

In conclusion, “sub-optimal” is the word provided by our Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. Everything that has been said about what we have in this House today suggests that it is below optimal.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I will discard most of my speech because all the points I was going to make have been made articulately. We will support the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, if she chooses to test the opinion of the House and I thank her for the thoroughness with which she introduced her amendment to the Motion. I agree with her that this SI is not yet ready to be put on the statute book.

The Minister set out the figures, which have been repeated a number of times as the debate has progressed. A number of questions were put to him about the issue of consent, the state of the European Convention on Human Rights, and answering the questions put by the Children’s Commissioner and other bodies which have expressed their extreme concern about the measures being put forward by the Government.

The noble Lord, Lord Murray, just intervened, giving examples of European countries which do some form of tested age assessment. However, this is of course a contested area in many European countries; we are not unique in this being a politically contested issue.

Noble Lords also made a point about the review mechanism that the Government propose to put in place so that, as this progresses—if indeed it does progress—the Government can keep an open mind about how effective it is and whether further changes in assessment methods need to be made. However, I want to conclude on a different point which no other noble Lord has made, and to talk slightly wider than the SIs themselves.

Last May, with my noble friend Lord Coaker, I visited the old RAF Manston airfield and the landing site, Western Jet Foil, in Dover harbour. I repeat my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Murray, for facilitating that visit. What became apparent to me then is that all the political debate, including today’s debate, is about the vast majority of young men who are potentially claiming to be under 18, and the impact that has on them. That is the totality of the political debate. However, there is another group of young men, which was drawn to my attention, who appear to the officials to be under 18 but are claiming to be adults. They are doing that because they want to work, either legally or illegally. Many of them will have started working in their home countries when they were 14, and they will have had a few years work under their belt and are coming here to better their prospects.

What tracking is there of those young men? I have raised this issue with the noble Lord, Lord Murray, and as far as I am aware, there is no tracking of them. Whether they are more likely to abscond once they go into the adult system or whether the Home Office tracks them at all, it is a significant, not an insignificant cohort. It was drawn to my attention when I made that visit and I will be very interested to hear the noble Lord’s answer, maybe by letter, on how those young men are tracked.

Rwanda: Asylum Arrangements Treaty

Lord German Excerpts

Tuesday 21st November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

Again, the noble Lord is asking me to speculate on something that has not yet happened, and I am afraid I do not see the point of that.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, are the Government intent on making any payment to the Government of Rwanda for converting their MoU into a treaty, and have the Government provided any support to the Rwandan Government in the last 12 months for the training of their officials in the immigration department?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

Again, as I said yesterday, in answer to the second part of the noble Lord’s question, the answer is yes. As regards the costs, I have no knowledge of that.

Illegal Immigration

Lord German Excerpts

Monday 20th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, does not the Rwanda judgment made by the Supreme Court make damning reading for the Government? Does it not expose once again the complete failure of the Prime Minister to get a grip, even at the most basic level, on the boats and asylum crisis?

The previous Home Secretary, appointed by this Prime Minister and then sacked, said to him:

“If we lose in the supreme court, … you will have wasted a year … only to arrive back at square one … your magical thinking … has meant you have failed to prepare any sort of credible plan B”.


Those are the words of one who was Home Secretary until only a week ago. The noble Lord, Lord Murray, who is also now not in post, was repeatedly told of problems with the Rwanda scheme as he drove the then Illegal Migration Bill through this House. Does the Minister agree that the former Minister was wrong to ignore the warnings that this House repeatedly made? These warnings were contained in the Supreme Court judgment, which outlined a number of problems with the policy. Ministers were warned about the failings in the Rwanda asylum system, so why did they just press on? They were told repeatedly of the failings of the Israel-Rwanda deal, so why did they just press on again?

