Legal Migration

Neil O'Brien Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

We have increased the pace of decision making in our asylum processing system tenfold. I remind the hon. Gentleman that in recent years we have made very generous offers to the people of Hong Kong and Ukraine. I know the British people will recognise which of our two parties will grip immigration, and it certainly is not his.

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough) (Con)]

This excellent package is a big step in the right direction, towards a higher-skill, higher-wage economy with less pressure on our housing and infrastructure. Will my right hon. Friend put in the Library the analysis behind his statement that this package, plus the previously announced reduction in student dependants, will mean that more than 300,000 people who came last year would no longer be able to do so? It would be interesting to understand how much of that is the previously announced reduction in student dependants, how much of it comes from each of the announcements made today and how it compares with the forecast for future migration laid out by the OBR in the most recent economic and fiscal outlook. Will he put that in the Library? A previous Government were rightly mocked for saying that only tens of thousands of people would come from eastern Europe, and they were completely wrong. As well as having a better policy, can we also have more transparency?

[James Cleverly]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, and I am more than happy to put in the Library our estimates of the impact of these announcements and the previous announcements.

Illegal Immigration

Neil O'Brien Excerpts

Wednesday 15th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

My understanding is that officials from my Department meet regularly on these issues. If there are specific cases, the hon. Member should please bring them to my attention.

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough) (Con)]

I welcome my right hon. Friend to his place, and I welcome his comments on the unfairness of illegal immigration for those who have come here legally. However, the Supreme Court’s verdict this morning is extreme comprehensive, and it reveals not just one obstacle, but multiple obstacles to deporting people from this country. If we want to deter the small boats, we need to be able to remove significant numbers of people extremely quickly. Given the comprehensive nature of the judgment this morning, can I encourage my right hon. Friend against an incremental approach? It is clear from the ruling that we need to do something stronger now. We chose in the Illegal Migration Act not to include “notwithstanding” provisions, but I think we do need them now.

[James Cleverly]

I hear the point my hon. Friend makes about a powerful deterrent—we are absolutely committed to that—but I do say again that, in circumstances as challenging as this, there are rarely silver-bullet solutions. In my whole time in government and in politics, I have never yet come across one. We have to pursue all our lines of effort, and I give him my assurance that we will continue to do so.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Neil O'Brien Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 20th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Neil O'Brien (Harborough) (Con) [V]]

The reason we need to take action through this Bill today is not, as the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) said, because the country is overwhelmed, but because the system is both broken and unfair. It is obvious it is broken to everyone who sees on TV every summer large numbers of people risking their lives as they are trafficked from France, a safe country, to the UK. The system is broken because it is leading to people profiting from putting others’ lives at risk and to people putting to sea in dangerous vessels. It is unfair to those who have played by the rules. They have often jumped through a lot of hoops, paid a lot of money and done everything right, and then they see other people pushing to the front of the queue as economic migrants, despite not following all the rules. Ultimately, we have to insist on a system that is rule-based and set our own rules on who comes to this country. If we are to do that, we have to crack down hard on illegal migration and those who profit from it.

Therefore, I welcome the measures in the Bill. I welcome the extra resources for Border Force to police channel crossings. I particularly welcome the extra life sentences for people traffickers—it is amazing that that is not the case already. It is right to bring those in for people who are profiting from others’ misery and from others being put in extreme danger as they cross the channel. It is right to bring in those tougher penalties and in the legislation to increase the penalties for those who return after being the subject of a deportation order. Those who break the rules in that way again should clearly be the subject of stiffer penalties.

I also welcome, as many of my constituents will, the measures to reduce the vexatious claims that see people potentially taking legal action, even though on the steps of a plane, with the endless appeals and poorly merited cases that people use to clog up the system, slow things down and waste lots of people’s time and taxpayers’ money. We have to have a decision-making system that is not only fair, but makes clear decisions and does not lead to endless legal processes of a kind that many of my constituents are certainly frustrated by. It is also right that we have tougher measures to limit visas for those third countries that are not co-operating with us. If other countries do not want to help us and are not taking back their nationals who are being deported—they are not taking back their own citizens from this country—we have to be more symmetrical about things and look again at the visa rules we have for those countries.

