Animal Experiments

Lord Harper Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2013 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Sheridan. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley (Henry Smith) on securing the debate, which has been a good one. I am pleased to see the hon. Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero) in the Chamber, standing in for the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson).

I am pleased that colleagues have given me time to elaborate at length on all the points raised by my hon. Friend and other Members, including, in particular, the hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy). First, however, I will set out a bit of context. I can do that because we have time left, so people will not think this is an excuse for not getting to my hon. Friend’s detailed questions.

The position of both coalition parties—I think it is shared on both sides of the House—is that we should license the use of animals only when it is essential and when there is no alternative. That is, indeed, Government policy, and it was the policy of the previous Government.

As several Members, including my hon. Friend, said, our current legislation—the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986—has recently been revised to transpose European directive 2010/63/EU on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes. There were two key objectives in the new directive. One was to strengthen the protection of animals used in scientific procedures, and the other was to promote the three R’s—strategies that replace, reduce and refine the use of animals in scientific procedures. The hon. Member for Bristol East asked about an academic post in that regard, and I will come to that in a little while.

The Government have fully embraced those aims in transposing the directive. The amended Act provides a high level of protection for animals. As several Members have made clear, work cannot be licensed if it could be carried out without using animals. The procedures must also cause the minimum possible suffering to the smallest number of animals of the lowest sensitivity.

We have taken the opportunity to place in the legislation absolute bans on the use of great apes and stray animals of domestic species. We have retained stricter United Kingdom standards, which provide for: special protection for cats, dogs and horses, in addition to non-human primates; protection for immature forms of birds and reptiles; larger enclosure and cage sizes for dogs and a number of other species; and more humane methods of killing animals. Those measures are necessary and justified on animal welfare grounds and to maintain public confidence that animals used in experiments and testing will continue to be properly protected.

At the same time, animal experiments continue, at the moment, to be necessary if improvements in health care are to be developed with the minimum of delay. It is a fact that our national health service would be unable to function effectively were it not for the availability of medicines and treatments that have been developed and tested through research using animals. Almost every form of conventional medical treatment has relied in part on the study of animals. That includes asthma treatments and medicines for ulcers, schizophrenia and depression, polio vaccine, and kidney dialysis and transplants—those are just a few examples.

While we accept that animal experiments are effective and necessary, they should be used only when the benefits have been carefully weighed against the costs to the animals; when there is no other way of achieving the desired result; when the procedures applied to the animals will cause the least suffering possible; when the minimum number of animals will be used to achieve the outcome; and when high standards of animal welfare are applied. That approach closely reflects what the public want. They understand the necessity and importance of using animal experiments in some areas, but they want the number of such experiments to be the minimum necessary.

[Roger Williams]

While animal welfare considerations must always be paramount, the use of animals in scientific procedures is extraordinarily expensive, so there is pressure in that sense to ensure that other forms of experimentation are used where appropriate.

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. There is sometimes a caricature of those involved in research. If they had alternatives to using animals, they would implement them; they use animals because there are not currently alternatives in all cases. My hon. Friend puts his finger on the issue: the use of animals for experiments, particularly in a country such as the UK, which has high standards, is expensive. Companies use animals only because there are not more effective remedies. Also, they are conscious that they could develop effective alternatives that would also be more cost-effective. However costly—in several senses—animal experiments are, if there are no alternatives, those cannot be used; but many pressures are pushing researchers towards the use of alternatives when they are available, and that is welcome to all of us, including my hon. Friend.

We also accept that regulation must not be overly bureaucratic, so we have made some small but important changes, allowing us to simplify the detail required in personal licences and the way we process applications for them. Another important change in the revised Act is the requirement placed on member states to collect and publish statistical information, on not just the number of animals used, but the severity of the procedures applied to them. Publication of information about the experience of the animals will be an advance in transparency. Combined with the mandatory requirement to publish non-technical summaries of authorised projects, that will help to inform the parliamentary and public debate .

[Kerry McCarthy]

To what extent is security an issue affecting the making public of the kinds of testing that are going on? I do not agree with some of the more extreme, violent protests used to highlight animal testing. Would that prevent some experiments from being made public?

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Lady raises an important issue. This may be a good time to pick up on the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley about section 24 of the 1986 Act, which, as he said, currently prohibits the disclosure by Home Office Ministers and officials, other than in their discharge of functions under the Act, of confidential information about the use of animals in scientific procedures. There are two reasons for the provision. One relates to the hon. Lady’s point, and covers information that might put individuals at risk from those people who sadly are not content with democratic decision making and debate, but choose to use violence—something that we in the House would all abhor. In addition, the provision protects intellectual property. I think that I can say a little more on that than my hon. Friend did.

The Government agree that section 24 is not framed satisfactorily. There is little room for manoeuvre, and it acts somewhat as a blanket ban on disclosing information. It can, for example, make it difficult for Home Office inspectors to share good practice between establishments. The hon. Lady raised that, and so did my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley. The problem is that clear consensus about what we should do did not emerge in the recent public consultation on the transposition of the European directive—whether we should repeal the section or change it in some way. There was a range of views, and we wanted, as my hon. Friend said, to give it further thought. As to a timetable—I think that is what he was after—I can be a bit more specific. We are doing that work now, over the next six months, and aim to report our conclusions to Parliament before the House rises for the summer. I hope that that gives some reassuring firmness to the timetable.

The problem was that many of the people who responded to the consultation did not like the status quo, but there was no really clear sense of what to replace it with. We must be mindful of the two issues I raised: intellectual property, which it is legitimate for researchers to protect; and the extent to which we need to protect those involved in important work. Changes to the regime for animal welfare should be made by Parliament, after legitimate public debate. They should not happen because people take it on themselves to try to drive out of business through intimidation and violence those who conduct lawful work. Those are the things that we shall be thinking through: being as open as possible, but with those two constraints. I hope that that is helpful, and that that approach is widely shared in the House.

It is probably worth picking up the point about statistics, which my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley and several other hon. Members raised. He is correct to say that the latest statistics, for 2011, showed that the number of animals used in experiments and testing was higher than it had been for some years. It was not the highest ever number. The high point was reached in statistics produced under the Cruelty to Animals Act 1876, which preceded the current legislation: in the 1970s about 5 million animals were used. Thus there has been a drop, but my hon. Friend is right to say that the number is going up.

An interesting point arises in that context, which brings me back to a point made by the hon. Member for Ashfield, about the United Kingdom’s reputation as a place to do life sciences and bioscience. I understand that that industry is growing in the UK, more quickly than the increase in the number of animals used; so the usage of animals for each £1 of research, or however one might characterise it, is falling, but more such work is being done in the UK. It seems to me that that is a good thing, because we want that work to be done here; we want those generally well-paid jobs to be in the United Kingdom. Also, because we have high standards of welfare in our animal testing regime, it is better for animals, if research is to take place anywhere in the world, for it to happen in the UK. However, if the size of the business in the UK grows, that may mean that even if the number of animals used for every given type of research falls, the overall number goes up.

Of course, the quickest way to reduce the number of animals would be to drive the work overseas, which would not be good for the United Kingdom, for jobs or for animal welfare. We must be thoughtful about the numbers. We should consider the size of the industry and the work that is being carried out, and whether we are driving down the proportion of animals being used in that work. We need to think about the global position. It is a coalition Government objective to get more of the life sciences business—the bioscience industry—in the United Kingdom. As the hon. Member for Ashfield said, the Opposition support that, and if we attract such business here more quickly than we manage to deliver on the three R’s, the number of animals that are used will rise. However, we may be driving down the rate at which they are used, while the industry grows. That is a bit of a conundrum, and I do not have the answer, but it shows that care should be exercised in using statistics.

[Roger Williams]

The Minister makes a good point. I put a question to the Home Office about the number of animals used for experimentation in Wales, and was surprised that the figure had gone up; but after I visited Cardiff university, I understood that its success in attracting research funds, and its high status in life sciences and bioscience, was the reason for the rise.

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. I was really only cautioning about the need to examine data and be careful about how we apply it. It is also worth commenting on the way statistics are set out, which was put into primary legislation. The most significant number relates to the breeding of genetically modified animals—largely mice. When the relevant table was designed, that was a small number at the end. Most of the animals that are bred—1.4 million mice—are used in other areas of research: they might well be used in medicine studies, or in fundamental biological research, but they are not categorised in that way. We need to be careful about categories and how we define uses. For example, my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley said that only 13% of procedures relate to applied studies for human medicine or dentistry; but, of course, the remaining 87% includes fundamental research, which can involve any of the categories; and applied veterinary studies and the protection of man, animals and the environment also underpin much medical research. Again, therefore, it is worth being cautious about numbers and what we read into them.

Several hon. Members mentioned enforcement. It is no good having good legislation if we do not enforce it properly. The Home Office inspectorate picks up much of that work. The Home Office inspectors are skilled individuals. They are all registered medical or veterinary practitioners and usually have first-hand experience of biomedical research and possess higher scientific or clinical postgraduate qualifications. Their work underpins the 1986 Act. They provide advice to the Secretary of State on licence applications, and technical and operational advice on issues related to regulating animal experiments. They also visit the facilities where work is carried out, to check compliance with licences and certificates and to provide advice on applications and good practice.

The majority of visits are unannounced. The relationship between inspectors, licence holders and animal care staff is critical to our implementation of the regulatory framework. We want to be careful not to jeopardise that. The Government are committed to maintaining a strong, properly resourced inspectorate with a full programme of inspections.

There is no magic number of inspections. Under the revised Act, there is a risk assessment for determining the frequency of inspection. We look at the number and type of procedures that take place at an establishment; the severity of those procedures; the number and species of animals housed and used; any special conditions placed on the licences; the history of compliance of that institution; and any information that might come to light and indicate non-compliance with the terms of the licence. That means that inspectors focus their effort where they can be most effective.

The Government made two specific and important commitments on animal research and testing, as mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley and Opposition Members. One was to work to reduce the use of animals in scientific research, and the other was to end the testing of household products on animals.

The commitment to work to reduce the use of animals is ambitious. There is no quick fix, as people have acknowledged. We want genuine reductions that improve animal welfare. We must be careful not to drive work abroad to countries where, it is generally accepted, standards are lower and there may be less stringent guidelines. The strategy should be science-led and that is why we have asked the National Centre for Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research to take a leading role in its delivery.

That might be a good point to pick up something the hon. Member for Bristol East said. She referred to the Dr Hadwen Trust chair in replacements. We welcome that. Home Office officials meet that trust regularly and we look forward to seeing the impact of its professorial post. That is a welcome step towards the science of replacement methods and will contribute to our commitment. The hon. Lady raised the specific question about the extent to which it could be rolled out elsewhere. We will take that away and think about how we might practically do that.

The Home Office takes this issue very seriously. Lord Taylor of Holbeach this morning visited a research laboratory to observe the work. He also has a close relationship with the Minister for Universities and Science, and they work closely together on examining trends in the industry, attracting life sciences to the UK and the implications for regulating this area. There is a fair bit of joined-up activity between the Home Office and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.