The Government say that they will introduce a new treaty to deal with all of this, but why only now? Why has so much time been wasted, when these problems were known about? Can the Minister explain how the Rwanda policy, if implemented, can actually work? Since the Act came into force—since the 20 July date that the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, brought forward in an amendment in Committee—approximately 13,000 people have arrived illegally. According to the Act, they are deemed illegal and therefore need to be sent abroad. How are they to be sent to Rwanda? Are they all expected to go to Rwanda, or are the reports we read in today’s media accurate that the Government are considering giving thousands of people deemed to be here illegally, in light of the Supreme Court judgment and since the passage of the Act, access to the asylum system? Is not the truth of the matter that thousands upon thousands of people deemed illegal are being held here indefinitely, with families often traumatised, and women and children in limbo? What sort of policy is that?

The Government are bringing forward new legislation, which we will consider fully and to which we will give proper consideration in such an important area in your Lordships’ House. But what do we learn? We learned today that the Government are split on what this should be. Is it the case that the current Immigration Minister is pushing for this new legislation to disapply the Human Rights Act and ignore the ECHR, even though the Supreme Court, in its judgment, said that the ECHR had nothing to do with it? Does the Minister—and indeed the Home Secretary—therefore agree with the Immigration Minister, or with those who say that this hard-line approach, as proposed by his colleague, the current Immigration Minister, is actually mad? Does he agree with the Home Secretary, who in private—as reported in the newspapers—also confirmed, in colourful language, that he regarded the policy as to be less than satisfactory?

What of the plan in the new legislation to simply declare Rwanda a safe country in its upgrade to change it from an agreement to a treaty? Again, the latter is something that many in your Lordships’ House have said should actually have happened. How long will it take? What do the Government say to Lord Sumption’s criticism that you cannot

“change the facts, by law”

by proposing legislation that would, as I say, declare Rwanda safe? How would that work? As the former Supreme Court judge said, you cannot say that black is white.

Would it not have been a much better thing—rather than the wasting of time that we have seen from the Government, with over £140 million spent without a single person sent to Rwanda—to have had a proper plan to tackle the criminal gangs? That is something that I moved in Committee, only to see it rejected, and then to see the Prime Minister announce the same policy two weeks after the passing of the Act. Would it not also have been a good idea to improve our agreement with France, to speed up asylum decisions, to establish safe and legal routes and to tackle the problem at source? We have this chaos: a Government who are divided, no clarity on the new legislation to come, Ministers sacked, briefings and counter-briefings, and some even saying at the highest level in our governing party that we should just ignore the law, which is simply outrageous.

We all know that there have to be effective border controls and that illegal immigration needs to be tackled, but to do so the Government must get a grip for the sake of our international reputation. They must deliver the effective humane immigration system that this country deserves, and not the chaos that we have now. It is simply not good enough and the Government need to get a grip.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, this Statement is welcome; of course, we could have had it last week, but that was not to be the case. However, that has allowed us the whole weekend to understand slightly more the Government’s intentions—at least some of the Government’s intentions, some of which are being challenged. It means that we have to examine this Statement very carefully. The Statement says that the Government of course “respect the Supreme Court”, but we are being asked to suspend belief—to convert black into white on the say-so of the Government.

Are the Government intending to implement legislation that simply allows them to make an opposing declaration to that of the Supreme Court on the safety of Rwanda for refugees? To what extent is that respecting the Supreme Court’s decision? Do the Government agree with the Supreme Court that, in order to see their Rwanda policy in operation, they would need to disregard the ECHR and the United Nations system of international treaties, including the refugee convention, the United Nations convention against torture, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and also change not just the Human Rights Act but also domestic asylum legislation from 1993 and 2002?

Further, the Supreme Court judgment states about the Rwanda system that

“necessary changes may not be straightforward, as they require an appreciation that the current approach is inadequate, a change of attitudes, and effective training and monitoring”.

Therefore, in the past 12 months, have the UK Government provided any effective training to Rwandan officials?

