Female Genital Mutilation

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 15th December 2015 General Committees

[The Chair]

We will now move to the questions session. The Minister started speaking at 2.35 pm; we have one hour from then, so I will bring proceedings to a close at 3.35 pm if they have not concluded earlier.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Evans. I would like to put on the record how impressive the Government have been with their zero-tolerance approach to female genital mutilation. I particularly thank the Minister, who has done everything she can to ensure that legislation and guidance are put into practice to prevent the crime.

Does the Minister recognise, however, that the figures in the EU document are actually outdated? Will she outline how she is updating the EU with UK-wide figures? Will she also comment on the provision of specialist FGM training for those in child protection roles? She mentioned the mandatory reporting, the guidelines and the specialists, but I am thinking about people who are on the frontline, such as social workers, health workers and teachers. What training provision is there for them? Will the Government consider conducting a review of FGM protection orders to determine if they are actually meeting their objectives?

[The Chair]

I will allow supplementary questions at my discretion. I know that this is the first Committee for a number of Members, so I will be hugely tolerant.

--- Later in debate ---

[Karen Bradley]

We do not yet have the final figures. Protection orders were only introduced on 17 July, so the first set of statistics has not yet come through. We hope to have them shortly, and I am sure the hon. Lady will be made aware of them when they are released.

[Sarah Champion]

Taking the Minister back to her answer about telephone helplines and reporting, I know that the advice on hate crimes is to call 111, but 111 does not have a translation service. Will the Minister tell Committee members, when she reports back to us, whether people are able to report in languages other than English?

[Karen Bradley]

I would be happy to report back to the Committee on that when I write with all the information on the helplines and the other help that is available, including from the FGM unit at the Home Office. We also have a forced marriage unit, which is a joint Home Office and Foreign Office unit working across communities to provide outreach education about forced marriage. It also works across borders with countries where we believe people may be being taken to be put into a forced marriage. I will be very happy to share all that information when I write to the Committee.

Motion made, and Question proposed,

That the Committee takes note of European Union Document No. 17228/13, a Commission Communication: Towards the elimination of female genital mutilation.—(Karen Bradley.)

[Sarah Champion]

Thank you for calling me, Mr Evans; you are being very tolerant with a novice, and I appreciate it.

I think the whole Committee agrees that female genital mutilation is a fundamental attack on the human rights of women and girls. It has been recognised as such by the United Nations General Assembly and stands in direct violation of the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women and the convention on the rights of the child. Women and girls subjected to FGM suffer lifelong medical and psychological damage. The procedure can lead to gangrene, septicaemia and tetanus. Long-term complications include enduring pain, severe complications during pregnancy and childbirth, higher infant mortality, stillbirth and death in childbirth. In psychological terms, women who have undergone FGM have been found to suffer from a wide range of conditions, including anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.

The elimination of FGM has, rightly, been a key goal of human rights organisations, the United Nations and national Governments for many years. Progress has undoubtedly been made, but FGM remains widespread. As many as 133 million women are thought to be living with FGM across the world. In Somalia, up to 98% of women and girls between the ages of 15 and 49 are thought to have undergone FGM. In four other countries, the prevalence of FGM is thought to be higher than 90%.

We must remember that FGM is not simply an African problem. In Europe, it is estimated that 500,000 women have undergone FGM, and that 180,000 girls are at risk every year. The figures for the UK cited in the communication were collated in 2007, and according to revised figures from 2014, as many as 137,000 women in the UK are estimated to have undergone FGM. The NSPCC has estimated that as many as 23,000 girls under the age of 15 could be at risk. We must therefore ensure that the UK plays a full part in bringing this barbaric practice to an end and continues to promote the elimination of FGM across the globe.

FGM is, in many countries, a deep-rooted cultural practice. Simply encouraging Governments to outlaw it will do little to address the problem. FGM is already illegal in many of the states where it is most widespread, but it remains endemic. We should of course continue to push for Governments to prohibit FGM and punish offenders, but we must energetically promote cultural change. UK Aid and the Department for International Development have done really good work on the subject, and initiatives such as “The Girl Generation”, an Africa-led project to tackle FGM, are positive steps, but eliminating FGM will take time, and the Government must continue their commitment of resources and expertise.

