Immigration Act
Lord Hylton Excerpts(7 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, while those children are in France, they are under the care and jurisdiction of the French. I have said this over and again and I cannot make the point strongly enough. The French have safeguarding systems that are among the best in the world. We are not talking about countries where these children are at risk. The French are doing everything they can to ensure these children do not abscond or jump on to the back of lorries, as the noble Baroness said.
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, there are, I understand, something like 140 reception centres in France to which Calais and Dunkirk children might have been, or are being, moved. Can the Minister assure the House that all of these reception centres will be visited by British officials in order to identify both family reunification cases and those who qualify under Section 67 of our Act?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, I can absolutely confirm to the noble Lord that there are, in fact, more than 160 reception centres. Officials in this country are engaging very closely in identifying exactly those children whom the noble Lord talked about.
Calais Camps: Unaccompanied Minors
Lord Hylton Excerpts(7 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Hylton (CB)
The Minister will correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding is that there is only one British official permanently in Calais for liaison with the French authorities, and only one official of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Surely that is inadequate, and surely the need for competent interpreters must be properly addressed. Does the Minister agree?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
What I can agree is that the number of officials in France is changing in accordance with the numbers needed in various roles. We have a permanent dedicated Dublin unit in the Home Office. In addition, on Monday, we sent nine officials to France to assist. I repeat again: we are guided by the French and by French law; we cannot do any more than that. We would not seek to usurp French law in trying to make the situation better for those children who we seek to help.
Calais Jungle Camp
Lord Hylton Excerpts(7 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Hylton (CB)
I have no knowledge of the organisation mentioned in the Question, but is it not the case that there should be much greater co-operation between British and French NGOs and the two Governments, in particular to identify cases for family reunion and to ensure that there is adequate protection for unaccompanied children?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
The noble Lord is absolutely right, and that is precisely what is happening with the partnership work between the British and French Governments. There is a steering group of the FTDA project, made up of representatives of the Home Office and officials from the French Ministry of the Interior, the Jules Ferry centre, the Calais prefecture and French law enforcement.
Calais Jungle Camp: Child Refugees
Lord Hylton Excerpts(7 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Williams of Trafford
I thank the noble Lord for that question. We are talking to the French Government about all aspects of the migrant situation in northern France. The French Government have made it clear that anyone who does not want to live in the makeshift camps in Calais has the option of engaging with the French authorities, who will provide accommodation and support. Nearly 5,000 migrants have taken up that offer since the autumn. On the speed of delivery, since the beginning of the year, the UK has accepted more than 50 requests from France under the Dublin regulations to take care of asylum-seeking children on family unity grounds. More than 40 children have already been transferred to the UK, and more than 20 who meet the criteria under the Immigration Act 2016 have been accepted for transfer to the UK since Royal Assent in May.
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, will the Government include in their discussions with the French authorities the issue of policing encampments and trying to avoid as much as possible the use of riot police? Secondly, will they try jointly, and harder, to make the Dublin III regulation actually work for real people?
Baroness Williams of Trafford
That is precisely the type of thing that both Governments are collaborating on and, yes, making the Dublin framework work is of course a top priority.
Immigration Bill
Lord Hylton Excerpts(8 years, 1 month ago)
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Lord Hylton
“Family reunion: persons with international protection needs
(1) Rules made by the Secretary of State under section 3 of the Immigration Act 1971 (general provisions for regulation and control), shall, within six months of the passing of this Act, make provision for—
(a) British citizens and persons settled in the UK to be enabled to sponsor their children, grandchildren, parents, grandparents, spouses, civil or unmarried partners, or siblings, who are persons registered with the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees or with the authorities responsible for the protection of refugees in the State in which they are present, to come to the UK on terms no less favourable than those under rules made under that section which apply to family members of persons recognised as refugees, save that it may be provided that those sponsored shall have no recourse to public funds; and(b) applications for refugee family reunion from the children, grandchildren, parents, grandparents, spouses, civil or unmarried partners, or siblings of persons recognised as refugees or who have been granted humanitarian protection in the United Kingdom.(2) An order shall be made by the Lord Chancellor under section 9(2)(a) of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (general cases) in respect of family reunion for the persons described in subsection (1) within six months of the passing of this Act.”
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, I thank the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Southwark and the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, who have both signed my amendment. When we debated family reunion in Committee, the only crumb of comfort that the Minister could offer was that the relevant application form had been simplified and better guidance provided for caseworkers. For that small mercy, I am grateful.