Thirdly, this Statement says that arrivals are down, decisions are up, returns are up—we are getting on with the job. Believe that if you wish. Small boat arrivals are down on last year, but if you remove Albanians—clearly, we must accept the policy that returns those who are not genuine asylum seekers to their safe home country—total numbers are up from 2022. Going by the recent annual grant rates, 75% of those who crossed this year would be granted asylum. Of course, because clauses of the Illegal Migration Act have not yet been brought into force, the Government will have to hear this backlog of cases. The current backlog of cases is 122,585, taking legacy and flow numbers together. In addition, government figures show that small boat arrivals represent only 37% of people claiming asylum, up to June 2023.

What actions are being taken to ensure that those from high grant rate countries have a safe way to travel to the United Kingdom to claim asylum: for example, an Iranian female political protester, a Russian anti-war activist, a young man at risk of forced conscription from Eritrea, and so on?

Finally, I note that the Statement says:

“we are not going to put forward proposals simply to manufacture an unnecessary row”

for short-term political gain. Good luck with getting people to agree to that.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Sharpe of Epsom) (Con)]

My Lords, it goes without saying that Wednesday’s outcome was not what the Government wanted to see, but we have spent the last few months planning for all eventualities and we remain completely committed to stopping the boats.

The core part of our policy—to relocate those who entered illegally and have no right to be here to another country—remains lawful. We have also made progress on other fronts of our plan to tackle the small boats—which I will come back to in a minute—but crossings are down, the backlog is being cut, and it is interesting to note that countries across Europe have seen what we are doing and are interested in following suit.

The Supreme Court recognised that changes may be delivered in future which would address the issues it raised. The Prime Minister has spoken to President Kagame of Rwanda and both countries reaffirmed their unwavering commitment to deliver on our landmark partnership. We will work with Rwanda to address the Supreme Court’s concerns by setting out strong assurances in a new treaty binding in international law. However, we are also going a step further. As has been noted, the Prime Minister has announced that we will take the extraordinary step of introducing emergency legislation to enable Parliament to confirm that, with our new treaty, Rwanda is safe.

As to the questions from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, on the various newspaper-based speculation about what people, including the new Home Secretary, may have said, I will not speculate but I note that he did not recognise the phrase that I think the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, described as colourful, and therefore I wish to take him at his word. What the current Immigration Minister thinks on this, I do not know.

When people know that if they come here illegally, they will not get to stay, they will stop coming altogether and we will stop the boats. Illegal immigration destroys lives and costs British taxpayers billions of pounds a year. We need to end it, so we will do whatever it takes.

However, as the new Home Secretary has pointed out, the Rwanda plan has only ever been one tool in our toolbox, and we have other schemes to drive down these numbers. We are tackling illegal immigration at every stage of the journey of a would-be illegal migrant, and our plan is working. Last year, the Prime Minister signed the largest ever small boats deal with France—I believe that 22,000 crossing attempts have been prevented because of the close co-ordination between British and French officials, and that is in 2023 alone.

Cutting-edge surveillance technology is in play, and we have beefed up security infrastructure, such as more CCTV at key border crossing points along the channel. We have ensured that there are more French officials and officers patrolling French beaches, and, as I said, they are working closely with their UK counterparts. So that is less money that British taxpayers have to spend on hotels, less profit for the criminal gangs and fewer people to process—fewer people also, I should add, putting their lives at risk. That sends a clear message to those who want to cross that we will stop them.

The noble Lord referred to the fact that we now have a returns agreement with Albania, and seemed rather dismissive of it, but the fact is that so far during 2023 we have returned more than 4,600 people in just 10 months. He should be applauding that. We are targeting the movement of goods, such as dinghies and engines, that are used to facilitate the crossings in order to undermine a key component of the smugglers’ business model. Apart from Albania, we have expedited returns arrangements with countries including France, Turkey and Italy. We have increased the number of illegal-working raids by almost 70%. We have cut the asylum legacy backlog by more than 59,000 cases. We have freed up hundreds of hotel beds with the use of alternative sites. We have announced the closure of the first 50 asylum hotels and we have passed the Illegal Migration Act 2023, which is the most ambitious immigration legislation in decades. It makes it clear that the only route to asylum in the UK is via one of the safe and legal routes that are in place.