I am proud to support this legislation, which ends a broken system, reduces the chance of people having their lives put at risk and ends some basic unfairnesses in the system that have gone on for far too long. It is a Bill that I am very proud to support.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call Helen Hayes.

Windrush Lessons Learned Review

Neil O'Brien Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

Of course.

[Neil O'Brien (Harborough) (Con)]

I strongly welcome the statement and the lead that my right hon. Friend is taking on this hugely important issue. What steps is she taking to make sure that Wendy Williams’s recommendations are taken forward as quickly as possible?

[Priti Patel]

My hon. Friend will know that there are a vast number of recommendations. Wendy emphasised the need to ensure that we did not just fulfil them all immediately, but that we had the time and space to give all the recommendations the right consideration. That is why we are taking this phased approach right now.

I am focusing on two particular elements. One is the compensation; it is right that we go through case by case and look at the complexities behind individual cases. The second significant area is the culture and the Department. That is the focus and, as I have said repeatedly, I will continue to share updates on the recommendations with the House. I have also spoken about the Department now being open to more scrutiny. That will play into the review that Wendy will undertake next year with regards to the Department.

Public Order

Neil O'Brien Excerpts

Monday 15th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

I am saddened by the hon. Lady’s tone. I thought that she would welcome an attempt to combat the inequalities in our society and end what has been a great disservice to many communities across our nation who are subject to real and pressing inequalities. I think it is right that we should all work together in a measured, responsible and reasonable way. I am just sorry that the hon. Lady is not of that persuasion.

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough) (Con)]

There was widespread revulsion in my constituency the other day when the news emerged that somebody had defecated on a war memorial in Market Harborough. I strongly welcome my hon. Friend’s commitment to introduce legislation to protect such memorials. While my constituents are doing everything they can to fight this deadly virus, they see on TV far-right thugs coming here to urinate on a memorial to a fallen police officer—they do not speak for the people of this country. The weekend before that, they saw hooligans disrupting the important Black Lives Matter protests by injuring dozens of police officers—they do not speak for Black Lives Matter, and they do not speak for this country either. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the people who really represent this country are our brave police officers, who are putting themselves in the line of danger to protect innocent people? Will she do everything she can to back them to the hilt, accelerate the work on the police covenant and ensure that the hooligans who injure our police officers end up where they belong—in jail?

[Priti Patel]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right on every level, and I thank him for the passion with which he spoke. I pay tribute to our police and our public service personnel who were supporting them over the weekend. They worked flat out, selflessly, to try to protect the public from the thugs and hooligans who were perpetrating the most appalling criminality, violence and disorder and the most aggressive and revolting behaviour. Racism, thuggery and that kind of hooliganism should never be tolerated at all. My hon. Friend speaks for the nation when he says that those individuals should face the full force of law, and that is effectively what will happen to them.

Automated Facial Recognition Surveillance

Neil O'Brien Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend raises an extremely important and useful point. He is quite right that the acceleration of technology needs to be embraced by the House in a way that perhaps it has not been in the past. Both he and I stood on a manifesto that contained a commitment to the enabling of technology in a strict and controlled legal framework, and we will be thinking about that over the next few months. Some years ago, I came across a company that was working on online financial security. It had a system that identified someone not only from their password when they entered it, but from the way in which that person typed their password, because apparently the way we type is very characteristic. Those are the sorts of technologies we can deploy to great effect, but with democratic control.

[Neil O’Brien (Harborough) (Con)]

This technology is potentially a very powerful tool to fight crime, including serious crimes like knife crime where deprived and minority ethnic communities are, sadly, disproportionately likely to be the victims. It could also help to clear up cases like the awful recent murder and aggravated burglary in my constituency. However, will the Minister reassure the House that we will use this powerful new technology only in a proportionate way?