The hon. Lady also raised information sharing. I mentioned in connection with section 24 that that sometimes gets in the way of inspectors sharing best practice. We will think about that as we consider how we change that section. She also mentioned databases and alternatives to animal testing. Several databases already exist. A new role has been created of the named information officer, who, we hope, will be able to assist scientists in searching for alternatives. I have said this before, but I repeat that nobody really wishes to use animals when there are alternatives. We need to make it easier for those involved to seek those alternatives and use them where we can.

Several other issues were raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley and supported by others. The number of procedures conducted for testing household products and their ingredients has fallen since 1997. There were no procedures under that heading in 2011. We have already announced our commitment to end testing household products on animals, to be implemented using licensing powers under the 1986 Act. We will put a condition on the relevant product licences. We have consulted on that to get a working definition of “household product”, as mentioned by the hon. Member for Bristol East. We are close to finalising a definition that we think will be workable—there is no point having one that is not. We will make an announcement on that in due course.

Several responses to the consultation favoured inclusion of ingredients in the ban, a point made by the hon. Lady. That is a bit more complicated than it might at first appear. Some substances used as ingredients in household products can have other uses. There are also ingredients, such as chemicals and biocides, that under other legislation have mandatory safety testing requirements that involve using animals. Therefore, it is quite a difficult area. We are in the process of thinking the matter through to come up with something that is workable and sensible, but does not have a chain of unforeseen consequences. It is complicated, and an obvious answer did not present itself during the consultation. I assure the hon. Lady that we are thinking and working on that, but rushing to do it and getting it wrong would not be helpful. I hope that she can take it on trust for the moment that the thought processes are under way. I have listened carefully to what she and my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley said and will feed that into our thinking.

My hon. Friend also talked about the mid-term review. He was slightly concerned by the use of the past tense. That was simply because it was a mid-term review, looking back over the first period of government. However, we are very much in the present tense in terms of continuing work. The national centre I talked about is actively pursuing a wide range of initiatives, including increased funding for three R’s work in universities. It supports innovation in the three R’s through its CRACK IT programme. It looks at new disciplines such as engineering and mathematics to reduce animal use. I think the hon. Member for Bristol East touched on that when she talked about the professorial post.

Other initiatives include working with regulators to reduce animal use, investment in education and training and support for stem cell and tissue engineering technologies. There is quite a lot of work going on led by experts in their field. That is what we want: a science-led approach to driving some of the change. That was touched on by my hon. Friend, and by the hon. Lady when she spoke about those involved in the business having alternative methods of delivering testing and safety assessments.

My hon. Friend also talked about the animals in science committee—the advisory committee that is in the process of being set up. There will be a working protocol agreed with the committee chair that sets up the size and qualifications of the committee. That working protocol will be published and will set out the issues that will be automatically submitted to the committee for advice. It will also cover important issues such as the promotion of the three R’s.

My hon. Friend talked about the use of non-human primates and their importation. Many people have a particular concern about the use of non-human primates in scientific research. It is a small part of animal research compared with overall usage, but it is an important part. In the UK, we use small numbers of non-human primates for developing and testing vaccines against some of the world’s largest killers, such as malaria, HIV/AIDS and TB, and for the potential future treatment of degenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. The majority—about three quarters—of the primates used in 2011 were used for the safety testing of medicines.

Most such primates are sourced outside the UK, where animals of the right quality are readily available—I am afraid that that comes down to our not-brilliant climate. For those particular animals, rearing them in the UK is not viable, as they would have to be reared inside. It is much easier to rear them outside in overseas locations, which makes the process more productive. Banning their importation would harm essential work. However, what is important, as my hon. Friend said, is for those who import the animals to ensure that the suppliers they deal with have proper controls and processes in place so that, in the breeding part of the operation, the animals are well treated.

My hon. Friend also talked about the personal licence system, which identifies the individual, the place where the work will be carried out, the species authorised for use and the types of techniques. Granting a licence depends, as it did previously, on a demonstration that the person has done the appropriate training, both for the species they are using and the techniques they are carrying out. The application requires a declaration by the local named training and competence officer to confirm that that level of training has been carried out by the applicant, and that the list of species that may be authorised is similar to the previous descriptions provided by applicants. It is also similar to a list used for the statistical returns. It is personal to the individual, which is important—when we debated the transposition of the directive, the personal link was felt to be welcome and valuable—and so it is not transferable to someone else. Furthermore, not only training, but the practical work experience under supervision, is important. That is something that the Home Office inspectors can monitor on their visits—not only someone’s initial training, but the practical experience under supervision to ensure compliance with the terms of the personal licence.

The hon. Member for Bristol East asked a couple of questions to do with cosmetics. She rightly noted that the UK banned the testing of finished cosmetics and ingredients in 1997 and 1998, because the Government considered the justification for using animals to be inadequate given the benefits of the products and the alternative tests available. She also referred to the European cosmetics directive; the EU banned animal testing for finished cosmetics in 2004 and for ingredients in 2009. To meet the requirements of the directive, a partial marketing ban was also implemented in 2009. It banned the supply of cosmetics for which animal tests had been carried out anywhere in the world, but did not extend to the test for the three most complex human effects of testing. A full marketing ban, which includes such tests and to which the hon. Lady referred, is expected to come into effect on 11 March, regardless of the fact that validated replacement tests are not available.

The ban is not a complete sales ban on all animal-tested cosmetics. Some parts of the world, as discussed by my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay (Mr Sanders), insist on animal testing as a regulatory requirement, so products subject to such a regime are not banned from the EU. Nevertheless, animal testing to meet the requirements of EU cosmetics legislation will be prohibited once the marketing ban enters into force. That is a bit complicated, and I have probably made things less clear, rather than clearer. The impetus, however, will come from consumer pressure, which the hon. Lady talked about, and transparency. Moreover, as other countries develop, as their consumers become more sophisticated—as happened in this country—and as their legislative processes improve, they will come under pressure on such issues. It is helpful, working through the Foreign Office and elsewhere, for us to explain what we have done in the UK and the EU to set our standards, to show that we can deliver on testing when necessary, or simply to lead by example when it is not necessary. We can all participate in that.

The hon. Member for Bristol East mentioned enforcement of the marketing ban, which does indeed fall to local authority trading standards, on which the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills leads. I will talk to my colleagues in BIS to see where that issue has got to and how it is being rolled out to trading standards departments. It may be rather dreadful to hand the action over to my colleagues, but I will ask them to look into the subject and to write to the hon. Lady. I will put a copy of the reply in the Library. I suspect that she will then use that information to go and duff up her local trading standards organisation, to ensure that it is fully engaged in that important work.

I hope that I have set out the Government’s approach. My hon. Friend the Member for Crawley made a wide-ranging speech. I think I have addressed all his questions, as well as those asked by the hon. Member for Ashfield, who spoke for the Opposition. I am grateful for the shared work with the Opposition on the subject; when the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North and I debated the transposition of the directive, she was machine-gunning her questions at me, so it did not feel entirely as if we were on the same side, but I machine-gunned all the answers back. A lot of the work in this area, however, which we supported, was done when the Labour party was in government, and now we are taking things forward with support from the Opposition.

The United Kingdom has a good reputation for delivering expertise in science and research, which is recognised throughout the world, and for doing so while delivering high standards of animal welfare and minimising the use of animals in research. That sends out all the right messages. Working together, we can continue to move in the right direction, minimising the use of animals, using them only when absolutely necessary and, if we do use them, having the highest possible standards. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley for the debate, which has been an excellent opportunity.

Immigration Rules

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 30th January 2013 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is today laying before the House a statement of changes in the immigration rules that will bring about urgent changes to tackle abuse in the entrepreneur migration route while protecting genuine entrepreneurs. The changes will take effect on 31 January.

In April 2011 we made some changes to the investor and entrepreneur routes to encourage greater uptake. These changes have successfully brought about a steady increase in applications from overseas.

However, it is clear that, following our tightening of other migration routes, the entrepreneur route is now being targeted by applicants seeking to abuse the immigration rules. There is strong evidence that funds to prove eligibility are being recycled among different applicants and that artificial businesses are being created. We need to tighten the current rules to allow for a meaningful assessment of the credibility of an applicant for this route.

I am therefore acting promptly to tackle this abuse, without damaging the legitimate applicants who are important to our economic growth. I am introducing a “genuine entrepreneur” test which will give UK Border Agency caseworkers the ability to test the credibility of suspicious applicants. I am also making a further change to require the necessary minimum funds to be held, or invested in the business, on an ongoing basis rather than solely at the time of the application. This will apply to those already in the UK and those who apply to come here under the entrepreneur route.

I emphasise that these are technical but important changes to improve the effectiveness of the current rules. Those seeking to abuse the immigration system will always seek new methods to do so. We are vigilant and will take swift action where we see evidence of abuse. At the same time, we will protect genuine entrepreneurs and continue to encourage them to invest in the UK where they will be made welcome.

Solidarity and Management of Migration Flows Funds

Lord Harper Excerpts

Friday 25th January 2013 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

The UK has opted in to the European Commission’s proposal to increase the co-financing rate for the Solidarity and Management of Migration Flows Funds, commonly known as the SOLID funds.

The proposal will increase the co-financing rates of the SOLID funds for EU member states benefiting from certain financial support mechanisms, thus reducing the amount of funding that those member states need to find before undertaking programmes, which in turn will improve their utilisation of the funds. The member states that will benefit from a higher co-financing rate are Hungary, Romania, Latvia, Portugal, Greece and Ireland. Other member states that receive assistance from the relevant financial support mechanisms up to the end of the 2013 annual programme period would also benefit. Member states enjoying the reduced co- financing rate would be better positioned to improve capacity in the area of asylum, which should help mitigate secondary pressures on the UK.

Practical co-operation and solidarity in support of well-managed migration is a powerful tool for securing British objectives in the wider EU sphere. This proposal is cost-neutral to the UK and will not result in additional UK budget commitments. It provides an opportunity to achieve British objectives while not undermining the primary responsibility of affected member states to address weaknesses in their asylum and migration systems.

The Government will continue to consider the application of the UK’s right to opt in to forthcoming EU legislation in the area of justice and home affairs on a case-by-case basis, with a view to maximising our country’s security, protecting Britain’s civil liberties, and enhancing our ability to control immigration.

Informal Justice and Home Affairs Council

Lord Harper Excerpts

Thursday 24th January 2013 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

The Informal Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) Council was held on 17 and 18 January in Dublin. The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice and I attended on behalf of the United Kingdom. The following items were discussed.

The first plenary session of the interior day focused on migration for growth. The Commission supported the presidency’s paper noting the legal instruments currently being negotiated and the forthcoming legal migration directive on students and researchers. The UK outlined our successful efforts to reduce net migration while attracting the brightest and best, including in the student sector. A number of member states highlighted the need to ensure effective matching of migrants to jobs, tackling abuse and support for national populations to fill skill shortages.

Next, Greece updated the Council on progress on its action plan on asylum and migration. Greece reiterated the need for European solidarity in this area. The Commission stood ready to assist Greece, but asked that all member states consider how they could contribute. The UK noted the improved border management at the land border with Turkey but also the significance of the task. The UK committed to look at what more could be done and invited others to do the same. The presidency concluded that implementation of the action plan should now be of the highest priority and that the Council would return to the issue.