Since the official text of the Dublin III regulation, which I have seen, runs to some 13 or more pages of official prose, it is very difficult for laypeople to understand. It was disappointing that the Government saw fit not to accept the very mild amendment from the Labour Front Bench that simply asked for a review of the rules governing family reunion to be laid before Parliament. For this reason, I feel fully justified in bringing back my earlier amendment. This benefits only those people already registered as refugees or in clear need of international protection. It therefore chimes in with government policy to help the more vulnerable people to come to Britain.
The effect of Amendment 120 would be to assist families that are already split, with some members here and others overseas. By widening the categories it would prevent additional families becoming split; for example, by the current exclusion of children over the age of 18. It seems important to make family reunion possible for children of all ages—including adopted children, who are often currently refused. It should be possible also for parents, grandparents, siblings and civil spouses. In all cases, it could be a condition that there be no recourse to public funds. Your Lordships may have noticed the case of Mrs Myrtle Cothill, aged 92, who recently won the right to remain here despite Home Office opposition. Subsection (2) of the proposed new clause is important for securing legal aid for this category of refugees.
It can hardly be said that the Dublin process has been a resounding success. How are refugees to know about it? Let us take as an example those in the north of France. Most of them cannot speak French, and anyway distrust all officials, whether French or English. They and other split families need a simple, well-publicised procedure that overcomes a lack of knowledge of where close family members are and how to contact them.
Ideally, those in Britain should be able to sponsor their next of kin, while those overseas should be enabled to contact a central clearing house. This would prevent what the Minister calls “hazardous journeys”, both cross-channel and from further afield. It would prevent people falling into the hands of traffickers and supply safe and authorised routes.
It may be argued that the Secretary of State already has discretionary power to give exceptional leave to enter or remain outside the normal rules. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, pointed out earlier, that power is used very sparingly, with only 12 cases known in 2014. Has the Minister a more recent figure than that? Once again, I ask: how can split families know that such a power exists? Further difficulties arise over access to British embassies and consulates, travel to which can be expensive or impossible. Even those who can reach our posts face heavy fees for visas and problems of documentation.
The British Red Cross laid out eight feasible improvements in its briefing dated January of this year. Have these been discussed and, if so, with what result? When I put down a Written Question calling on the Government to meet the Red Cross, the reply was, “We are constantly in touch”. I think that we are entitled to know what has happened.
There is strong support for the amendment throughout the country. It is backed not only by the Red Cross but by Save the Children, Amnesty International, the Refugee Council and the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association. Taken together, these organisations have more members and supporters than the Conservative Party. I said in Committee that increasing family reunion provides a triple benefit: to the families themselves; to social cohesion in our communities here; and to the Government by increasing family incomes and reducing demands on statutory services. The Government’s offer to take in 20,000 Syrians who have been approved by the UNHCR looks good, but will they ask the UN body to give priority to family reunion cases, even where the relationship may be more remote than is set out in the amendment? We want happy families, not just families who will be sad and isolated when they come here.
I realise that this amendment may be too widely drawn and is sure to draw the fire of my noble friend Lord Green of Deddington. If that is the case, I urge the Minister to take the amendment away. Either he can give us positive assurances that the procedures for family reunion will be radically improved without delay or he can undertake to come back with a text for Third Reading which puts the matter beyond doubt. I would particularly like to hear the Government’s thinking on involving the UNHCR in family reunion and on the chances of having a clearing house for applications from overseas. I do not propose to press this amendment, but I understand that Amendment 122A, which I also support, may well go to a Division. I beg to move.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, my Amendment 122A, which my noble friend Lord Hylton has just referred to and to which he and the noble Lords, Lord Rosser and Lord Roberts of Llandudno, are also signatories—to whom I am grateful—seeks to address the inadequacies of the existing rules on family reunification to prevent families being torn apart and loved ones left behind because of age. It is an issue which we debated extensively in Committee and, in returning to it, I will try to be succinct and simply tell the House what makes this amendment different from that just described.
The Red Cross has provided me with case studies which eloquently illustrate why such a change is necessary, and I am happy to make them available to any Member of your Lordships’ House but particularly to the Minister, who I know has not only been doing sponsored walks for Save the Children, as we heard in relation to an earlier set of amendments, but has done a sponsored walk for the Red Cross as well, walking most of the way across China. So I know that he has great admiration for those organisations. I shall not take the time of the House this evening by going through those examples, but I commend them to him. My noble friend has also set out the points about Dublin III and how the rules apply in that context, so I shall not exhaust the time of the House on that either.