The work of the European Union towards ending FGM is vital. It remains an international issue that cannot be managed by the UK alone. The framework provided by the EU is valuable in co-ordinating and amplifying our efforts. The UK must work closely with our European partners to ensure that the prevention of FGM, the identification of those at risk and the services for those living with FGM are strong across the EU. We must also utilise the EU’s global influence to promote action to challenge the cultural norms and attitudes at the root of FGM.

FGM has been explicitly illegal in the UK since 2004. There have been no successful prosecutions for FGM in the UK, which highlights the lack of awareness of FGM across our services. Positive steps to promote awareness have been taken in recent years, and it is vital that we ensure that practitioners can identify women and girls who may have been subject to, or who may be at risk of, FGM and report that to the authorities.

The introduction of FGM prevention orders in the Serious Crime Act 2015 was a welcome development. They provide a legal avenue to protect girls who are at risk of FGM, but we must ensure that they are effective. The Government should consider, as I have asked them to do in parliamentary questions, undertaking a review to determine whether they are meeting their objective. Victims of FGM, like those of any other form of abuse, are often reluctant to come forward or engage with support services. Health, immigration, child protection and immigration services are all likely to come into contact with those who are at risk. Multidisciplinary co-operation, better understanding and training are essential to protect girls who are at risk.

Education on FGM must be embedded as an integral element in curricula for professions in which practitioners are likely to come into contact with affected women and girls. Guidelines and procedures must be in place across the services to make certain that FGM, and those at risk, are identified and appropriate steps taken. Where FGM is identified, services must be able to provide support for its wide range of physical and psychological consequences.

The communication from the EU identifies a lack of holistic support services across the EU, including in the UK. The needs of survivors of FGM will vary dramatically, and we must therefore ensure that there is a focus not only on gynaecological services but on psychological support and post-traumatic counselling. Services should also share best practice across countries. In many cases, with cultural practices such as FGM, the messenger can be even more important than the message. We must therefore continue to engage proactively with minority communities, particularly those at risk of FGM. Without such engagement, the message that FGM is illegal and abusive will not be heard. Initiatives such as that recently undertaken by the Muslim Council of Britain, which issued explicit guidance to council members condemning the practice of FGM, are crucial and to be welcomed.

The Government should continue to work closely with community groups, third sector organisations and faith leaders to ensure that the message is heard loud and clear. We should also ensure that resources are allocated specifically to African-led organisations, as those might be the most effective at communicating the message about female genital mutilation.

Continued commitment to tackling FGM is vital if we are to ensure that all women and girls are safe from abuse. Many significant advances have been made in the fight against FGM in recent years, but we must not allow our focus to be diverted. FGM remains a widespread and, by some estimates, growing problem. I therefore welcome the EU communication and encourage the Government to engage closely with its recommendations and conclusions.

Serious and Organised Crime: Prüm Convention

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 8th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

I am glad that we have had the opportunity to debate the business and implementation case for the Prüm decisions. I appreciate the fact that it has been a wide-ranging debate. I support the conclusion in favour of rejoining. I welcome the Government’s change of heart relating to these decisions, even if that has taken them over a year. I am glad they are now listening to the evidence, rather than just to their Back Benchers’ fears about the EU, and recognise that these measures improve policing capability both in the UK and across the EU.

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) and the right hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green), who referred to the fact that our freedoms, civil liberties and laws are built on the foundations of security and safety for all our citizens. Prüm seeks to enhance that. The recent attacks in Paris demonstrated the importance of working closely with other member states to ensure that our police forces have the best possible means at their disposal for combating crime and ensuring the protection of our citizens.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Interpol has a motto, “Connecting police for a safer world”. It could do this very well not only in Europe but across the world if it got its act together.

[Sarah Champion]

Personally, I think we should use all the measures and all the tools at our disposal. Particularly in my field, abuse, I see that criminals are working internationally now and we must do all we can to prevent that.

I am aware that opting in to Prüm may seem like a technical matter, but it speaks to a deeper issue—that we can and do achieve more by co-operation with our European partners than we can individually. Labour firmly believes that by working with our European partners on such matters, we are more than the sum of our parts. As we have heard, these decisions establish requirements for sharing data related to DNA profiles, vehicle registrations and fingerprint images. The Labour Government were right to support these as vital means of improving policing across the EU. However, in an attempt to appease their Eurosceptic Back Benchers, this Government opted out of them in 2013, with effect from 1 December 2014.