During lunch Ministers received an update from key agencies on the situation in Syria. Delegations expressed concern and continued to emphasise the importance of protection being provided in the region. On 21 December the UK announced £15 million in new humanitarian funding for the crisis, bringing our total contribution to £68.5 million.

In the plenary session on internal security and growth, Europol noted that citizens were coming into closer proximity with organised crime as the black economy grew. The latter had an impact on competitiveness. Europol would assess this in the next serious and organised crime threat assessment. Europol was, in particular, seeking to bolster its financial intelligence capacity and encouraged member states to do the same. The Commission noted the importance of tackling money laundering and seizing criminal profits and drew attention to: the directive on the confiscation of assets, the 4th money laundering directive, the directive on the protection of financial interests (PIF), and the upcoming anti-corruption package. Member states generally supported the presidency’s analysis of the links between internal security and economic growth.

Next the presidency explained its intention to hold an annual national missing persons day on 4 December. This would be complementary to the international missing children’s day held in May. The presidency said they would write to colleagues to seek views as to whether this should become an EU missing persons day.

The presidency scheduled an additional item to discuss the emerging situation in Algeria following the taking of hostages at the In Amenas gas plant the previous day. The presidency concluded that the security situation in the Sahel/Mali would be discussed at the March JHA Council with a focus on security issues arising for member states.

Next there was an update from Bulgaria on the Bourgas attack in July which killed five Israeli tourists and a Bulgarian bus driver. The UK highlighted that if the Bulgarian evidence suggested the military wing of Hizballah was behind the attack, the EU must consider the designation of Hizballah’s military wing under the EU’s common position 931 terrorist asset-freezing regime.

Justice day began with the Commission presenting their package on insolvency which forms part of their “Justice for Growth” programme. They stated that the broadened scope would assist companies across Europe having greater access to a “second chance”. The European Parliamen t supported the proposal and the idea of partial harmonisation of insolvency law. The UK supported the proposals as being the type of measure that would support the functioning of the single market measure and the objective of allowing business a second chance when they fall into difficulty.

The presidency invited the head of the Irish Criminal Assets Bureau to present on Irelands proceeds of crime act and the Criminal Assets Bureau information exchange function. The presentation majored on the importance of civil procedure in asset confiscation.

The Council then discussed three issues relating to data protection: the household exemption, the right to be forgotten, and sanctions. The Commission explained the working of the regulation on all three points and argued that the right to be forgotten was not incompatible with the freedom of expression and that processing for journalistic or historic purposes were specifically allowed. The UK supported a broader household exemption than in the Commission proposal and advocated the use of a risk-based approach. The UK also supported appropriate deletion rights for data subjects, but voiced concern about unachievable expectations in the “right to be forgotten” and felt that the starting point should be the current directive. The UK thought national supervisory authorities should be given greater discretion in deciding sanctions. The UK called for the text to return to Ministers before any mandate with the European Parliament was agreed in Council. Many member states expressed support for the direction of work proposed by the Irish presidency, including a broader household exemption, a more practicable implementation of the right to be forgotten and a simpler and flexible sanctions regime.

Over lunch the presidency highlighted the need to address racism and xenophobia at political level, inviting the fundamental rights agency to present on their latest reports.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Harper Excerpts

Monday 7th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)]

2. Whether her Department has taken steps to ensure the continuity of supply of seasonal agricultural workers following the lifting of restrictions on immigration from Bulgaria and Romania.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

The transitional restrictions on Bulgarians and Romanians come to an end at the end of this year. With reference to the agricultural industry, we will look to see whether any further schemes are necessary once the Migration Advisory Committee has reported to us in March this year.

[Harriett Baldwin]

As the Minister knows, the finest fruit and vegetables are grown in West Worcestershire. Can he reassure my farmers that they will be able to face the 2014 growing and picking season with the confidence that, working together with the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, there will be an adequate supply of people to pick the crops?

[Mr Harper]

I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. In December I met one of the West Midlands Members of the European Parliament, Anthea McIntyre, together with farmers who farm both in Herefordshire and in my constituency in the soft fruit sector. That may be the one respect in which I slightly disagree with my hon. Friend. I have listened to their concerns and will listen to what the Migration Advisory Committee says in its report before we take a decision early this year.

[Mr Nicholas Brown (Newcastle upon Tyne East) (Lab)]

Precisely because of the sort of problems that the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Harriett Baldwin) raises, previous Conservative and Labour Governments took a hard look at the Agricultural Wages Board and decided to retain it. The present Government intend to abolish it. Surely that will just exacerbate the situation and leave agricultural workers without even the limited protection that the wages board provides.

[Mr Harper]

I do not think that that is true at all. Those working in the agricultural sector are governed by the national minimum wage legislation, and as well as desk-based research the Migration Advisory Committee will be going out and listening to the sector concerned. I am confident that when it produces its evidence-based report in March, we will be fully informed and able to take a sensible decision for the sector.

[Peter Luff (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)]

As my hon. Friend has made clear, the scheme is incredibly important for farmers and growers throughout the country, certainly in Worcestershire. Can he confirm that throughout its long life the seasonal agricultural workers scheme has lived up to its name and the seasonal workers have returned to their country of origin at the completion of their work?

[Mr Harper]

That is indeed the case. The MAC report will look both at providing labour to the sector and at how the scheme functions in meeting the Government’s commitments on controlling immigration. Both aspects will be important when the Government take the decision later this year.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

On 17 October 2011, the former Immigration Minister, now the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice, the right hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green), said:

“I believe in free movement. The Government believe in free movement.”—[Official Report, European Committee B, 17 October 2911; c. 18.]

On 21 November 2011 he said:

“Free movement has been, and is, one of the great achievements of the EU.”—[Official Report, European Committee B, 21 November 2011; c. 14.]

Does the Minister agree?

[Mr Harper]

I do not demur from anything that my right hon. Friend has said, but that does not mean that we will not look at how that operates in our balance of competence reviews. Abuses do take place under free movement throughout Europe. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has discussed the issues at Justice and Home Affairs Councils and has found a lot of support from colleagues there. A road map has been set out by Justice Ministers throughout Europe to deal with the abuses that took place and were not dealt with by the Labour party when it was in power.

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

The Minister paid an extremely successful visit to my county of Herefordshire before Christmas, for which I thank him. Will he reassure me that SAWS will be preserved through the MAC process and that it is not formally part of the immigration figures at all but operates in an entirely separate category?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend correctly points out that it was his constituency that I visited in December. I am not going to prejudge the outcome of the work being done by MAC. The whole point is that it is doing some evidence-based work to inform the Government’s decision. It will be looking at whether a successor scheme needs to come into force to ensure that the sector has access to adequate labour when Romanians and Bulgarians have alternative choices after the end of this year.

[Mr Speaker]

For the benefit of any uninitiated members of the public, those referring to SAWS are talking about the seasonal agricultural workers scheme, and the MAC of course is the Migration Advisory Committee. I am sure that 57 million people know that perfectly well, but it is as well to remind them.

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[Gemma Doyle (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab/Co-op)]

5. If she will take steps to ensure that mail to the UK Border Agency is not left unopened owing to a backlog of cases.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

Timely dealing with correspondence is obviously something that the UKBA takes very seriously. It has not always been perfect in the past and it is very well aware of the need to improve in future. It has therefore implemented a new national operating model, particularly to deal with MPs, to improve things.

[Gemma Doyle]

Will the Minister assure the House that full security checks have been or will be carried out in all these cases and confirm how many live cases have been discovered?

[Mr Harper]

I am not entirely certain which cases the hon. Lady is talking about. If she is talking about the issues that were raised in the chief inspector’s report when he found some unopened post, she will know that he has confirmed in his report that that has now all been cleared and those cases are being dealt with.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

6. What assessment she has made of the effect on family migration of the new immigration rules which came into force in July 2012.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

The new family immigration rules are expected to reduce burdens on the taxpayer, promote integration and tackle abuse. That was clearly set out in the impact assessment that we published in June 2012. We will of course keep the impact of the rules under review in terms of how we are achieving those objectives.

[Kate Green]

Children’s well-being may be at risk if the family migration rules perpetuate family separation by preventing a parent from joining his or her family here in the UK. What is the Minister doing to monitor the impact of the family migration rules on children’s well-being?

[Mr Harper]

The purpose of those rules is very straightforward—it is to make sure that people who wish to bring somebody who is not a British citizen into the country are able to support them out of their own resources rather than expecting them and their family to be supported by the taxpayer. That seems perfectly reasonable to me, and it was very well supported in the consultation, but we will keep its impact under review, as I set out in my earlier answer.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

I strongly welcome this change. Although this measure has been denounced by some as hard-hearted, may I suggest to my hon. Friend that, in practice, in many cases it will still let people come in who will require a very significant subsidy for their housing, so it is only a first step in the right direction?

[Mr Harper]

The income limit that we set for spouses wishing to bring their family members into this country is based on evidence that the Migration Advisory Committee put forward, having looked at the level at which people were largely not able to claim income-related benefits. As I said, the premise is very simple: if someone wants to bring their family to the UK, they can, but they are expected to support them rather than expecting the taxpayer to do so. That seems perfectly reasonable.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

8. What steps the Government are taking to tackle antisocial behaviour.

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[Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab)]

11. How many student visa applications were received from India in 2012.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

There were 21,295 sponsored tier 4 student visa applications from Indian nationals in the year ending September 2012. We have cut the abuse of student visas, but continue to attract the brightest and best students from around the world.

[Mr Sharma]

I thank the Minister for that answer. Does he agree with the Mayor of London that the Government are doing

“things that are going to cause unnecessary alarm and prejudice against the UK”

by targeting legitimate foreign students from India?

[Mr Harper]

No, that is not what we are doing. We want to attract the best and brightest students to the United Kingdom. However, we want to combine that with dealing with the education providers that in the past were not providing education but were in effect selling immigration permits. We have dealt with the abuse and will continue to do so, but we want students from around the world to come here to use our excellent universities. The latest figures show that those numbers are up.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

The Minister will be well aware that London Metropolitan university has been affected by a decision that the UK Border Agency made last year. I understand that discussions are going on between the UKBA and the university with a view to seeing whether a system can be brought into place so that tier 4 status can be returned. May I urge the Minister to interest himself in that, to ensure that we get good overseas students into this country and benefiting from higher education here?

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Gentleman raises the case of London Metropolitan university, and he will know that it was not carrying out its responsibilities as a tier 4 highly trusted sponsor, which was why its licence was revoked. He will know that the Government put in place a taskforce to ensure that all the legitimate students were able either to transfer to another education provider and stay in the country or to finish their course at London Metropolitan university. They were all written to last Friday, so they should all shortly be aware of their status in the coming months.

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[Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)]

19. Under which category of immigration entry most people enter the UK from non-EU countries; and if she will make a statement.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

The latest statistics from the Office for National Statistics show that most non-EU immigrants come to study. In reforming every route of entry for non-EEA migrants, we have cut the abuse while continuing to attract the brightest and best. The latest figures show that our policies are working.