Like the amendment tabled by my noble friend and those tabled in the other place—I pay tribute to the right honourable Yvette Cooper MP and those who have championed this cause in the House of Commons—Amendment 122A seeks to reunite those families but through a very different approach from that proposed in the amendments tabled previously. Instead of expanding the categories of family members who would qualify under the existing family reunion route, the amendment proposes a limited resettlement scheme based on schemes already operated, such as the Syrian vulnerable persons resettlement scheme. The scheme would be specifically for the purposes of reunited family members and priority would be made for those family members who are currently unable to access existing routes to family reunification.
Amendment 122A seeks to address a key concern of the Government: the difficulty in determining how many refugees might be entitled to come to the UK if eligibility for family reunion were widened. The amendment provides for a managed and limited programme of resettlement specifically for the purposes of family reunification and it would provide a legal, safe route for families to be reunited while limiting the number eligible through such a route. Indeed, Amendment 122A is intended for family members in clear need who have no route to reunion under the existing rules. It states that those covered should include children—adult or minor, grandchildren, parents, spouses, civil or non-marital partners and siblings, and that the scheme should apply to family members of both refugees in the UK and British citizens whose family member has fled conflict or persecution.
The amendment would apply to refugee family members in Europe, such as those in Idomeni or Calais, as well as in Syria and other regions. Your family remains your family, whether in Beirut or Calais, and as the Red Cross and others will testify, the need is no less great.
Under this provision, the Secretary of State would be able to set a limit on the numbers accepted through this route after consultation, and surely that is the key concern of people like my noble friend Lord Green. He has raised the point during our proceedings. Clearly this goes nowhere near as far as the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Hylton, but it is a genuine attempt to meet the Government’s concerns about open-ended commitments. Any number set would be in addition to the existing commitment to resettle 4,000 a year for five years from the camps around Syria.
It has been noted that the family reunion rules provide for a discretionary category which can sometimes apply to other family members in compelling and compassionate circumstances. Ministers have taken a position that these rules are sufficient to reunite those families which do not fall within the existing narrow categories, but the reality is that this has always been an exceptional and little-used category. The number of family members admitted through this route has in fact fallen during the refugee crisis. In 2011 some 77 were admitted in this way, and as my noble friend and the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, have pointed out, in 2012 that number had fallen to just 12.
Lord Bates
I do not have those updated numbers, but I will be happy to write to the noble Baroness. I mentioned a figure of 21,000, but that referred to the whole group of family reunion cases that came to the UK between 2011 and 2015.
Lord Hylton
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister. He gave me one more small crumb of comfort when he spoke about a government review of cases and the discretion that is available to entry clearance officers. On the review, I ask Members of your Lordships’ House, and of the other place, to send into the Home Office the maximum number of difficult, hard and compassionate cases. I hope that the organisations outside this House that have supported this amendment, and that tabled by my noble friend, will do the same. I hope that entry clearance officers will get clear instructions to consider the best interests of any children they may come across who are applying through them.
I beg leave to withdraw Amendment 120.
Immigration Bill
Lord Hylton Excerpts(8 years, 1 month ago)
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The Earl of Listowel (CB)
My Lords, as the vice-chair of the parliamentary group for children and young people in care and leaving care, and in declaring my interest as a residential landlord, I want briefly to follow up on the remarks made by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister—in the absence of Lord Avebury—regarding those people who may have difficulty returning to their home country but who have perhaps exhausted appeals so far in the immigration arrangements. The Minister is well aware that this Bill changes the circumstances for about 750 young people who have been in foster care or in children’s homes and who have turned the age of 18, and takes them out of the normal care-leaving protections that are offered generally.
The Minister has been very helpful and recognises the vulnerability of this group—we have met to discuss them. I have amendments relating to them which we will deal with on our next day on Report. In that discussion, I would be grateful if the Minister could reassure me that no young people leaving care who may be exempted from the normal care-leaver protections and have difficulty returning home will have difficulty in finding a place to rent because they cannot prove that it is safe for a landlord to rent to them.
Lord Hylton (CB)
Before the Minister replies, can he link the request from my noble friend with Amendment 113 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Roberts of Llandudno?
The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Bates) (Con)
My Lords, I thank noble Lords for this short debate. As this is a fresh part of the Bill, perhaps I may put on record that my wife is a small-scale private sector landlord. I will structure my response first by speaking to the government amendments in this group which stand in my name and then seek to devote the rest of the time, which I think will be needed, to addressing the many points which have been raised.