Noble Lords asked about treaties and why this was not considered at the start. The fact is that a memorandum of understanding is a common mechanism for establishing an arrangement or partnership between countries. The Supreme Court was clear that Rwanda entered into the partnership and signed the MoU in good faith, and both countries remain committed to the partnership. We always knew that the partnership would face challenges, but we have been clear that we will do whatever it takes to deliver it.

On the Supreme Court’s decision and conclusion, the Prime Minister has said that we respect the Supreme Court’s decision. The rule of law is fundamental to our democracy, but it is also of fundamental importance that we stop the boats. I have of course taken note of the comments of Lord Sumption, but at the moment the only fact that is changing is that that MoU is being, shall we say, converted into a treaty. I do not know the details of that piece of legislation, but I have little doubt that we will be discussing it all at considerable length.

Something else that the Supreme Court said which I think is worth pointing out is that

“changes and capacity-building needed to eliminate the risk”—

it was talking, of course, of refoulement—

“may be delivered in future, but they were not shown to be in place when the lawfulness of the policy had to be considered in these proceedings”.

I make the point that the lawfulness of the policy that needed to be tested dated back to June 2022, more than a year ago. So, in answer to the noble Lord, Coaker, about what we have done since, the answer is that we have taken considerable measures since the Court of Appeal’s judgment in terms of getting skills and people into Rwanda to help them with their processes.

The noble Lord asked me about commencing parts of the Illegal Migration Act. We are moving ahead with operationalising other measures in the Illegal Migration Act, which will make it easier to remove people with no right to be here—for example, those who have travelled from fundamentally safe countries. On the cohort to which he referred who arrived under the new terms, I believe that they are still expected to be returned to Rwanda, but, obviously, at some point that will be tested in this House and the other House, so, as yet, there is no point in speculating as to how that might happen.

The ECHR has also come up. It is clear that this was a judgment from our domestic courts, not the ECHR. We always said that our plan will deliver the changes necessary to take away the incentive for people to risk their lives through illegal crossings, while complying with our international obligations. But, as the Prime Minister said, if people continue to put obstacles in the way of this policy, we will remove those barriers. As I said, we have already started the process on the treaty to address the Supreme Court’s concerns. The Prime Minister’s announcement of emergency legislation was clear, but I do not know what the content of that legislation will be.

Lastly, I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Murray of Blidworth for his hard work, professionalism and absolute dedication to stopping the boats. He is a friend, he was an excellent colleague and I am going to miss him.

Metropolitan Police: Operational Independence

Lord German Excerpts

Thursday 9th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord has raised operational independence—in effect, therefore, the policing protocol—and I shall go into that in some detail. The police are operationally independent, but the concept of operational independence is not defined by statute. However, it remains a fundamental principle of British policing. The Policing Protocol Order 2023 sets out how the various actors in the system—the Home Secretary, PCCs, mayors with PCC functions and chief constables—should exercise their roles and responsibilities. It seeks to clarify the operational independence of chief constables, noting that operational decisions on the deployment of police officers are matters for chief constables. The order also makes it clear that:

“The Home Secretary is ultimately accountable to Parliament and charged with ensuring the maintenance of the King’s Peace within all force areas, safeguarding the public and protecting our national borders and security”.