Although the Government opted back in to 35 EU justice measures, the Prüm decisions were not among them. Labour was opposed to that decision at the time, so we are pleased that the Government have come to their senses and now see the benefit of these measures. Before I come on to why we support rejoining Prüm and set out some outstanding questions that I have for the Minister, it is important that we set the original opt-out in context. My right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) reminded the House that in justifying the decision not to rejoin Prüm in July last year, the Home Secretary stated that the Government had

“neither the time nor the money”.—[Official Report, 10 July 2014; Vol. 584, c. 492.]

I am pleased that they now have the time and the money to devote to this important issue. However, it is hard to shake the suspicion that apart from time and money, last year they lacked the inclination because of the need to appease their Back Benchers. We all remember the pressure the Government were under with regard to the European arrest warrant, and we have seen today the divisions within the Tory party regarding Prüm. While I welcome the change in stance and the party’s willingness now to stand up to its Back Benchers, I wish that there had not been the need for a delay of over a year. The demonstrated benefits of Prüm mean that this delay is likely to have had a negative impact on British policing, so it is important that legislation is now introduced as soon as possible.

Although the business case and the pilot study clearly show that there would be operational and public protection benefits, there is of course a need for balance and safeguards. I have a number of questions relating to these issues, and I would appreciate it if the Minister could answer them.

It is right and proper that we send information abroad only about people actually convicted in the UK, and that additional requirements be applied prior to the release of information relating to minors. The risk of false positive matches is another serious issue. While it is promising that the Government’s business case found that there was increased convergence in DNA testing standards across member states, we would like a requirement under Prüm that data is collected using a system of quality assurances for crime scene examination. Will the Minister confirm that the standard requirement prior to transferring DNA information will be maintained at 10 loci rather than the minimum of six loci required by Prüm?

I have a number of questions about the proportionality test mentioned in the implementation case. Will the Minister give an example of when he thinks that the test will prevent personal information from being sent abroad due to the offence under investigation being insufficiently serious? Given that the proportionality test is not explicitly included in the Government’s proposed draft legislation, will it be contained in any legislation, and who will be responsible for taking these decisions?

In addition to those concerns about sufficient safeguards being put in place, I have a number of other outstanding issues that I would like the Minister to clarify. The business and implementation case estimates that the cost of Prüm will be £30 million, although it acknowledges that there will be additional downstream costs. How are the savings of £18 million being made from the previous estimate of £31 million? What are the annual costs expected to be for the rest of this Parliament? It is important that ongoing transparency and scrutiny is applied to ensure that the measures are operating effectively. What plans are there to publish details of the number of pieces of information being sent abroad from the UK, as well as the number being denied due to failing the proportionality test?

Will the Minister tell the House about the timeframe for bringing forward the legislation needed to give effect to the decision to rejoin Prüm, and how long it is expected to take for the system to become operational? Given the delay already caused by the initial opt-out from Prüm, preventing any further delays should be a matter of priority for the Government.

In summary, Labour supported the Prüm decision when in government and opposed the initial opt-out from these measures during the previous Parliament. We are therefore happy to support this motion authorising the Government to rejoin.

Immigration Bill (Fifteenth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 17th November 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Keir Starmer]

I am grateful. I did think that that was what the Minister had said, and I just wanted that assurance.

Turning in a little more detail to the provisions in paragraph 2 dealing with those leaving care, former looked-after children who require leave to enter or remain when they turn 18, but do not have it or are not asylum seekers, will be excluded from receiving accommodation, financial support, a personal adviser, a pathway plan, funds for education or training and any other assistance under various provisions of the Children Act 1989 and from staying put with foster carers or maintaining contact. The Minister says that that is because the needs of those who have no right to be here are different from those of people who have their future in this country. Such individuals are former looked-after children who have just turned 18, and care leavers in such circumstances include those with no immigration status, those who arrived as children and sought asylum and were granted UASC leave, and those who came to the UK at a young age but were never helped to regularise their status.

Such people can only claim access to accommodation and other assistance in limited circumstances. The first is if they are destitute, have been refused asylum and are eligible for support and there is a genuine obstacle to them leaving the UK. The second is if they are destitute and have a pending non-asylum immigration application or appeal. The third is if their rights are exhausted, and regulations will set out the limited circumstances in which they can receive support.