It is important that we place this debate in some context. We had a significant debate on this issue at Second Reading. Following that, I wrote extensively to noble Lords seeking to provide some reassurances. We revisited the issue in Committee and further letters were sent. We also had what I thought was a very productive meeting on 11 February at the Home Office to which all interested Peers were invited, and we were delighted to have with us at that point the noble Lord, Lord Best, who cannot be with us today but who co-chairs the landlords consultative panel, to guide us through some of the working. A lot of reassurances were offered then but there were some outstanding issues of concern. In that context I will be referring to a letter I sent on 7 March to my noble friend Lord Howard of Rising, a copy of which is in the Library, which provides further reassurances on certain specific points that were made. Lastly, we are bringing forward today government amendments within this group. I have set this out as context to reassure all noble Lords that the Government are listening carefully to the concerns being raised and will continue to do so as the scheme is rolled out.
As I say, the Government have listened to the concerns about the effect that these provisions could have, which is a fear of prosecution on the part of genuine landlords. Government Amendment 62 provides a further defence for landlords who, once they know that they are renting to an illegal migrant or have reasonable cause to believe that that is the case, take steps to end a tenancy within a reasonable period. The amendment also provides that the courts must have regard to any statutory guidance issued by the Secretary of State in determining whether the landlord has proved that the defence applies on the balance of probabilities. This guidance must be laid before Parliament before being issued subject to the negative resolution procedure. The guidance will provide reassurance to landlords about the sorts of steps and periods of time which the Home Office considers reasonable and unreasonable in these circumstances. I understand that the Residential Landlords Association warmly welcomes the amendment, so I hope that it offers some reassurance.
Government Amendment 64 makes a minor change to the drafting, the effect of which will mean that, where an offence has been committed, it will not serve to render the terms of any tenancy agreement invalid or unenforceable on the grounds of illegality.
Government Amendment 72 seeks to remove a provision in Clause 40 that permits the Secretary of State to amend, repeal or revoke any enactment contained in this Bill. This follows a recommendation made by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, to which we wrote in response to its report, which of course the Government fully accept. I shall be moving the government amendments in due course.
I turn now to the points that were raised in the debate by my noble friends Lord Howard of Rising and Lord Cathcart. In my letter dated 7 March, I wrote as follows:
“The ‘reasonable cause to believe’ threshold is a very high one. Its inclusion in addition to the ‘knows’ threshold arguably makes it easier to successfully prosecute the landlord who is fully aware that there are illegal migrants in his or her property and deliberately turns a blind eye, or the landlord who has all the pieces at their disposal to know that he or she is renting to an illegal migrant. For a successful prosecution in such cases, the fact that the landlord is renting to a disqualified person would still have to be the only reasonable conclusion the landlord could draw from the information available to them. For example, a landlord who had undertaken all of the relevant right to rent checks in accordance with his obligations under the scheme”—
including Greek passports in the example given—
“but had no idea that he had been deceived by a good quality fraudulent document, or a landlord whose tenants had subsequently moved occupiers who were disqualified from renting into the property without his knowledge, would never satisfy the mens rea for commission of this offence”.
I hope that that offers some reassurance to my noble friends.
The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, asked about care leavers. If they have lawful status, they will have the right to rent. If not, but there are genuine obstacles to their return, permission to rent is likely to apply.
The noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, raised a number of issues relating to prejudice. I was particularly concerned about prejudice against people with northern accents in this regard.
Lord Hope of Craighead
My Lords, I shall make a very short point about proposed new subsection (2) in Amendment 84, and in particular the word “exceptional”. This is simply a power in the tribunal to extend the period. To introduce the word “exceptional” is, I would have thought, unnecessary and perhaps unduly restrictive. The phrase,
“on the basis that the … circumstances of the case require extended detention”,
I would have thought, sets a sufficiently high standard for the tribunal to work to. Of course, the shorter the period—if the Government are minded to introduce a fixed period—the more important it is that the word “exceptional” should not be there, for the reasons that others have mentioned. So I suggest that that word requires very careful thought. I would rather it was not included in the proposed subsection.
Lord Hylton
My Lords, having spoken on this subject at Second Reading, and having visited two removal or detention centres more than once, I support what the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, was saying about the categories of people who should never be detained. I draw particular attention to those with serious mental health issues or post-traumatic stress. Surely, if they are at risk of injuring either themselves or other people, they should not be in these detention centres. They should be in secure psychiatric wards. So I hope that the Government will take very seriously what the noble Baroness was saying.
Baroness Hamwee
My Lords, my name is on the amendment. I made a lot of notes as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, was speaking, but I do not think that, having been given his conclusion, I need to deal with all of them. I am well aware that there is opposition to the clause from a number of organisations which do not want to see any exceptions at all. That seems to me to have been the burden of their concerns.