There are no plans to change the policing protocol; that is incredibly clear. I of course agree with the noble Lord that protecting our communities and keeping them safe should be the primary responsibility of the police, and it is incumbent on all of us to give them the support they need. However, we must also acknowledge that operational independence does not provide a blanket exemption from criticism about broader policing issues.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, the words of the Home Secretary have consequences for our policing and our police services and for the safety that people feel in our country. Will the Minister therefore confirm that the Metropolitan Police has followed the law and the evidence and has made a judgment which sits, and rightly so, within the operational independence of the police services? Will the Home Secretary concentrate on running the Home Department rather than running her leadership campaign? If she cannot, she should be replaced.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I have already spoken about the operational independence of the police, which I think we all regard as sacrosanct. The Answer that I repeated included the line:

“it would be disrespectful and demonstrably wrong for protests to take place on Armistice Day and Remembrance Sunday”.

Actually, I do not think that my right honourable friend the Prime Minister used the word “demonstrably”, but what he did say was “disrespectful”. However, he went on to say:

“part of that freedom is the right to peacefully protest. And the test of that freedom is whether our commitment to it can survive the discomfort and frustration of those who seek to use it, even if we disagree with them. We will meet that test and remain true to our principles”.

I happen to think that is exactly right and describes the country I am proud to be a citizen of.

Asylum Seekers: Channel Crossings

Lord German Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

On the three points the noble Lord raises, first, I do not accept that the decline is entirely down to the weather. One will have seen that, even in the comparator week of 2022 to this week of September, small boat arrivals are very significantly down, by a sum in the region of 20%. As to his second point, on returns, there is very good news to tell. So efficient now are our returns of Albanians that the number of Albanians crossing the channel has reduced in excess of 90%. As to his final point, on lawyers, abusing our asylum process by providing accounts to individuals to falsely claim asylum is a problem. Noble Lords will have seen the reporting in relation to that. Any responsible Government would agree that this is a dreadful crime which prioritises those who have no claim over those who would have a good claim. This Government take very seriously their obligations towards stopping that kind of abuse by those few practitioners who behave in this fashion. That is why we have set up the enablers task force, which will bring together all the information, allowing for the prosecutions of these people.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, we are told by the Government that 46% of asylum seekers reach here by small boat. Can the Minister tell us how the other 54% arrive?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

They arrive usually on visas, such as student or work visas, or they overstay on other types of visas.

Illegal Migration Update

Lord German Excerpts

Wednesday 6th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, even as we discuss yesterday’s illegal migrants Bill update, new information emerges which requires the update to be updated, as we read in today’s papers of various claims and counter- claims. First, can the Minister explain to us where the Home Office will find the additional £2 billion a year, because it will no longer be allowed to use the foreign aid budget to pay for migrants in hotels? This is a result of the illegal migrants Act. Is this report from the Independent Commission for Aid Impact accurate? Why has it never been mentioned? Did the Minister know about it, because when he was asked about it earlier by another noble Lord, he did not know anything about it. So can he update us on whether this should have been mentioned, or whether the reports of that additional £2 billion are wrong?

This Saturday we saw the year’s record numbers for a day, with 870 people crossing the channel. So far this year, 21,000 people have crossed the channel in small boats. Can the Minister tell us how many of those were children and what the estimate is of the numbers waiting in France for the opportunity? If the weather improves, does the Minister expect that that number will continue to grow?

As we watch the Government move from crisis to crisis on migration, can the Government update us on plans to house migrants? Is it the case that the Army base in the Prime Minister’s constituency is still to be used, and not dropped, as a possible option, as Sir Edward Leigh MP said yesterday in the other place? When will the “Bibby Stockholm” barge be fully utilised? Has all the legionella in the water supply now been dealt with? What happened with “Bibby Stockholm”, and when did Ministers become aware of the problems? What plans does the Home Office have for more barges or, as I read in the papers over the Summer Recess, for marquees?

The Prime Minister keeps declaring victory in respect of small boats, yet the “small boats week” designed to highlight success was a catastrophic failure that merely highlighted that fact. Is it not the case that the asylum backlog is still at record levels? Migrants continue to cross the channel in huge numbers, the provision of detention facilities outside hotels is a mess, and costs continue to rise. Can the Minister also update us on how many failed asylum seekers under existing laws are awaiting deportation?