[Mr Robertson]

On a recent trade mission, which I happened to lead, to Nigeria, it became clear that people who are educated in this country help British businesses. When we try to go to those countries, the English language is already established and there are links with this country. Although we should try to cut down on immigration and although students who finish their studies should go back to their countries of origin, is it not important to recognise that educating foreign students in this country is greatly beneficial to British business?

[Mr Harper]

I agree with my hon. Friend. Of course it is important that students should actually be coming here to be educated. We need to deal with the abuse whereby they are really coming here to work instead of study, which happened all too frequently under the previous Government, but he is right: there is a real benefit to Britain in having those students come here. That is why I am pleased that the latest statistics saw an increase in the number of international students coming to our excellent UK universities.

[Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)]

Of course we all want to see an end to bogus colleges and it is right that the Government have taken action on that, but the reality is that legitimate colleges and universities have seen their numbers reduced. If the Minister says I am wrong, will he publish the figures from each university for countries that have sent students in the past but are now not sending them?

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Gentleman simply is not right to say that our university sector has not seen an increase. The latest figures show an increase in international students coming into the sector, and I am pleased that that is the case. The Government will continue to work with our excellent universities to encourage international students to attend them at every opportunity.

[Mr Mark Spencer (Sherwood) (Con)]

20. What assessment her Department has made of the most recent statistics on net migration.

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[Sarah Teather (Brent Central) (LD)]

22. When she expects to announce the asylum support rates for 2013-14.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

There are no current plans to change the asylum support rates, but we do of course keep the matter under constant review.

[Sarah Teather]

The Minister’s Department has not made a decision on the asylum support rates in this financial year. He has therefore frozen the rates by default, without coming to the House to announce that decision. I understand from an announcement made in another place that a review is ongoing, but does he accept that kicking the matter into the long grass for a further year simply will not do?

[Mr Harper]

I said in my answer that we keep the matter under review. There is no statutory provision to make an annual uprating, but we keep this under review and look at the figures. I have listened carefully to what the hon. Lady has said and I will consider the matter.

[Mr Nicholas Brown (Newcastle upon Tyne East) (Lab)]

T1. If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.

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[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

T2. A business-friendly visa service can be key to unlocking exports and investment in our economy. In Melksham, a multi-million pound investment in Stellram followed the securing of a visa for someone from Mexico with specialist skills, yet in Chippenham, Merganser is threatened by a lack of UK Border Agency accreditation for teachers from Turkey applying for its highly regarded training courses. What is the Minister doing to convert the UKBA from an obstacle into a partner for businesses building a stronger economy?

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s question. The first part of it related to a very successful enterprise in his constituency, which had had good support from the UK Border Agency, while the second part showed less good support. On that second point, I would be happy if he would like to write to, or meet, me to discuss that particular issue. I have made it clear to the UK Border Agency generally that it needs to see itself as a partner for businesses that are trying to do the right thing and to attract good people to come to Britain and skilled workers to work here. If any Member knows of examples when that is not the case, I would be happy to hear from them.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I join the Home Secretary in paying tribute to those police officers who have lost their lives. The hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh) was right to pay tribute to the officer who lost his life in her constituency while rushing to help others in an emergency call. We also extend our sympathies to the family of the 13-year-old; it is right for that tragic case to be investigated.

Ibrahim Magag absconded from his TPIM—terrorism prevention and investigation measure—on Boxing day. This is someone who the Government believe has attended terror training camps in Somalia, has raised funds for al-Qaeda and is sufficiently dangerous to warrant a TPIM. He has disappeared for the last 12 days. In the final four years of control orders, when relocations were extensively used, the Home Secretary will know that no one absconded. The independent reviewer, David Anderson, has asked of Mr Magag:

“Could he have absconded so easily from the West Country where he was made to live when under a control order?”.

What is the Home Secretary’s answer?

Human Trafficking

Lord Harper Excerpts

Thursday 20th December 2012 Westminster Hall

[Fiona Mactaggart]

Indeed. Unfortunately, that is one of the risks of a strict liability offence; it tends to have a lower penalty. It would have been good had there been something tougher, but what I am hearing from the police is, “Oh whoops, we can’t prosecute because we have to prove both that she is under duress and also that he has offered to pay her.” The police keep telling me that they cannot do two things at once, which is a bit sad really. What they need is someone to drive them to do it. The only person who will do that is the Minister who will reply to this debate. I am expecting him to do that, and I hope that the figures that we see over the next couple of years will be an improvement on the 43 prosecutions that we know of already.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

On that specific point about the priority that police forces should attach to prosecuting the offence, it is not I who should drive that. The right person to do that and for MPs to raise this with is the police and crime commissioner. The police and crime commissioners will be setting out the policing plan for their particular areas and they will need to tell the chief constable that this matter is important and is something that they should be making a priority. Then they should make it clear that the resources are available.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

The Minister is right from a month ago, but up until a month ago—for the whole of 2011 and for most of 2012—it was he and his predecessor who were responsible. In 2011 and 2012, I expect to see a pathetic number of prosecutions, because the number in 2010 was pathetic. I have already spoken about the matter to the police and crime commissioner in Thames Valley whose main concern seems to be with wildlife crime—I will not go down that route right now. That is what happens when a person does not prepare a speech and has just got out of their flu bed.

This is a very serious issue for the Government, and it is not sufficient to say that the police and crime commissioners must let the flowers bloom. Human trafficking is an international crime that needs national effort to solve. There will be parts of the country that say, “It does not happen here,” and the Minister knows that they are wrong. I remember the hon. Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) telling the all-party parliamentary group that that had been his experience after the discovery of the horrible events in his constituency. He described how shocked people were to discover that in a very pleasant part of the country, such exploitation could occur. This matter needs national Government leadership. It is spin to claim, as the report does, that action, which I am proud to have been an author of, is going to do much more than it has done so far.

The second claim of spin is in paragraph 7.29, which states:

“Whilst traffickers’ attempts to move victims”—

of domestic servitude—

“to the UK illegally are likely to continue, the changes to the route of entry for overseas domestic workers coming to the UK to work in the private household of their employer means that”—

wait for it—

“fewer will be eligible to come to the UK and as a result the risk of abusive relationships developing in this visa category should reduce further.”

Well, that is nonsense. Every single study of this matter, of which, I think, there have been three by the Home Affairs Committee, has concluded unanimously—many of the parties involved had believed that kind of nonsense to start with—that the overseas domestic workers’ visa was one of the best protections against human trafficking. In the report “Service not Servitude”, which I wrote last year to mark international slavery day, there is compelling evidence to show that the introduction of the overseas domestic workers’ visa reduced exploitation. It did not end it—I am not claiming that—but it reduced the levels of abuse and exploitation experienced by migrant domestic workers. If we compare the level of reported abuse in 1996 with that in 2010, we will see that the number of migrant workers who were expected to work 17 hours a day or more was halved. The visa cut significantly the proportion of such workers who were denied time off and who had faced psychological abuse. It more than halved physical abuse and it reduced sexual abuse by a quarter. Those are just one set of figures showing the impact that the visa has had on migrant workers.

This Government are not alone in thinking that abolishing the visa might be one way of controlling immigration and that it actually might be a sensible thing to do. Previous Labour Governments thought so too, and started consultations on doing it. I was part of the campaigns that prevented them from doing so because we were able to produce compelling evidence that showed the extent to which trafficking for domestic servitude increases. I am shocked and sad that the report, which is supposed to be the report of a rapporteur, is actually promoting spin about Government policy. Every single independent analysis of the overseas domestic workers’ visa makes it quite clear that it was one of the best protections for overseas domestic workers against domestic servitude.

Consequently, I am depressed about this debate, not only because it has got me out of my sick bed but because we are better than this, we care more than this, we can do more than this and we do not want to be “spinners”. We believe that we can be transparent, frank and honest about our successes and failures in dealing with this appalling crime. However, as can be seen from just the two examples I have given, the report falls down on those requirements. I do not believe that the Government want to fall down on this issue; I do not believe that. I am not saying that the intentions of the Government are malign—they are not.

Nevertheless, there is an ineffectiveness to this kind of report. It attempts to big up things that are good, for example joint investigation teams. However, when we look under the surface of those things, difficulties arise. When I talked to Steve Gravett, it looked like joint investigation teams had a short future.

Is it not time for us to be big enough to be completely open about the effectiveness of what we are doing on international trafficking? What we are doing is not as good as we want it to be; it is not good enough, but it is better than what we did before. That is fine, but it is not fine for the Government to produce something that is too much in the way of spin. That is sad and I expected more of this Government, and of any British Government.

[Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)]

Thank you very much, Mr Robertson, for calling me to speak. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) on lobbying the Backbench Business Committee for this debate, and it is good to see Members from all parts of the House debating this really serious and important issue.

I will focus on one aspect of human trafficking that I became aware of in my constituency back in September 2011, and I will go on to show that, sadly, it was not an isolated case, because something along similar lines was reported in the press the next week. I will end by suggesting a number of ways that all of us—MPs, police officers, local councils and above all the public—can come together to play a combined part in trying to eradicate human trafficking from our country.

The first thing that I will say in that regard is that human trafficking is not just about people being trafficked from Asia or eastern Europe into this country. That is, of course, a very big part of human trafficking, and it is appalling. Human trafficking is, at one and the same time, both a global scourge and capable of being so intensely local that it can be happening right under our noses.

When more than 200 police raided a Traveller site just outside Leighton Buzzard in my constituency in September 2011, they rescued 22 victims. Among them, there were Romanians, Poles and people from other eastern European countries, but the vast majority were British citizens who had been trafficked from all around the country to come to work as slave labourers in Bedfordshire, so I want to set a marker at this stage of the debate to say that when we are talking about trafficking, yes, we are talking about people from Romania, Ukraine, Thailand and Nigeria, but also about people from Wembley, Southampton, Leeds and Birmingham, who are taken against their will and forced to work in other parts of our country. I just want to be clear that that is recognised, that it is part of this debate, and that it is as much human trafficking as is the international dimension.

Going back to September 2011, after a considerable period of surveillance, Bedfordshire police and Hertfordshire police got together more than 200 police officers to go on to the Greenacres Traveller site outside Leighton Buzzard early one Sunday morning. They rescued 22 victims of slavery or human trafficking. Some of them had been on that site for 15 to 20 years—a very, very long time.

I am pleased to say that there has been a trial, and that James Connors is now in prison for 11 years, Josie Connors is in prison for four years, and Tommy and Patrick Connors were convicted of holding and forcing men to work, so the justice system has worked, but I want to put on the record what life was like for the victims of human trafficking on that site during that period, and I think Members will be quite shocked when they hear some of the things that went on.

The people who were forced to work were often given next to no food. They were forced to wash in cold water. They often worked 19-hour days, and at the end of those days they were forced to come back and immaculately clean the caravans of the slave-owners for whom they were working.

They were also physically abused. When the police arrived at the site, they found that many of the victims had injuries. The victims had often been punched, kicked or hit with broom handles. The men were told that if they used the toilets and washing facilities in the caravans of the Connors family they would have their legs and arms broken. They were forced either to use a bucket or to go outside into the woods. One of the victims was forced into the boot of a family car and forced to sing children’s songs.