The short point is that the system is not working. We do not live in a perfect world. If we were to create other rules that one might say would support the system as we now have it, I do not believe that they could be made to work. The then Chief Inspector of Prisons commented on how many of the detainees were released back into the community, which poses the question: if they are suitable to be released back into the community, why do they need to be detained in the first place?
The Government’s position is a presumption that an “adult at risk” will not be detained. Our presumption is against detention for more than 28 days, so we start at the other end. It is unambitious to say—as the Government do—that they expect to see a reduction in the number of those who are at risk in detention and that they will be there for reduced periods. The Written Ministerial Statement which the Government published in January categorises the issues in a way which worries me, separating risk and vulnerability from healthcare. Care and assessment are very closely allied, and I suggest, for instance, that a victim of sexual violence may not be able to explain to a healthcare worker that this is her experience until after quite a long period of treatment. Therefore, looking at the Government’s approach to this, I am concerned.
We already have Rule 35 of the Detention Centre Rules, whose purpose is,
“to ensure that particularly vulnerable detainees are brought to the attention of those with direct responsibility for authorising, maintaining and reviewing detention”.
It is not working. We have that now and there is a great range of problems—in view of the time I will not go through them but I hope that noble Lords will understand that the all-party group, of which I was a member, heard a good deal of evidence from medical professionals about the problems with Rule 35. Therefore, if that rule does not achieve what is needed, will guidance—the Government’s Amendment 86—achieve it? I fear that it will not.
Amendment 85 aims to flush out the Government’s view of the conditions of vulnerability listed by Stephen Shaw in his report. It says that a vulnerable person should not be detained unless there are exceptional circumstances, as determined by the tribunal. The Government’s answer will, no doubt, be in Amendment 86, which talks about particular vulnerability—someone being particularly vulnerable to harm if they are detained. We start from the premise that vulnerability is vulnerability, full stop.
There is so much more one could say; I wish I could but I will not. I support the amendment.
Immigration Bill
Lord Hylton Excerpts(8 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Hylton
“Overseas domestic workers
(1) For section 53 of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 (overseas domestic workers) substitute—
“53 Overseas domestic workers
(1) Immigration rules must make provision for leave to remain in the United Kingdom to be granted to an overseas domestic worker.
(2) Immigration rules must make provision as to the conditions on which such leave is to be granted, and must in particular provide—
(a) that the leave is to be for the purpose of working as a domestic worker in a private household;(b) for a person who has such leave to be able to change employer, registering such change of leave with the Home Office.(3) Immigration rules may specify a maximum period for which a person may have leave to remain in the United Kingdom by virtue of subsection (1), and if they do so, the specified maximum period must not be less than 2½ years.
(4) Immigration rules must provide for a period during which no enforcement action should be taken against such an overseas domestic worker in respect of his or her—
(a) remaining in the United Kingdom beyond the time limited by his or her leave to enter or remain, or(b) breaching a condition of that leave relating to his or her employment if he or she wishes to change it.(5) The Secretary of State must issue guidance to persons having functions under the Immigration Acts about the exercise of those functions in relation to an overseas domestic worker who may be a victim of slavery or human trafficking.
(6) The guidance must provide for an overseas domestic worker remaining in the UK for more than 42 days to be required to attend a group information session as defined in that guidance, within that period.
(7) In this section—
“enforcement action” has the meaning given by section 24A of the Immigration Act 1971;“immigration rules” has the same meaning as in that Act;“overseas domestic worker” means a person who, under the immigration rules, has (or last had) leave to enter or remain in the United Kingdom as—(a) a domestic worker in a private household, or(b) a private servant in a diplomatic household.””
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, most employers who visit the United Kingdom, bringing their domestic workers with them on a tied visa, behave decently. A minority, however, do not. That is why since the early 1990s cases have been coming to light of unpaid wages, payment of less than the national minimum, withheld passports, no free time, intolerable conditions and physical and mental abuse—even rape. Because of these, I commend to the Minister the brief that I received today from a group of lawyers called the Anti Trafficking and Labour Exploitation Unit. They cite two cases of awards of more than £250 million but warn of the difficulties and delays in taking cases through the national referral mechanism. They also criticise delays in obtaining residence permits from the Home Office.
Before going further, I thank the last Government for appointing Mr James Ewins QC to review the working of the visa. I am grateful to him for his recommendations, which we discussed briefly in Committee on 20 January. I thank the Minister for saying then that there was a problem to be addressed because of the special vulnerability of these workers, living as they do on their employers’ premises. I also thank the Minister for arranging several meetings, including a large one at the Home Office with the reviewer and the anti-slavery commissioner. The Minister has shown throughout that he listens and wants to conciliate. He has carried out his commitment by getting the Home Office to produce a three-column Written Statement dated 7 March.