We have continually called for proper returns agreements, particularly with France; safe routes; stronger police action nationally and internationally; dealing with the problems at source; and speedier decision-making. This Government remain in denial, while passing ever more laws, some of which undermine our international reputation. Can the Minister also tell me whether he agrees—and, if not, why not—with the deputy chair of the Conservative Party, Lee Anderson MP, who said that his party had failed on immigration and that it had allowed the situation to get, to quote him, “out of control”?

We all believe that the small boat problem needs resolving—it needs dealing with—but greater competence and sensible policy would make a real difference, rather than always seeking tomorrow’s headlines. Is it not about time that the Government got a grip on this problem and, as a start, were actually competent in implementing the policies they put before us, rather than the incompetence we see day after day and week after week?

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I will not repeat the questions which have already been asked, except to emphasise the issue about the ODA money and the question of where on earth they will find funding for this to be changed.

This Statement is, basically, very thin gruel, because it opens the door to more problems than the problems we had already raised. I will question two of those big problems which are additional to the ones which have already been asked. The first is about the number of claim withdrawals. There has been a big increase in withdrawals of asylum claims, particularly from countries which have a very high grant rate for asylum claims. The previous rules on treating asylum claims as withdrawn provide three reasons that an asylum claim will be treated as implicitly withdrawn. The new version of the rules, since we completed the debate before the Recess, now adds two more grounds: failure to maintain contact with the Home Office or to provide up to date contact details, and failure to attend reporting events unless due to circumstances outside the applicant’s control. The Government say that the rule changes are to improve clarity regarding the withdrawal of asylum applications. It is difficult to see how adding yet further grounds will do anything other than increase the number of people who have genuine asylum claims thrown out.

The claims that I want to talk more about are those where, according to the rules, the circumstances in which an asylum claim will be treated as explicitly withdrawn have now widened. Before, the only circumstances in which a claim would be treated as explicitly withdrawn were where an applicant signed a specified form. Now, an applicant may also

“otherwise explicitly declare a desire to withdraw their claim”.

Can the Minister clarify what the “otherwise” circumstances are? These are new circumstances, but nowhere are they explained. How can he be sure that these people do not require protection, and what happens to them once their application has been withdrawn?

I will now follow on from the question I asked the Minister earlier today about the moving on process from Home Office accommodation. He indicated today that the process would be very swift, and he did not demur from the seven days I mentioned. That was down from the 28 days that currently exists; seven days now seems to be the new norm. We understand the urgent need to move people out of hotels and into more appropriate, community-based accommodation, but the way to achieve that is not by evicting them into homelessness—in effect, dumping them on the front door of the local authority, many without the biometric certificate which is the essential ticket to getting universal credit and the gateway to a home.

So my questions are these. What, if any, communication exists between the Home Office and local authorities of the names and details of those who are to be released and when? At what point, following the letter telling the recipient they have leave to remain, do recipients receive their biometric certificate, without which they cannot really proceed anywhere? Is there any standard of service in the Home Office on any time gap between the letter arriving saying that they have leave to remain and the biometric certificate being delivered? The Minister spoke today of the need to protect the service provision, but the actions taken by the Government focus entirely on the numbers issue, not on seeking a sensible solution to those coming through and out of the system. I fear that we are in for many more debates on the chaos left by a system that is driven by numbers and not by people.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Migration and Borders (Lord Murray of Blidworth) (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their questions. It is apparent that I would refute the allegation from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, that, in any sense, the illegal migration update did not reveal a sensible and competent approach.

I will remind the House of the six points contained in the Statement. The first was the agreement we have recently struck with Turkey to take action with the Turkish authorities to disrupt gang activity and to prosecute those who would seek to smuggle people across the channel. The second point was the reiteration of the department’s approach to lawyers who would seek to undermine the efficacy of the asylum system by coaching or by, in effect, enabling fraudulent use of asylum and other routes; we have created the Professional Enablers Taskforce to prevent such an abuse of the system. The third was the massive increases in civil penalties for illegal working and for renting to those who are not entitled to do so.