The people exploiting these men made millions of pounds by forcing these vulnerable people to work without pay, in some cases for nearly two decades. When the police turned up on that morning in September 2011, some of the victims had broken bones, scars and fresh wounds from abuse that they had recently suffered.

It is fair to say that most of the victims on that site had fallen on hard times of one sort or another. They had been found by members of the Connors family in night shelters, soup kitchens and jobcentres. They included a wide variety of individuals. One was a Gulf war veteran who had served this country with distinction; another was a former priest. Many others were just at difficult stages in their lives.

When the men arrived at the site, their heads were shaved, and their possessions and papers were taken from them, which is very reminiscent of what happened in the concentration camps. They were generally unable to shower, except on a Friday night, and there was a reason for that; it was because on Saturdays they were forced to go and knock on doors, to try to drum up more work for the block paving business that was the main business of the Connors family at the time.

The press reported the trial, which took place in Luton Crown court earlier this year, as

“the first quasi-slavery trial in this country for over 200 years.”

Many of the victims said that, rather than the Connors family hiring machinery, the victims had been used to carry out very heavy manual work. One man who had been promised £80 a day told the police that in the 15 years that he had worked for the Connors family he received a total of £80. Another victim described life on the site as “beatings, starvation and work.”

That was in my constituency. We have had the trial; actually, there will be a retrial, because the police want to press further charges. Nevertheless, we have had some convictions. I pay tribute to those MPs who, in the last Parliament, ensured that the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 was passed. I am thinking particularly of section 71, headed “Slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour”, because that section enabled Bedfordshire police to bring those successful prosecutions. That shows that what we do in this House can have an effect and does work.

I had thought that this incident in my constituency was perhaps an isolated, though particularly horrid, one; it is one that, as the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) said, I have often recounted to members of the all-party group on human trafficking. However, only last week I saw on the BBC website that in Gloucestershire, the county from which the Minister comes, there had been another trial, and five other people also called Connors—I do not know if they are related to the other Connors—had been found guilty of keeping their own private work force and of treating their victims in a similar manner.

On the site in Gloucestershire, some of the victims were from Leeds, and one had been picked up at the YMCA hostel in Birmingham. The victims had been forced to work in Gloucestershire, Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire, and had been trafficked to eastern Europe and Russia to work; the same happened in the case in Bedfordshire. This is a case of British citizens being trafficked to work in eastern Europe and Russia, as well as in different parts of this country. It is not just a trade into this country; British citizens are being trafficked to work outside this country, and are desperately exploited.

[Mr Harper]

I want to put on record that the case in Gloucestershire—I am pleased to say that the family members were found guilty last week and were sentenced to time in prison yesterday—required a year-long police operation, including a long five-month surveillance period by Gloucestershire constabulary. Picking up the point made by the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), I am pleased that Gloucestershire constabulary takes such cases very seriously and is willing to put significant effort into them. That, and the example given by my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous), should be a lesson to all police forces about taking such cases seriously across the country.

[Andrew Selous]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Minister for making that point. The case required considerable resources from Bedfordshire police, which is a fairly small force. It, too, had to do months and months of surveillance, as well as all the work after the raid. Assembling all the information needed for the trial made a considerable demand on its resources. Now that convictions have been made, I hope that at least some of the ill-gotten proceeds of the Connors family in Bedfordshire will be used to recoup the costs incurred by Bedfordshire police in manning the operation. I hope that the same can happen in Gloucestershire.

Going back to what happened in Gloucestershire, some of the victims had been working on Traveller sites in Gloucestershire, Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire—and also outside the United Kingdom—for nearly two decades. Physical violence was a regular part of what they endured. They were beaten, hit with broom handles, belts, a rake, and a shovel, and were punched and kicked. They were stripped and hosed down with cold water. They were given so little food that in many cases they had to scavenge from dustbins. The people they were working for—it was the same in Bedfordshire—had luxury caravans and top-of-the-range kitchens. They enjoyed expensive foreign holidays and drove a Mercedes and even a Rolls-Royce.

Similar levels of work were required. Again, the work was in the block paving business or laying manholes. The victims were often required to work six days a week, sometimes seven, from dawn until dusk. One of them said that slaps were a way of life. One of the victims ran away from the Gloucestershire site back to Leeds, where he was from, but Miles Connors went to Leeds that day to bring him back, which shows the level of fear and intimidation. I make no apology for putting graphically on the record the events in these two cases.

I want to focus on what all of us can do to try to bring such cases to an end. We all have a role, particularly the customers of the Connors in both Bedfordshire and Gloucestershire who actually bought block paving from them and had their drives block-paved. It is not simply up to the police, the local council and Members of Parliament to spot these things. Yes, we all absolutely have a role, but the police can fully do their job only if the public are their eyes and ears. If someone is having their drive re-laid and the people re-laying it look as though they have not had a square meal in ages, and look fearful, frightened and emaciated, that person has a duty to contact the police to alert them to their concerns. It is much better to make that call and find that nothing is wrong than to stay silent and allow victims to go on being intimidated year after year. It is not just Traveller sites; whether we are in shops or restaurants, or visiting factories, we all have a duty, and we all need to see what can be done.

I pay tribute to Councillor Kristy Adams from the Newnham ward of Bedford borough council. She shares our concern and passion on this issue. She has done something that I have been trying to do for a long time, which is to provide a checklist of signs to look for to try to spot victims of human trafficking. She has produced a little bookmark with a list of signs and information on what to do if someone has suspicions. I will read out what it says, if I may, so that it is on the record, because it is so helpful. At the top of the bookmark, it says:

“Is the person you are with a victim of Human Trafficking?”

It has a number of pointers:

“Doesn't know home/work address? Expression of fear, distrust, anxiety? As an individual or group, movements are restricted by others? Limited contact with family and/or friends? Money deducted from salary for food and/or accommodation? Passport/documents held by someone else? Recognise any of the above? Please call 101 or Crimestoppers 0800 555 111.”

Councillor Kristy Adams is going to make sure that the bookmarks are with the police, local authorities, and as many people as possible in Bedfordshire who can take action. She wants to provide the bookmarks to raise public and front-line workers’ awareness of human trafficking. She wants to provide training on how to identify a trafficked individual and who to contact, and she wants to set up a human trafficking working group in Bedfordshire to deal with these issues. That is a fantastic initiative from a local councillor.

We all have a role—Members of Parliament, local councillors, local authorities, the police and members of the public. Here is a great initiative from Bedfordshire, and I commend it to colleagues. I am sure that together we can take further action.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

It has been a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship and the chairmanship of Mr Robertson, who preceded you. I thank, as most hon. Members have, my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) for securing the debate. I knew that he planned on doing so and it is timely that it arrived today—the last day the House sits before Christmas. This has been a good debate, with contributions from Members who are well informed about the subject and know their stuff—I think that is the general view. I have certainly picked up on points that were made, but I suspect that I will not be able to cover them in the 22 minutes I have left. The debate has provided me with food for thought on the steps the Government will take.

Echoing my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous), I want to put on record my thanks to Anthony Steen for his work with the foundation he chairs. I found him to be an excellent colleague when he was in the House and very focused on human trafficking. He and I spoke about it occasionally, though it was not within my area of responsibility. When he left the House, he told me that he would continue to focus on it and promised that he would be back here regularly to highlight the issue. He has kept that promise. I add my tributes to those of my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough.

My hon. Friend reminded us that he welcomed the Government opting in to an EU directive. I suspect that it is the first and probably the last time he will ever utter those words, but I will treasure them.

[Andrew Selous]

Frame them.

[Mr Harper]

Indeed, I will frame them.

Rather than going through the remarks in the order I had planned, I shall do so in the order my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough raised them. I will deal with his remarks first, because he, with others, picked up the debate and got it going. I take his point, which the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field) repeated, about the group’s title. By repeating it, he raised a point that had occurred to me: the Inter-Departmental Ministerial Group on Human Trafficking is not the catchiest of titles. I will go away and reflect on that. Having been in government, he knows that Governments do not come up with catchy ways to describe things.

The right hon. Gentleman might have a good point, but that should not detract from the fact that the group includes not only Ministers from across Government, but members from all the UK’s Governments—the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government and the Northern Ireland Executive. We have not been reflected on that, but it is important partly because it addresses the points made about independence. If the UK Government wanted to sweep things under the carpet, there are members from three other Governments, who are not of the same political party, who would not let us.

When I was given the job and told that I was chairing the group, I thought about the arguments for an independent rapporteur and the effectiveness of a group of Ministers. A ministerial group is also effective in ensuring that action is taken, which was my prime reason for being in favour of it. If we want to get things done, whether requiring legislation or otherwise, it is important to have Ministers from across Government working with our colleagues in the other parts of the UK, particularly on an issue that several Members described as one that the Prime Minister takes seriously. If we cannot make things happen, no one in Government can.

I did not understand the criticism from several people about the group not being able to get information from within Government. We are all Ministers in the Government, and if we want to get information from Departments we do not need a statutory basis to do so because we are able to get it. Having thought about it, I genuinely believe that having a group of Ministers is effective in delivering change and making things happen in practice. This is the group’s first annual report, and I accept that it is not perfect. We can do many things to improve it, some of which I will set out.

[Mr Frank Field]

None of us argued for one strategy or the other; we argued for both—the ministerial group backed up by the rapporteur.

[Mr Harper]

I accept that, but I felt slightly beaten up about the question whether the interdepartmental ministerial group was effective. I was also worried by the almost unanimously positive comments from Opposition Members about me and my future career—it is never good when Opposition Members over-praise Ministers; I always think that does us great harm—but I will take them in the spirit in which I am sure they were intended.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough and the right hon. Member for Birkenhead raised the question of data and of really understanding this issue, which is something I have raised internally. The cases referred through the national referral mechanism are only the tip of the iceberg. Globally, reports suggest that many millions of people are affected in the trade. One task that I have given my officials is to crunch those numbers and to understand the true picture, including how that plays out across the country.

As some Members have said—my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire made the point powerfully—and as the NGOs that I have met have echoed, the problem is not just in inner cities or parts of the country where people think this sort of thing goes on. On anti-slavery day, I met several people from what some might call leafy parts of the country, such as Surrey, who had seen this activity happening. They felt that, as my hon. Friend said, it is important to get people to think about the issue, to understand that it might be going on in their street or round the corner, and to be alert to what they should look for.

On data and understanding the problem, it is important to get the public to understand that there is an issue—picking up the point made by the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty): telling a constituent why it matters to them, and making them understand that—and to focus on it. That, in turn, picks up the point made by the hon. Member for Luton South (Gavin Shuker) about pressures on police forces and constabularies. People must understand that this is a big problem and that there are interconnections, in that people involved in trafficking are also involved in wider organised crime. This big economic problem generates lots of money that is then used for other criminal activities. It is not a small problem located in one place; it is very wide and police forces ought to take it seriously.