The Statement candidly admits that the Government have taken the advice of the anti-slavery commissioner rather than implementing in full the recommendations of the review. The weakness of that decision is, first, that it allows the domestic workers to find alternative employment only during the balance of their original six-month stay. In practice, that is likely to be just a few months or weeks. Few employers will want to take someone for such a short time—all the more if they have no references from an employer here. There is therefore a serious risk that the worker leaving their original job will become destitute and then be deported. The Government have failed to produce, in the very words of the Statement,
“an immediate escape route from abuse”.
They have gone back on the strong hopes of Karen Bradley MP, who was the Conservative Minister in 2015 and who wanted the review recommendations to be implemented.
The second weakness is that the Minister in Committee and in the recent Statement relies heavily on the national referral mechanism, which was never designed to deal with the problems of tied domestic workers. They enter this country perfectly legally with their employers, whereas most trafficked and enslaved people come in illegally or as sham visitors or students. Some slaves may have been trafficked within this country, usually from one brothel to another. I therefore ask: how many overseas domestic workers’ cases has the NRM handled? How many employers have been prosecuted or banned from importing domestics as a result? Lastly, have some workers received compensation or extensions of stay as a result of the NRM? One can say that the mechanism is not entirely relevant to the wrong we seek to address; it is not suited to important hardships that may be less than crimes. How are workers even to know that the NRM exists?
I now come to Amendment 58 itself. This proposed new clause amends the Modern Slavery Act to give full effect to the recommendations of the Ewins review of the ODW visa. It gives clear directions about the changes needed to the Immigration Rules, which currently tie the incoming domestic worker to a single named employer, thus making them highly vulnerable to abuses and exploitation and, sometimes, to conditions of complete slavery. This amendment is better than the one that I spoke to in Committee; it does not provide for indefinite leave to remain but specifies not less than two and a half years. This is made up of the original six months provided by the tied visa plus a further two years, which Mr Ewins considered necessary to enable the worker to find alternative domestic work. Proposed new subsection (2)(b) would require changes of employer to be registered with the Home Office, thus keeping track of the worker and making action possible against some employers. Proposed new subsection (6) meets a most important Ewins recommendation, namely that domestic workers who stay here for more than six weeks should have group information sessions. This gives a chance to check that the national minimum wage is paid, that passports are not withheld, and that conditions are generally reasonable.
I have outlined the purpose of our amendment, which, I submit, is better and more tightly drafted than those previously discussed. The scandal of abuse, exploitation and slave-like conditions has gone on for far too long, with impunity, and in the most prosperous parts of London. This scandal has been strongly criticised by voluntary groups, churches, law centres, trade unions and some Members of the other place. Now is the time to improve the Modern Slavery Act so that this country can hold up its head, safe from reproach because it has done everything possible to end an admitted wrong. I beg to move.
Baroness Hamwee
My Lords, I find myself preceding the noble Lord, Lord Rosser. Again, I am delighted to support this amendment and that my noble friends are doing so.
The government Statement, with its proposals as to how to respond to James Ewins’s report, does not seem to redress the power imbalance which he identified in his report. I must not let the opportunity go by—I should have started by saying this—without congratulating the Government on appointing Mr Ewins and congratulating Mr Ewins on his splendid report. The Government’s Statement, to which the noble Lord has referred, was at first attractive. I changed the notes to my colleagues last night after I had read through it again, thought about it more and become, I am afraid, less attracted to it. I am not persuaded that without a right to apply for an extension to the visa—for the reasons that Mr Ewins gave, which I will come back to—the Government’s proposals will work. That proposal seems to be the linchpin. His recommendation is to entitle overseas domestic workers to be granted the right to change employer but also to provide for annual extensions provided that they are to work as domestic workers in a private home for up to two and a half years in total. He says in his report that he considers it,
“both impractical and invidious to discriminate between seriously abused, mildly abused and non-abused workers”,
and that,
“there is a real possibility, perhaps likelihood, that many overseas domestic workers will not avail themselves of that right … for those who are abused in any way at all, the universal right will give them a real and practical way out of that abuse without the current possibility of a subsequent precarious immigration status and threat to livelihood”.
He acknowledges that,
“an unintended consequence may well be that there are those who avail themselves of the universal right without having suffered any abuse at all”.