Fourthly, on the very satisfactory statistics in relation to returns, I need not remind the House that 3,500 Albanians have been returned in recent times—a 90% reduction in the numbers arriving on small boats. Fifthly, my right honourable friend the Immigration Minister reminded the House of Commons that the target of 2,500 asylum decision-makers has now been met. Finally, there has been a 20% reduction in small boat crossings, compared to this time last year. This must be viewed in the context of circumstances where small boat arrivals in Italy have gone up by 100%.

In the context of all those points, it is notable that none of the questions from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, or the noble Lord, Lord German, focused on these points. That is because neither the Liberal Party nor the Labour Party has any answer to the problem posed by small boats.

I turn now to address some of the questions raised by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker. First, on the article in the Times about the report of the Independent Commission for Aid Impact, the Government are looking at that report and considering its outcome. It may be that the outcome is not something with which His Majesty’s Government agree, but in any event I can reassure the noble Lord that funding for asylum support will remain.

On the noble Lord’s question about Catterick garrison. I can confirm that work is ongoing to bring forward accommodation there as part of wider efforts to relieve pressure on the asylum system.

On the noble Lord’s question about the “Bibby Stockholm”, as my right honourable friend made clear in the other place, we are confident that we will be able to return asylum seekers to such accommodation within a fairly short period. Final checks are being conducted.

As to the work with France, I can reassure the noble Lord that our agreements with France have yielded a great deal of success. Our French deal has prevented some 33,000 illegal crossings in 2022—40% more than in 2021. In the first eight months of 2023, around 15,000 of these dangerous, illegal and unnecessary crossing attempts have been prevented. This is on top of the agreements with Albania which have had the effect I have already outlined. We have a similar agreement with Turkey to tackle and disrupt the small boats supply chain. This includes the creation of a Turkish national police centre of excellence, based in Turkey, to tackle organised immigration crime.

This must all be viewed in the context of the operationalisation of the Illegal Migration Act, which will demonstrate the effect of the provisions. If you come to the UK illegally in a small boat, you will be detained and speedily removed.

Asylum Applications Backlog

Lord German Excerpts

Wednesday 6th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

The GOV.UK website contains detailed guidance on circumstances in which a claim will be withdrawn or deemed withdrawn, including a timescale. I do not believe, although I do not have the facts before me, that there is a concrete deadline after which a claim may not be restored, but I will check that and revert to the right reverend Prelate in relation to it.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I draw attention to my interests in the register. One of the consequences of the Government’s rush to beat the backlog is that those who have the right to remain are given as little as seven days, or sometimes even less, to leave their asylum seeker accommodation—seven days to find a home and a job and, most crucially, to put in a successful application for universal credit. Do the Government believe that making people homeless and passing the buck to local authorities and the voluntary sector, while that may solve the Government’s problem, places cash-strapped councils in an impossible position?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

Clearly, as the noble Lord knows, it is a priority for the Government to reduce and eliminate the use of hotels. If people have successfully claimed asylum, the position is that they should no longer reside in Home Office accommodation and that they become the responsibility of the local authority. This is a well-known procedure and has been in place for a long time. I do not believe that there is any reason why that should not be the case.

Police Act 1997 (Criminal Record Certificates: Relevant Matter) (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2023

Lord German Excerpts

Monday 24th July 2023 Grand Committee

In conclusion, the disclosure and barring regime is based on the principle that those making employment decisions for the most risky jobs have access to more criminal record information than is available for less risky ones. This order will ensure that this principle is always delivered. For that reason, I commend this draft order to the Committee.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I start by saying that the rationale for this SI seems sensible. Standard and enhanced DBS certificates should never have a lesser capture of information than that provided by basic checks. However, as is always the case with complex organisational things of this nature, the devil lies in the detail; in other words, does all this match up together appropriately? I want to ask a few questions about the connection between the new disclosure provision for standard and enhanced DBS certificates and the provision for filtering—that is, where things are filtered or not filtered accordingly.