I will not go through this issue at length, but it is worth saying on police and crime commissioners—I take the point made by the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) that they have been in existence for not quite a month—that the Government are making sure they are aware of their national responsibilities as well as their purely local ones. In other words, they must be aware of the types of crime with a national or international dimension that will impact on them, so that, in setting priorities, they understand that their police forces must think about such matters.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough mentioned the National Crime Agency. It will have within it the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, the Human Trafficking Centre and the Border Policing Command. It will be a repository of good intelligence gathering and an analysis operation. It will have its own operational police and law enforcement officers but, as my hon. Friend said, it will also have the ability, if necessary, to task police forces for particular operations. Clearly, it will be much better if it engages such police forces by debating and explaining the issue and getting them on board voluntarily, but it also has a tasking power that may ultimately be important, certainly in getting people to pay attention, as my hon. Friend rightly said.

My hon. Friend and other Members raised the issue of the protection of children, which the Government take very seriously. The hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) spoke about training in the UK Border Force and the UK Border Agency. On meeting front-line Border Force officers who are at the primary checkpoints as people come into the country, and the staff of the UKBA, I have been struck by how aware they are of the child protection issue and the need to be alert to it, of all the signs of children travelling with people who are not their parents, and of what we need to put in place to protect those children. I am not saying we are perfect—we can always do better—but I have been pleasantly surprised by that. Before doing this job, I was not really aware of how much training and expertise is available at the border for those officers as people enter the country. As I have said, I am sure we can do more, but we are very focused on that area.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough also raised the issue of how we look after adult victims of trafficking. We have the contract with the Salvation Army to look after adult victims because there was no existing process for looking after them. There is an established mechanism for child protection that, as my hon. Friend said, is delivered through local government. I absolutely heard what he said about its effectiveness. There have recently been several cases in which—if we are in any doubt—we can see that trafficked children are not always well looked after by local government. I listened carefully to the examples he gave of projects that are under way to find a better approach. I do not want to prejudge their outcomes, but I assure him that I and other members of the ministerial group will consider those results closely to see whether there is a better way. He specifically referred to the Barnado’s pilot project for safe homes for children, and that and various other pilots will provide us with evidence about what works best, and we will be guided by what the evidence shows is effective.

Another thing worth saying is that the failures there have been will drive change in how we deliver care for children generally. Not only have trafficked children not been as well protected in the care sector as they might have been, but many UK-based children who have not been trafficked end up not being well looked after. We will need to see what various reports suggest the Government should do instead before we respond. The protection of children is one of the most important things—my hon. Friend said it was the single most important thing—and that feeling was generally shared by the Members who have spoken.

My hon. Friend also flagged up that the report did not specifically mention the all-party group on human trafficking or the Human Trafficking Foundation. I assure him that, if so, that very much falls into the cock-up and not the conspiracy camp. There was certainly no deliberate intention not to mention them, and he was right to put on the record what he said about the Human Trafficking Foundation, which I have already echoed. He was too modest to mention, although others did, the excellent work of the all-party parliamentary group—that is not a catchy description either. It is important and helpful to get together people from across Parliament not only to take evidence, but to visit other countries and see what goes on. In a previous debate, my hon. Friend invited me to attend a meeting of the all-party group and if he wishes me to do so at an appropriate time, I would be delighted to attend, both to listen and to talk.

The hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk mentioned child guardians, which we have not introduced because there are existing mechanisms. However, I have signed off funding for the Refugee Council and the Children’s Society, which he mentioned, to undertake a joint independent scoping review of the practical care arrangements for trafficked children in care. That will look at the experience of trafficked children and practitioners to find examples of how people have been treated in the care system, and will report by the end of spring 2013. When we commissioned the report, we wanted something that told us about the experience of real children who have been through the system rather than a piece of desk research. We will look very carefully at the evidence to see whether it leads us to change policy in this area.

There are trafficked victims who end up undertaking criminal activity. We want to protect them and ensure that they are not turned into criminals. Let me be clear: if the circumstances of the arrest, or the evidence referred to by a prosecutor, suggest that someone may have been trafficked, the guidance is clear, as was I think acknowledged. In such a case, prosecutors should obtain further information, and work with the police to get more evidence. Where there is evidence that a suspect has been under duress, the prosecutor should not proceed. That is clear in theory, but I understand the concerns of Members about the extent to which that theoretical plan is carried through in practice.

[Mr Bone]

If non-governmental organisations provide me with specific cases of people being prosecuted when they should not have been, will the Minister undertake to look into them?

[Mr Harper]

Yes, I will. My hon. Friend the Solicitor-General, who sits on the interdepartmental ministerial group, is obviously responsible for prosecution policy. If my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough gives me some specific examples of that policy perhaps having not been followed, of course I will look at them and, where appropriate, discuss them with the Solicitor-General to see whether we need to take further steps.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

About six months ago, I spoke at a meeting of the Thames Valley criminal justice association at which a number of defence barristers were present. They said that their universal experience was that young Vietnamese gardeners in cannabis factories were always prosecuted.

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Lady gives me a link into my next point, about children who are being ruthlessly abused to run cannabis farms. Again, the guidance from the Association of Chief Police Officers is clear. It says that we should look at the circumstances and be alert to the fact that the children may well have been trafficked. If that is the case, there should be a child welfare response rather than a criminal justice response. I absolutely hear what the hon. Lady says about whether that is actually happening in practice. I will speak to my hon. Friend the Solicitor-General to see what data there are about the position on the ground—I know we have gathered some from Crown prosecutors—to see whether we can be better informed. She is quite right: if people have been trafficked and are under duress, we should treat them not as criminals but as victims. That is what we intend to do and what the guidance says, but I accept that what is supposed to happen in theory does not always happen in practice.

The hon. Lady made a number of points. I am pleased that she is here, and I wish her a speedy and full recovery from the flu. I would not have known that she was ill apart from the odd cough. Her illness did not seem to detract from her performance. If that is how she performs when she is suffering from flu, woe betide me in the next debate when she is not.

Let me disabuse the hon. Lady of her main point. We absolutely did not try to bury this report. We chose to launch it to coincide with anti-slavery day. We did our very best to make people pay attention to it. We had some success on social media. We worked with NGOs to promote it and we did a very good piece on the BBC, which took this matter very seriously and covered it extensively on its news bulletins to raise awareness. I am pleased to talk about the report at every opportunity, and I do not think that we buried it at all.

I thought that the hon. Lady was a little unfair about the report, and, by the way, if she could only find two examples of what she called spin—I do not think that they were spin—she cannot say that this whole exercise is about saying that the Government are doing a great job. Genuinely, I looked at her two examples, and did not think that spin was a fair characterisation of the report or the way it outlines what the Government are doing. I am sorry she thinks that, because that is not in the spirit of the way in which we have engaged in this report. The report was an attempt to give a fair picture of some of the data that show what the Government are doing to develop a human trafficking strategy. I rebut what she says and feel just a bit disappointed.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

In what way does the Minister believe that the abolition of the domestic worker visa makes it less likely that people will be trafficked into domestic servitude?

[Mr Dai Havard (in the Chair)]

May I remind you, Mr Harper, that we must leave three minutes for Mr Bone?

[Mr Harper]

Absolutely. Let me just deal with that issue. We have made changes to reduce the numbers of overseas domestic workers who are eligible to come here and to protect them, so I do not agree with the hon. Lady’s characterisation. We can have a debate about it, but it is not fair to say that it is spin. The changes include insisting that domestic workers work for an employer for longer. We have ensured that they have to provide more evidence of that relationship, that they have proper written terms and conditions, that they know their rights and that they are given information in their local language, setting out the position when they apply for their visa. We want them to be properly alert to the position in the United Kingdom. Her specific point was about whether we had given them information produced by Stop the Traffik. I am not sure whether that is the particular document we give them, so I will go away and consider that matter. I think it was the “travel safe” resource that she talked about. If that is good information, I will look into supplying it to the workers as well.

[Michael Connarty]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I need to leave at least three minutes for my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough to sum up the debate.

[Mr Dai Havard (in the Chair)]

There is only three minutes left.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Harper]

Let me conclude, then.

I am sorry I have not managed to cover all the points raised in this detailed debate. I agree with what everyone said about slavery being one of the great man-made evils, as the right hon. Member for Birkenhead described it. The Government are determined to do what we can to combat it. I am grateful to the Members who have spoken today. This will not be the last debate on this subject, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough for securing it and look forward to his summation.

Immigration Rules

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is today laying before the House a statement of changes in immigration rules. The main effect of these changes is twofold.

First, they will apply most of the changes to the immigration rules on family and private life contained in the statement of changes in immigration rules laid on 22 November 2012 (HC 760) to all applications decided on or after 13 December 2012, rather than only to applications made on or after that date. This will provide greater clarity for applicants and for the UK Border Agency as to the requirements in respect of family and private life applicable to all applications decided from 13 December 2012.

Secondly, they will apply a transitional concession to migrants under tier 1 (Investor) of the points-based system who entered the route, or applied to do so, before the clarifications in HC 760 regarding loans secured against investments and overseas custodisation of investments come into effect on 13 December 2012. This will ensure that such migrants are not adversely affected by these changes.

Immigration (Romania and Bulgaria)

Lord Harper Excerpts

Tuesday 4th December 2012 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) on securing the debate and on making his points in his usual robust fashion. I am pleased to be serving under your chairmanship, Mr Caton. I will try to address the concerns of my hon. Friend and those of my hon. Friends the Members for Peterborough (Mr Jackson) and for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers), and of my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field), who raised a local issue—we will see how “canary in a mine” it is for the future.

To give some context, the Government’s overall position on immigration is clear. We want to bring down the unsustainable levels of immigration—net migration—that we have seen, and we are taking a range of measures. The Office for National Statistics figures published last week show that the net migration figures, including EU citizens, have actually fallen by a quarter, from 242,000 to 183,000 in the year ending in March. It is also worth remembering, as my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering accurately set out, some of the misjudgments made by the previous Government, who did not introduce transitional controls so, in effect, the United Kingdom bore the entire burden of the adjustment process.

On the latest figures, about a third of the people coming to the United Kingdom are from the EU, but 55% are from outside the EU, where our policy changes are bearing down, and about 14% are British citizens returning home. The bulk of our net migration, therefore, is from outside the EU and not from our EU neighbours. It is worth saying that to put the matter in context.

[Mark Field]

My hon. Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) referred to the reluctance of the Home Office to come up with any statistics in that regard. Is it fair to say that that is simply a case of once bitten, twice shy, and is due to a concern that such statistics might be superseded by events, as they were in 2003 and 2004 in relation to the A8 nations? Alternatively, does the Home Office have an idea in mind, but does not want to go public with it? If the latter is the case, will the Minister indicate the effect on local communities of the overall numbers expected to arrive from 2014?

[Mr Harper]

I assure my hon. Friend that the reason is simply that it is genuinely a difficult exercise. The difference this time is that we had transitional controls, as have a number of other European Union countries. We are not the only country that will have to remove our transitional controls at the end of next year. A number of other countries, including Germany, for example, will be doing that. It is difficult to assess where the Romanian and Bulgarian citizens who wish to move to another EU member state to exercise one of their treaty rights will choose to move.