However, referring to pre-2012 figures, he says that the number of workers is likely to be low, and that,
“by legitimising their status, they will continue working, paying tax, and will be visible to the UK authorities during their extended (but limited) stay”.
With all the work done with overseas domestic workers over the last few years we have learned that that visibility is very important. To come to the balance, this takes us back to some of the arguments made on the last amendment:
“Such an unintended consequence is of limited detriment compared to the benefit of the central intended consequence”.
The second major recommendation is with regard to information sessions. Like the noble Lord, I was glad to have the briefing from the Anti Trafficking and Labour Exploitation Unit, which, on the basis of its experience, has described to us that the complexity of the information that is required needs what Mr Ewins proposes more than what the Government propose. It considers that most domestic workers, faced with items that would be included in those information sessions—which it enumerates over a third of a page of bullet points —would choose to stay in abusive situations rather than take the risk of escaping. As it says, the right to change employer is not clear, concrete and simple. It also comments about the national referral mechanism, which is of course a part of this whole picture. As I say, I congratulate the Government on having appointed Mr Ewins and having made an attempt, which I recognise, to meet the situation with the Written Statement a few days ago, but we are not there yet.
I am very pleased to support the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Hylton. This House has shown on previous Bills and in previous Sessions its concern for this group of workers. I hope that we will do the same again tonight.
Lord Bates
More will come forward than do at the moment. We are implementing the vast majority of what James Ewins recommended. He recommended, supported by Kevin Hyland, that there ought to be information meetings. It will now be a requirement that that will happen within 42 days. We are flexible on that, and if it needs to be sooner, we will look at that very carefully. The reality is that to qualify for this visa people will have to sit down with somebody who is independent—not from the Home Office or the Government—who will ask them if they understand what their rights are. These are unprecedented protections that have been put in place by the Government, alongside the Modern Slavery Act—we are leading the world in this area. I urge the noble Lord to think very carefully about the safety of people and the ability of the police to prosecute those who are carrying out this heinous abuse of the most vulnerable people in our country.
Lord Hylton
My Lords, I am extremely grateful for the support I have had from the Opposition Front Bench. It has been suggested that implementing the review is impractical. But I say to my noble friend Lord Green and to the Minister that that surely overlooks the point that changes of employer would have to be registered. The Government also rely on the national referral mechanism, but there have been serious criticisms of how that mechanism works in practice. This whole discussion shows how closely interrelated domestic and overseas issues have become.
Lord Bates
I am sorry to interrupt, but I want to make a very important point. People need to understand that there have been criticisms about the national referral mechanism and that is why we asked Jeremy Oppenheim to undertake a review. He undertook a comprehensive review, which was discussed during the passage of the Modern Slavery Act and which we are now going through and implementing to ensure that it works in a way that is on the side of victims.
Lord Hylton
I think it is paradoxical for the Government to have a review and then turn down two-thirds or so of its recommendations. As I was saying, home issues and overseas issues are closely related—
Lord Bates
If it were not such an important issue, I would not intervene again, but I am afraid that it is not true that we have turned down two-thirds of those recommendations. We asked Jeremy Oppenheim to undertake that review and we have implemented the vast majority, if not all, of its recommendations. Some elements related to child trafficking advocates. There was a trial; it was not working as we wanted and we said that we would look at it and do something else. But that is not turning down two-thirds.
Lord Hylton
It is clear that the Minister and I are not going to agree tonight, so I wish to test the opinion of the House.
Asylum: Processing of Applications
Lord Hylton Excerpts(8 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Bates
I am trying to remember the immigration phone line to which the noble Baroness refers. I assume that she means the right-to-rent checks, for which there is a helpline charged at local rates. That is simply just to check immigration status. It is almost a binary issue of whether the person is legally entitled to be here or not. We think that it can probably be dealt with at that level.
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, I understand that students may well be able to carry out clerical functions connected with processing, but will the Minister assure the House that they are never in a position to conduct the substantive interviews on which essential decisions depend?
Lord Bates
If they have the qualifications and the mentoring in place, they can undertake those interviews. It is very important to say that their work is overseen by the independent chief inspector. When he looked at this, he found that the decision-makers were professional and dedicated and demonstrated commitment to fairness. Perhaps it might also be of interest to noble Lords to visit the office in Croydon—I can arrange that—to see the type of people who are undertaking these very important decisions.
Calais: Child Refugees
Lord Hylton Excerpts(8 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Bates
That is right. In the Written Statement on 28 January, we announced that we were devoting £10 million to the protection of children across Europe. We have provided additional support, particularly in the camps, to make sure that people get the advice they need. As the noble Lord rightly says, we are talking about children here and I well understand that they need an adult on their side who can work with them, helping and guiding them through the process. We have said that the best route for that is in the first instance that they claim asylum in France and then they can enter that system and get the protection they need. Then when their family are identified in the UK they can be safely transferred to the UK to be reunited with them.