The concern here is that specific provision was made in the Children Act for all children leaving care in recognition of their additional vulnerabilities and the need for additional support in order for them to have the same chances as other young people entering adulthood. The new clause and new schedule fundamentally change that position. There is a real concern that someone who has just turned 18 and who, as a matter of fact and possibly because of vulnerabilities, has simply not regularised their immigration status will be denied support under this provision, which cuts across the thrust of the 1989 Act.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

I want to speak against new clause 17 and new schedule 3. I want to start by asking the Minister whether he has the approval of the Minister for Children and Families, because the provisions seem to challenge much of the core principles for which he has been arguing. The changes have far-reaching impacts on the core definitions and duties of the Children Act, and it is strange that such dramatic changes are being housed within an immigration Bill.

Section 23(4)(c) of the Children Act places a duty on local authorities to give care leavers assistance to the extent that their welfare requires it. While the young person was a looked-after child, the local authority was their corporate parent. That duty recognises the legacy of the parental role and allows the local authority to step in and protect a care leaver in crisis. The Government’s Staying Put initiative explicitly recognises the need for care leavers to have “stable and secure homes” and to

“be given sufficient time to prepare for life after care.”

The Department for Education care leavers’ charter outlines key principles that will

“remain constant through any changes in Legislation, Regulation and Guidance”,

including the provision of advice and practical, financial and emotional support. Such initiatives are entirely undermined by the proposals.

Migrant children in care often face additional difficulties to British children. They are particularly likely to have faced trauma. They may experience language and cultural barriers. They are less likely to have any contact with biological family members. Care leavers often need their personal adviser or advocate to help to identify and even instruct an immigration lawyer. Barnardo’s conducted a child advocacy pilot for the Home Office that by all accounts seemed to be very beneficial. It helped the young person enormously to make informed choices and it helped the state to provide the level of support that was needed, so it seems odd that the new clause will undermine the Government’s pilot.

Not only is it discriminatory to remove support from young people leaving care on the basis of their immigration status, but in order for migrant care leavers to enter adulthood successfully it is vital that they can access a care plan under the 1989 Act. They are very young adults who often have no one else to turn to. The Government’s changes will remove all possible support usually provided to care leavers—including a personal adviser, a pathway plan and funding for education or training—other than, as the Minister confirmed, basic accommodation and financial assistance for certain groups.

It is not clear from the new clause whether it is envisaged that local authorities or the Home Office will be responsible for providing the support set out in proposed new paragraph 10B. Although I oppose the changes as a whole, at the very least local authorities should be responsible for providing support if the Government are not, and that should be stated in the Bill.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

We have spoken at length about the complexities of immigration law. In introducing yet another Immigration Bill, the Government had the opportunity to simplify some areas of the law. In areas such as appeals, the Government have, to their shame, done so by removing the right of appeal from the majority and proposing that the few who retain it might have to exercise it from outwith the country.

Some of the strongest arguments in the whole debate have been about the support we give to migrants and refused asylum seekers, particularly the children involved in such situations. The Government’s proposals on support for 18-year-old care leavers and destitute families with children in new clause 17 and new schedule 3 are nothing short of a dog’s breakfast, and are potentially dangerous. Either by accident or design, we could very well see support removed from the most vulnerable groups.

Under the existing system, Home Office support is provided under two relatively—I stress: relatively—broad provisions, namely sections 4 and 95. We will now have heavily caveated and more complicated support available across four provisions, including new paragraphs 10A and 10B of new schedule 3. The new clause and new schedule will sow confusion at a local authority level, and dangerous gaps in support can and will occur.

The changes relating to section 17 of the Children Act 1989 will prevent local authorities from providing accommodation and support where there are

“reasonable grounds for believing that support will be provided”.

That will prevent local authorities from supporting families on the basis that they might receive support in future, even though they are not currently receiving any support. It could prevent a local authority from providing emergency support if a family are destitute and have been unable to access immediate support from the Home Office. It will also prevent local authorities from providing support to families who in principle would be entitled to support under new paragraph 10A but are not receiving it in practice.

I am sure the Minister is well aware of the case of child EG, a one-year-old who died in 2012, followed two days later by his mother, when they were left in limbo between two different types of support. It is people like that who might be affected by the Government’s proposals. On the topic of vulnerability, there cannot be many more vulnerable people than young adults who have just turned 18 and have spent long periods of their childhood in care. Indeed, as has been alluded to, the Minister for Children and Families described them as “highly vulnerable” when calling for more support as part of a leaving care strategy as recently as July this year. It seems that our commitment to providing more care for this vulnerable group depends on where they were born or have come from.