The history is relevant, because there is no point in the Government effectively making up a number that is based on poor data or making a set of assumptions, which are effectively guesses, and bandying around a number that proves inaccurate. That is not sensible. It is more mature and open to say, “It is a difficult exercise and there are a range of factors,” then people can make a judgment about whether the Government are being frank. That is more sensible than picking a number out of the air, which appears to be what happened beforehand, that is used as a defensive mechanism for a period until it is shown to be untrue. That is not a mature way of treating the matter.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend the Minister give way?

[Mr Harper]

Briefly, but I want to deal with points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering.

[Mark Reckless]

We learned recently that my hon. Friend the Minister is making excellent progress reducing immigration from hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands a year, but is he not concerned that the potential entry of Romanians and Bulgarians into the country might set back the progress and make it significantly harder to achieve the target by 2015?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend raises a valid concern, but the evidence is that net migration from the EU has been fairly consistent. However, we keep that matter under review. If he will allow me to answer my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering, he will see that some steps we are taking may alleviate some of his concerns.

My hon. Friend knows that the Government have adopted this policy change, but we will always implement transitional controls in respect of accession countries. We have already set out plans enabling primary legislation in respect of the accession of Croatia to the EU. I will take through the House regulations coming from that legislation, which will put in place those transitional controls. We have learned from the past. My hon. Friend mentioned that the previous Government learned from their experience and made more sensible decisions.

If people from EU member countries, including Romania and Bulgaria, want to stay in the United Kingdom beyond three months once there are no transitional controls, they have to be exercising treaty rights and be here as workers, students, or as self-employed or self-sufficient people. My hon. Friend mentioned the Government being robust about enforcing that. I will say a little bit more about that in a moment.

My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, whom my hon. Friend mentioned in terms not as complementary as ones that I would use about her, has been working with our colleagues in the European Union to crack down on fraud and abuse of free movement rights. That concern is shared by a number of EU member states; it is not just a concern of the British Government. At the Justice and Home Affairs Council in April, a road map of actions was agreed, specifically to tackle human trafficking, sham marriages and, importantly, document fraud. If we can tackle document fraud, that will help strengthen our ability to deal with those entering the UK illicitly.

[Mr Stewart Jackson]

Will my hon. Friend the Minister give way?

[Mr Harper]

If my hon. Friend will forgive me, I may take an intervention from him shortly, but I want to make some progress, given that this debate was called by my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering. I do not want to leave lots of his points unanswered.

There is more work to do with our EU partners and we will continue working with like-minded member states to move this agenda forward in the European Union.

My hon. Friend knows that the Foreign Secretary has set out plans for the balance of competences review. The Home Office will lead a piece of work next year, considering the free movement of people across the EU, including the scope and consequences of that, as part of that balance of competences review. I am sure that all my hon. Friends in the Chamber, not just my hon. Friend, will take part in that balance of competences review and ensure that their views are well known to me and the Government.

My hon. Friend set out clearly what happened when the A8 states joined the EU, so I do not need to repeat that. As he correctly said, before Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU on 1 January, the previous Government, learning from the past, decided to impose transitional controls. Such controls can be applied for a maximum of seven years and can only be maintained beyond five where there is, to use the words in the treaties,

“serious disturbance of the labour market or the threat thereof.”

We did that, listening to the advice and careful evidence taken by the independent Migration Advisory Committee. We have extended those controls to the full length permitted under the treaties.

Under the current regulations, Bulgarian and Romanian nationals have to retain authorisation from the UK Border Agency before they take employment in the UK and they must also get authorisation to take lower-skilled employment in the agriculture and food processing sectors, under the seasonal agriculture workers scheme and the sectors- based scheme. The numbers given permission to work under those arrangements have not increased over the period in which they have been enforced. Excluding SAWS, the number of Bulgarian and Romanian nationals issued with accession worker cards was 2,618 in 2011, 2,776 in 2008 and 2,097 in 2007. That has been fairly consistent.

[Mr Jackson]

My hon. Friend the Minister knows that I have a great deal of respect for him. He brings his skills to every portfolio. He has an even more difficult job now than in his previous role as the Deputy Prime Minister’s human shield. However, he is somewhat missing the point. Yes, of course, we are concerned about criminal records checks, for example, but those of us who are expressing concern about this issue are focusing on the sheer weight of numbers and the impact on the economy and the labour market. That is the key issue. Hon. Members’ greatest concerns are about the numbers, which have not been properly thought through.

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend mentioned his ten-minute rule Bill, as did my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering. I was in the main Chamber when he presented that thoroughly and carefully. We are considering that. I look forward to meeting him next week to talk about that and, no doubt, other issues connected to it.

To paraphrase my hon. Friend, the point is to use all the tools at our disposal. First, to put matters in context, Bulgaria and Romania may be different from the A8 countries. For example, 1.7 million of the 2.2 million Romanians who live in another EU member state have chosen to live in just two member states: Italy and Spain, notwithstanding all their economic difficulties. People can draw from that what they want; I am not making a forecast off the back of it

All hon. Members want to know that the Government want to use all the powers at our disposal. They may not be aware—this is a relatively new initiative—that we have set up a ministerial Cabinet committee, which the Prime Minister has asked me to chair, that will look at the rules on legal and illegal migrants’ access to public services and benefits, across the piece, working with colleagues across Departments. The committee will consider the pull factors, which are particularly important for EU nationals, where we do not have the same controls for those coming from outside the EU. We are at the beginning of that process, but I hope the fact that we have set it up and that it is being chaired by the Immigration Minister shows that we take these matters seriously, and I hope that that provides at least a little bit of comfort to hon. Friends.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster mentioned the operation that we have been carrying out with UKBA, working with the police, local authorities and other partners to identify EU nationals who are rough sleeping and not exercising a treaty right and, therefore, do not have the right to be in the UK. We look at enabling them to return home and, if they do not do so voluntarily, we will consider using our powers to administratively remove them.

My hon. Friend can rest assured that, where we have the power to act, we will look at using that power. We will look at the pull factors that entice people to come to the UK and ensure that things are being applied fairly, so that we are not unwarrantedly popular among our EU partners. Of course, I am sure we will return to this issue again over the coming months. I am happy to engage in debate with hon. Friends and to meet them and discuss any of their concerns. I will meet my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough shortly. I hope that I have at least addressed some of the issues.

Transit Visas (UK Trawlers)

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 28th November 2012 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Turner.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile) on securing the debate, which I know is important to his constituents. I am, of course, looking forward to visiting his constituency some time in the new year, when I am sure we can discuss the matter further.

I am also pleased to see the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) in the Chamber. I know he has a long-standing interest in this matter from a constituency and a wider Northern Ireland perspective. I listened carefully to what he said, and I will draw his remarks to the attention of the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), who has responsibility for fishing. He works closely with people from all parts of the United Kingdom when we set out our policy on fishing and fishing quotas, and when we have debates in the European Union. Thankfully, my job today is not to talk about wider fishing policy, but to talk about the specific issue of crewing and visas.

The use of non-European economic area crew on UK vessels has been an issue for several years, and I know that it is an ongoing concern for my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport. The issue has also been raised in Northern Ireland and with colleagues who represent constituencies in Scotland, where fishing is also an important industry. The subject is complex and wide-ranging, and its scope goes beyond immigration. The concern raised by my hon. Friend’s constituent and the Catholic Church in his constituency is about the living and working conditions of people employed in the sector, and I know that that concerns my hon. Friend, too.

I will set out the background of the visa regime for those who work in the sector. Non-EEA migrants can come to the UK to join ships that are currently in the UK but operate outside UK territorial waters—those ships that mostly operate more than 12 nautical miles beyond UK territorial waters. Because those people are joining ships that operate outside the UK, they do not fall under the scope of normal immigration rules, which means they do not need permission to work. However, they do need permission to enter the UK to join the ship—effectively to transit, hence the title of my hon. Friend’s debate. To do so, they must obtain permission to join the ship, either by way of a visa issued overseas, or with the permission of an immigration officer at the UK border. Those provisions are necessary to allow international vessels to change crew, thus allowing fresh crews to arrive in the UK to join ships and outgoing crews to leave ships and return home.

Within the fishing industry, the arrangements mean the UK’s deep-sea fleet has been able to bring in non-EEA fishermen without prior permission to work because the fleet operates mainly outside territorial waters, which is a perfectly legitimate use of the immigration system. Migrants entering through that route are not migrant workers in the usual sense, so the system is not a loophole through which employers can bring in non-EEA workers to carry out work that is not deemed to be sufficiently skilled, as the work is largely taking place outside the UK. We recognise the need for migrant labour in some specific and highly skilled roles in the United Kingdom, but, as my hon. Friend said, businesses should be looking to the local labour market for opportunities to fill lower-skilled roles. That is why non-EEA nationals cannot come to work on vessels that operate within the 12-mile limit—the inshore fleet—under the “to join ship” provisions.

[Jim Shannon]

One of the problems in Plymouth and the area I represent is around incentivising local people to go out on the fishing boats. The danger is apparent, and there is also a skill level that has to be achieved. Those on the boats have great skill, because they also fillet the fish. As the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile) asked, how can local people be more incentivised to participate in the job opportunities on fishing fleets?

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Gentleman raises a good point. I chose my words with care. I did not say that the work was low-skilled, but that it was not sufficiently skilled to meet our criteria. The Migration Advisory Committee, which is the expert committee that the Government often commission to consider the appropriate skill level required for jobs before we allow people to come to the UK from outside the EEA, did not think the jobs were sufficiently skilled. He raises an important point, however, which I think was the nub of the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport: in an environment in which UK nationals are without work, what is the industry doing to ensure that we can train UK or EU nationals to the appropriate skill levels so that they can staff the inshore operations without needing to bring in people from outside? I will touch on that later.

Visas would not be issued for people to come to work on inshore vessels. People who work—or employ people to work—on vessels in the inshore fleet after they have come to the UK on a “to join ship” visa, or sought to enter at the border to join a ship, are breaking immigration law and behaving unlawfully.

Some years ago, it became apparent that some in the UK inshore fishing fleet were using non-EEA labour to crew their ships. The UK Border Agency made it clear that that was not acceptable and that immigration rules needed to be enforced in that area. However, genuine concerns were raised at the time, including by the Scottish and Northern Ireland Governments, that the UK fishing fleet relied on non-EEA labour and that immediate enforcement of the immigration rules would have a significant and negative impact on that fleet.

In light of those concerns, in March 2010, the previous Government introduced temporary—I stress the word “temporary”—concessions that allowed for up to 1,500 visas to be issued to non-EEA fishermen to work on the UK inshore fleet to give it sufficient time to transition to using local labour for such jobs. In other words, that was to give it time to identify the labour requirement and put in place the relevant training mechanisms so that people could gain the appropriate skills to staff our inshore fleet.

Those concessionary arrangements came with strict conditions. Permission was granted only after appropriate assurances were given that the workers would be paid the minimum wage and—this addresses the point raised by my hon. Friend—that they would be given suitable onshore accommodation when their ships were in port. The take-up of the concession was relatively low. The route was extended last year, and we closed it down for good this August. We will no longer grant permission for non-EEA migrants to work on inshore UK fishing vessels.