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, I apologise for not having heard what the Minister repeated. He was too quick for me. However, as I was in Calais just over a month ago, perhaps I could ask: does he agree that getting information to the relevant people, whether children or adults, is crucial to those who already have close relatives in Britain? Does he also agree that that kind of information would be best conveyed not by officials but by people who are already in this country, who can explain their situation and how to go about family reunion? I hope the Minister will look sympathetically on my amendment about family reunion when we come to Report on the Immigration Bill.
Lord Bates
On the point about family reunion, the French Government are supporting some NGOs that are operating in that area and doing important work in the camps, ensuring that people get access to the type of advice they need. We will make sure that that work continues. The NGOs want to do the right thing. The Government want to do the right thing, both here in the UK and in France. That is why the relationship is so important and why we are working so closely together to ensure that children and families are reunited as soon as possible.
Immigration Bill
Lord Hylton Excerpts(8 years, 3 months ago)
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Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I am pleased to support my noble friend. The Government are to be applauded for the aid they are giving directly to the region and their recent statement regarding resettling some unaccompanied children, mainly from the region. However, as Heidi Allen MP said on the “Week in Westminster” on Sunday, no amount of such aid can help those in Europe now. In a recent Commons debate on child refugees in Europe, Sir Eric Pickles—not someone I normally quote in support of an argument—said that while the Government are quite right to keep children in the region,
“we are where we are. There are children at risk, and I urge the Government to look carefully at that”.—[Official Report, Commons, 25/1/16; col. 41.]
Perhaps, more accurately, we should say these children are where they are. Refusing to help them is not going to result in them returning to their homelands. Instead, they are stuck in appalling conditions. The International Development Committee took up Save the Children’s recommendation that we should take 3,000 unaccompanied children. It made a very strong recommendation in support of that and called for urgent action from the Government on it. The committee warned that children are prey to exploitation by people traffickers—the very thing that the Government say they want to avoid by supposedly not encouraging children to make the perilous journey to Europe.
Ministers rightly say that any action to assist unaccompanied minors must be in the best interests of the children and that this is their primary concern. But how can it be in the best interests of unaccompanied children to be left to fend for themselves in the camps of Calais and Dunkirk without hope and, as we have already heard, at the mercy of hunger, cold, exploitation and people traffickers? Like my noble friend Lord Dubs, I am not totally clear what the Statement of 28 January promised. In particular, can the Minister confirm that, as Save the Children says, it is intended to try to reunite lone child refugees who are already in Europe with families in the UK? If so, that is welcome, but can he say exactly what is intended and how many children he expects will be helped in this way?
Finally, I take this opportunity to ask the Minister about a report in the Independent on Sunday that the Council of the EU is discussing measures that could have the effect of criminalising individuals and charities that help Syrian refugees, including children, when they arrive on the European mainland—in particular, on Greek islands. The noble Lord, Lord Roberts, talked about what we owe those people, who are doing amazing humanitarian work. Can the Minister give an assurance that the Home Secretary will oppose any such measures? The very suggestion that such humanitarian action could be equated with people smuggling is, frankly, quite abhorrent. I hope that the Minister can assure us that the report is unfounded—I do not necessarily believe everything that I read in the newspapers but this is an opportunity to check it out—and, if it is not unfounded, that the Home Secretary will vigorously oppose any such move.
In the mean time, I hope that the Minister—I agree with what has been said; I know that he is a Minister who listens and cares—will be able to give hope to children who need it. I hope, too, that, even if it is not a final response to my noble friend, he will be able to give a response that at least leaves the door ajar.
Lord Hylton (CB)
My Lords, I support the amendment and I have just one question for the Minister. I wonder whether he has noticed a statement by a small and rather obscure English NGO that has a database with the names of 10,000 would-be English foster carers. I apologise for not having the name of the organisation with me but, even if that figure has become inflated or if, when those volunteers are vetted, not all of them are suitable, surely there must be enough to cope with the 3,000 children mentioned in the amendment. Taking up those offers would greatly ease the burden that presently falls on the local authorities in, for example, Kent and Sussex, and it would spread the load much more evenly around the country.
Finally, I urge the Government not to insist on deporting children who reach the age of 18. They may once have entered this country illegally but they have been here for a considerable number of years. They have been to school in England and have made friends in England, and they should not be deported.