As I understand it, police national computer records relating to protected cautions and convictions will not automatically appear on a certificate. If that is the case, is it the case across all three if they are protected? Are there any unspent offences or cautions that will now become declarable and where filtration will or will not apply, as it could be one way or the other? Will the unspent caution change apply equally to both simple and conditional cautions, which are two different styles of caution?

I want to ask the Minister a question about the two-tier caution system, which is obliquely associated with this SI. This regime was investigated in a pilot, which resulted in 2018 with three police forces undertaking the activity. I wonder whether, now that they have got to the end of that and we have passed through Covid, any further consideration has been given to a different regime here, such as the one described in the 2018 report.

Finally, on the consultation on this SI, there are bodies and agencies such as Unlock, which supports prospective employees who have convictions. Can the Minister say that their awareness of what is happening and why has met with their consent or approval? Has it been met with any concerns from bodies such as them about the way in which this order is before us today? I have only those questions.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, this appears to be a sensible SI. No concerns were raised by the SLSC, nor was the instrument reported by the JCSI. It will align the separate rules which determine what criminal record information is automatically disclosed on a basic DBS check, on the one hand, and what is disclosed on the higher-level standard and enhanced DBS checks, on the other, so that higher-level checks will never disclose less criminal information than is disclosed on a basic DBS check. The Explanatory Memorandum states:

“The Home Office is working with DBS to ensure that this change and the timing for this to come into effect, is widely understood by those it may affect”.


The example that the Minister gave of the 17 year-old working in a supermarket and then also applying to work with children was a very good one, and one which I have actually seen myself in youth courts. I had not realised that there was this anomaly, and I am glad that this SI is rectifying it.

This morning, I sent the Minister a particular conundrum I had, which is actually outside the strict remit of this statutory instrument. I will just run through that scenario, and I hope the Minister will be able to answer the question it raised with me. I was recently sitting as a magistrate to hear domestic violence protection order applications. Of course, these are civil orders. The applicant was a young mother, who was represented by a lawyer who happened also to be a part-time judge. The respondent, the former boyfriend, was unrepresented. The applicant’s lawyer suggested that the best way to deal with this matter was to not find any facts and just put an order in place for a relatively short time, and everyone could continue living their lives separately and the matter could be disposed of in that way quite quickly. I explained to the respondent that, if he were to breach that order, it would be a criminal offence and he needed to be aware of that. The respondent said to me that he was employed as a primary school teacher, and he was in a much more serious situation than seemed to be realised by the court. He would have to tell his headteacher if the DVPO had been put in place. So I put it off for a contested hearing and advised the young man to get a lawyer.

Subsequently, I talked about this case with a legal adviser, and she said that, as a solicitor, she would not have to disclose whether she had any equivalent civil order put in place. She would not have to tell the Solicitors Regulation Authority, so she doubted whether this primary school teacher would have to do so in his case. I did not know the answer to that question. I suspect there may well be more stringent regulations for teachers, particularly primary school teachers, and there is of course the wider question of all these—really quite a lot of—civil orders which magistrates now put in place, for the reasons we have often debated, and whether there are any guidelines for the various professional organisations about what the requirements for disclosure are and whether that is a ramification which may be taken into account within the whole DBS system.

Also this morning, I went on to the website of the charity Unlock, which deals with people who have left prison and who have had community sentences and that sort of thing. It has a number of worked examples about when things are declarable and when they are not, and at what stage of the job application process matters are declarable. It is an extremely complex picture. It is something which people often fall foul of, and the rules are not clear at all. Can the Minister say anything in a wider sense about how these checking procedures are being reviewed and simplified, from the point of view both of employers and of those people who do have criminal records, so that a system which is better understood can be operational, which would be to the benefit of both sides?