The point at the heart of my hon. Friend’s concerns was about how we enforce the rules and ensure that people are playing by them. I shall also address the living and working conditions on board the vessels, which clearly concern him and his constituent, because although the UK Border Agency is not responsible for enforcing that part of the law, and thus I will not go into incredible detail on this, our officials do some work in that area and we work closely with other agencies.

The “to join ship” visas for the fleet that operates outside our territorial waters are granted in the same way as any other visa. They are issued only when a UK Border Agency official overseas or on the border is satisfied that the applicant meets the requirements of the rules. The official therefore has to be satisfied that the applicant is genuinely joining a ship at a UK port and that that vessel will be leaving UK territorial waters in the near future.

The British Chamber of Shipping has expressed concerns that “to join ship” visas are increasingly difficult to come by, particularly for ships that are tied up awaiting cargo, sailing instructions or repair. Our officials rightly question whether crew are actually required in such circumstances, given that the ship will not depart port imminently. The individual circumstances of each application are examined by officers from the UK Border Agency and UK Border Force on a case-by-case basis. Our Border Force officers will always question fishermen and other crew seeking to enter the UK. If they have any doubts about the individual, the company or the vessel that they are joining, they will refuse entry to the United Kingdom.

UK Border Force also regularly undertakes enforcement action to ensure that those who employ non-EEA fishermen do so legally. Border Force cutters regularly patrol UK waters, monitoring vessels, gathering information and intervening when appropriate and necessary. The monitoring allows us to ensure that vessels using non-EEA crew who are here on “to join ship” visas are indeed operating outside UK territorial waters. Alongside that, regular enforcement visits are conducted to ensure that those working on board vessels have the right to do so.

If we find people working illegally on vessels, we treat them in the same way as any other immigration offender and they are liable to removal from the UK. If employers employ people illegally on inshore fleets, they are liable to fines of up to £10,000 for each illegal worker employed. As with all our enforcement activity, we do not accept people hiring outside the immigration rules, and we seek to deal with that in a tough manner.

During the course of enforcement activities on vessels, Border Agency officers may come across unsuitable living and working conditions. There have been tragic consequences of such conditions. My hon. Friend may be aware of the fire on a fishing boat in 2008 in which two Filipino and one Latvian crew member were tragically killed.

Border Force and UK Border Agency officers are concerned primarily with enforcement of the immigration rules and do not have enforcement powers in areas such as employment rights or health and safety, but we certainly do not close our eyes to those things. If, in the course of enforcing immigration rules, Border Force and Border Agency officers come across such conditions, they will draw them to the attention of the appropriate enforcement officials in other agencies, such as the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, with which we have close working relationships. Our enforcement activities are often multi-agency efforts involving the police, the MCA and other agencies, so not only do we enforce immigration rules, but our partners enforce rules on employment rights, the minimum wage and health and safety conditions.

We will continue to work to ensure that all those who do not have a right to work here cannot do so, that those who have a right to work on ships outside UK territorial waters can do so, and that any rogue employers who exploit vulnerable workers, as my hon. Friend suggests, face the full extent of the law. If the inshore fishing fleet requires people to work in the industry, it should look first to the domestic labour force and ensure that people there are appropriately trained.

My hon. Friend raised a point about the International Labour Organisation convention. That, of course, is a matter for the fisheries Minister, so I will draw my hon. Friend’s remarks to his attention and ensure that my hon. Friend receives a reply outlining the Government’s position on the ratification of the convention from officials in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs or the Minister.

The hon. Member for Strangford raised a point about training and skills, which are devolved issues. I know that the Scottish Government and the Northern Ireland Executive are working to provide training to the local work force. The Governments, as well as the industry in those parts of the United Kingdom, are engaged in efforts to ensure that the local work force is appropriately skilled for our inshore fishing fleet.

I think that I have covered all the issues raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport, and I say again that I look forward to visiting his constituency in the new year, when we can no doubt talk further about these matters.

[Oliver Colvile]

I look forward to welcoming my hon. Friend to Plymouth, when we will certainly want to talk about these issues with the organisation, and I take my hat off to the Apostleship of the Sea, which runs a good, effective operation in Plymouth for migrant workers who need help. Occasionally, the organisation finds that migrants do not have food and therefore has to provide them with some, and their living conditions can also be bad.

[Mr Harper]

I am grateful for that extra detail. When I visit my hon. Friend’s constituency to talk about a range of issues, if it will be at all possible to talk about that to people at first hand, it will be a valuable opportunity.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for securing this debate and for the interest shown by the hon. Member for Strangford.

Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism

Lord Harper Excerpts

Thursday 22nd November 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

I beg to move,

That the draft Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2012, which was laid before this House on 19 November, be approved.

The Government are determined to do all they can to minimise the threat from terrorism to the UK and our interests abroad. Proscription is an important part of the Government’s strategy to tackle terrorist activities. We would therefore like to add Ansarul Muslimina Fi Biladis Sudan, known as Ansaru, to the list of international terrorist organisations, amending schedule 2 to the Terrorism Act 2000. This is the 11th proscription order under that Act.

Section 3 of the Terrorism Act 2000 provides a power for the Home Secretary to proscribe an organisation if she believes it is currently concerned in terrorism. The Act specifies that an organisation

“is concerned in terrorism if it—

(a) commits or participates in acts of terrorism,

(b) prepares for terrorism,

(c) promotes or encourages terrorism”—

including the unlawful glorification of terrorism, or—

“(d) is otherwise concerned in terrorism.”

If the test is met, the Home Secretary may exercise her discretion to proscribe the organisation.

In considering whether to exercise this discretion, the Home Secretary takes into account a number of factors: the nature and scale of an organisation’s activities; the specific threat that it poses to the United Kingdom; the specific threat that it poses to British nationals overseas; the organisation’s presence in the United Kingdom; and the need to support other members of the international community in tackling terrorism.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

I welcome the Minister to the Dispatch Box in dealing with counter-terrorism matters. I had not realised the Immigration Minister was now going to be responsible for counter-terrorism within the Home Office, but I am glad he has got this portfolio as well. Is there any indication as to how many supporters Ansaru has in the UK?

[Mr Harper]

The right hon. Gentleman, the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, may be pleased or disappointed to know that I am handling this order, but my fellow Minister, my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary, retains responsibility for security matters. He is out of the country today on Government business, so I am dealing with the order on his behalf.

I hope the right hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I do not answer the question he asks. There are things I am not able to say in the House, based on intelligence issues. If he will forgive me, I would prefer not to answer his question directly.

Given the wide-ranging impact of proscription, the Home Secretary exercises her power to proscribe only after thoroughly reviewing the available relevant information and evidence on the organisation concerned. That includes open-source material, intelligence material, legal advice and advice that reflects consultation across government, including with the intelligence and law enforcement agencies. These decisions are taken with great care by the Home Secretary, and it is right that the case for proscribing new organisations must be approved by both Houses.

Having carefully considered all the evidence, the Home Secretary firmly believes that Ansaru is concerned in terrorism. Members will appreciate that I am unable to go into detail, but I can provide a brief summary. Ansaru is an Islamist terrorist organisation, based in Nigeria, which publicly emerged in January 2012. It is motivated by an anti-Nigerian Government and an anti-Western agenda, and is broadly aligned with al-Qaeda. It is believed to be responsible for the murders of British national, Christopher McManus, and his Italian co-worker. Franco Lamolinara, in March 2012.

In conclusion, for these reasons I believe it is right that we add the organisation to the list of proscribed organisations under schedule 2 to the Terrorism Act 2000. I commend the motion to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Harper]

Let me deal with the issues that have been raised by the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) and the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz). The hon. Lady spoke on behalf of the Opposition, and I thank her for their support, as I thank the Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee for his support. This is always a difficult area, because as the hon. Lady said, there are things that the Government know which they are not able to share publicly. I am grateful for what she and the Chairman of the Select Committee said about my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.

Proscription is a tough but necessary power. Its effect is that a listed organisation is outlawed and is unable to operate in the UK. It makes it a criminal offence for a person to belong to that proscribed organisation, to invite support for it, to arrange a meeting in support of it or to wear clothing or carry articles in public which arouse reasonable suspicion that an individual is a member of that organisation. Proscribing Ansaru will also enable the police to carry out disruptive action against any of its supporters in the UK and—picking up the point made by the Chairman of the Select Committee—ensure that it cannot operate effectively in the United Kingdom.

The right hon. Gentleman mentioned de-proscription. Anyone who is proscribed can apply to the Home Secretary to be de-proscribed. If that application is refused, the applicant can appeal to the Proscribed Organisations Appeal Commission, a special tribunal which is able to consider the sensitive material that underpins proscription decisions.

The Chairman of the Select Committee also mentioned the report that David Anderson, QC, has recently produced and also the Select Committee’s report. The Government have carefully noted the comments that David Anderson made in his report about the de-proscription process and the Home Secretary will respond shortly to the report, so the right hon. Gentleman may not have too long to wait to find out the Government’s view.

[Keith Vaz]

I know that we have become used to the word “shortly”, but it may well have been used a year ago, when we were told that there would be a response shortly. Is that this year? Is it next year? [Interruption.]

[Mr Harper]

As my right hon. Friend the Work and Pensions Secretary says, the waiting time is getting shorter. I will not put an exact date on it, because when I have done that in the past I have inevitably disappointed people. The right hon. Gentleman will clearly have less time to wait than he did when he heard a Minister say that last year.

The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North mentioned Boko Haram, which operates in Nigeria. For very sensible reasons, the Government do not comment on whether any group is under consideration for proscription, but we are deeply concerned about violence, whether terrorist or otherwise, in Nigeria. We remain committed to working closely with the Nigerian authorities to tackle the security situation in Nigeria. When the Prime Minister met President Jonathan in February this year, he re-affirmed our shared agenda. We have experience on counter-terrorism policy and various frameworks for dealing with it, and we work closely with our Nigerian colleagues to support them in any way we can in combating the security challenges that they face.

The hon. Lady mentioned Hizb ut-Tahrir. As she knows, that organisation is not proscribed in the United Kingdom. As I said, proscription can be considered only when the Home Secretary believes that an organisation is involved in terrorism, as defined in the Terrorism Act 2000. As the right hon. Member for Leicester East suggested though, it remain an organisation about which the Government have significant concerns, and we continue to monitor its activities very closely.

The final issue that the Chairman of the Select Committee raised was organisations that change their name but not necessarily their activities. Section 3(6) of the Act allows the Home Secretary, by order, to specify an alternative name for a proscribed organisation, and we keep the list of organisations under review, including consideration of whether they are operating under any alternative aliases.

[Dan Byles (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

Is there a streamlined process for claiming that a group with a new name is still the old group? Instead of having to start again and prove that the group under the new name is a risk, is there is a quick and simple process for saying “This is the old group under a new name”?

[Mr Harper]

Yes. If we proscribe a group on the basis of all the information we have about it, and it then tries to change its identity, there is provision in the Act to allow us to specify an alternative name without having to go through the process of reconsidering all the legal tests that the Home Secretary has to carry out.

I hope that with those answers I have dealt with the questions that were raised, and that the House will support the motion.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the draft Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2012, which was laid before this House on 19 November, be approved.