Migration and Economic Development Partnership with Rwanda

Lord Stirrup Excerpts

Tuesday 20th December 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

If I may, I will turn first to the point made by the noble Baroness in respect of the Rule 39 indication made by the Strasbourg court in one of the cases of those to be removed on the initial Rwanda flight. I point out to the noble Baroness that, domestically, the Divisional Court and the Court of Appeal refused to grant an interim injunction, and the President of the Supreme Court in the United Kingdom refused permission to appeal against that decision. As was revealed during yesterday’s debate in the other place, it seems that the Russian judge granted the Rule 39 indication without hearing submissions from the UK Government and without providing any formal avenue to appeal against that decision. I do not accept that there was any automaticity about the interim relief afforded by the Strasbourg court.

I turn to the judgments on the eight specific written decisions. As I have already noted, the department has accepted the criticisms of the court, revoked those decisions and will redetermine them. It has revised and improved the decision-making process to ensure that the errors highlighted by the court will not be repeated.

[Lord Stirrup (CB)]

My Lords, further to the question from the noble Lord, Lord Alton, people smuggling is a crime, and not just a cross-channel crime, but we seem currently to be more interested in addressing the victims of the crime than the perpetrators. Surely one of the purposes and main themes of any international conference and expanded international effort should be much more effective, co-ordinated and hard-driven law enforcement across a spread of countries, targeting the traffickers themselves. What activities are the Government undertaking to pursue this and what progress, if any, has been made?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I agree with the noble and gallant Lord. Clearly, international co-operation is vital. That is one of the five limbs that the Prime Minister outlined in his Statement, and the agreement with Albania is part of that. It is a sad fact that a good deal of the criminality in the channel arises through the actions of Albanian gangs who cross borders around Europe. We are working with our European friends and with great vigour to address this criminality. The noble and gallant Lord is entirely right that this is an important part of the limb. The Rwanda scheme is just one part of a wider picture.

Brexit: Immigration Policy

Lord Stirrup Excerpts

Wednesday 30th November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, I think I have just explained why that might be a foolish position.

[Lord Stirrup (CB)]

My Lords, recent reports have criticised the efficacy of the methods used to estimate the emigration from and immigration to the United Kingdom, casting doubt on the accuracy and usefulness of the figures themselves. Can the Minister reassure the House that when we are discussing these issues, we will have data on which we can rely?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, for the moment the ONS figures are the figures that we use. As we develop the figures around exit checks, once they have had a bit of time to bed in, they will add to the mix of estimating the migration figures.

UK Border Agency

Lord Stirrup Excerpts

Monday 7th November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My noble friend is quite right to say that those are very important. It is obviously important that we do not burden every single individual with a full investigation as they go through. That is why we have different procedures for UK citizens and EU nationals in comparison with what we have for other people. There will always be a place for making decisions based on the perceived risk as seen by the individual officer concerned.

[Lord Stirrup]

My Lords, few would argue with the principle of risk assessment and the targeting of resources more appropriately, but can the Minister tell us whether, as a result of the pilot, the total effort or quantum of scrutiny that went into protecting our borders was increased or reduced?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, it is early days for saying much about the pilot other than that it looks as though it achieved rather good results by focusing on the more high-risk people rather than on the lesser ones. However, no doubt we will be able to tell the noble and gallant Lord more in due course once the pilot has been fully assessed.