The Minister for Children and Families is not alone. The Joint Committee on Human Rights also stated that unaccompanied migrant children must be properly supported in the transition to adulthood and receive bespoke and comprehensive plans that focus on educational goals, reintegration and rehabilitation. That includes planning for possible return to their country of origin and the provision of support to young people leaving care whose appeal rights are exhausted. The Joint Committee also stated that it would be difficult to reconcile the removal of support from young people leaving care on the basis of their immigration status, rather than on assessment of need, with the non-discrimination provisions of the UN convention on the rights of the child. Article 2 of the convention requires that states respect and ensure the rights of each child in their jurisdiction without discrimination of any kind.

During the evidence sessions, we heard time and again from expert witnesses that the proposals in the Bill run counter to the provisions and principles in the Children Act 1989 and the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. The hon. Member for North Dorset mused that it might be easier just to amend the 1989 Act, much to the dismay of myself and my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North-east. The Government may not have gone that far, but they are trying to make changes to the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 that will have a similar effect. Be in no doubt: the Scottish National party will be voting against these retrograde proposals.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

As the hon. and learned Gentleman has already highlighted, support is provided to a child within the meaning of the Children Act. The point we are making is that when someone becomes an adult who is appeal rights exhausted, it is appropriate for the state to seek the removal of that adult from the UK in those circumstances. We are making an in-principle point about facilitating the removal of those with no rights to be here. The hon. and learned Gentleman seems to be suggesting that because someone came to this country as an unaccompanied asylum-seeking child, they have an enhanced right to remain in this country. We are saying that that is not correct. We should of course work with the Home Office to see that someone returns in those circumstances and that they are assisted to do so. Fundamentally, the provisions in the Children Act are designed for those who are likely to stay in the UK. Therefore it is our judgment that they should not apply and that is why we are bringing forward these provisions.

To the hon. Member for Rotherham I would add that we have consulted the Department for Education closely in the preparation of these provisions. The schedule therefore reflects a whole of Government view, rather than just a Home Office view.

[Sarah Champion]

May I have a brief clarification from the Minister? My understanding is that, if the child or young person is in a care home, the Minister is absolutely right—the age of 18 is the cut-off. If a child or young person is in foster care, I thought we had changed it so that the age at which they stop receiving support is now 21. Would that apply to an unaccompanied asylum seeker, or will they be discriminated against?

[James Brokenshire]

The point is that there is no discrimination. As I have already indicated, we are talking about children and the support provided under the Children Act. When someone turns 18, they are an adult and therefore we judge it is appropriate that the new provisions should apply. I think that the hon. Lady was highlighting the staying put duty in respect of foster parents. We are saying that, at the point at which someone becomes an adult, they should be leaving the UK and not staying put within the UK. Obviously, we have a strong desire to work with local authorities and with the young people themselves to support them in their departure from the UK.

I want to address the point about gaps made by the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North, which was also made in the briefing from the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association that I am sure hon. Members have received. We do not agree with the analysis that is given. Indeed, we think that the provisions in the new schedule will assist, because we can see that support is being provided. We are simplifying the basis on which the principal need of families without immigration status can be met by local authorities. That need is for accommodation and subsistence support to prevent destitution, as is clearly shown by the study I have highlighted and previously referred to. In respect of family groups, we are clear that section 17 of the Children Act will remain the basis on which local authorities will meet any other social care needs beyond destitution—that is, what they consider to be necessary to safeguard or promote the welfare of a child pending resolution of a family’s immigration status or their departure from the UK. I intervened on the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras on that point.

The individual case that the hon. and learned Gentleman highlighted involved moving to DWP benefits rather than asylum support. As has been flagged previously, there have been delays in respect of some of the provisions. The Immigration Act and schedule 3 provisions we are discussing are about simplifying the process, so that there are not those laborious human rights assessments that replicate a number of other assessments in the system. The intention is to close some of the gaps, rather than extend them. That is why we take a different view from the analysis articulated by the hon. and learned Gentleman and set out in the ILPA briefing notes. We can see a difference of principle in the Committee this morning on the appropriateness of continuing Children Act provisions beyond the age of 18. Our judgment is that at that stage people should be leaving the UK rather than staying, and therefore we are talking about two distinct mechanisms and two distinct means. I hope that the Committee will be minded to incorporate the new clause into the Bill.

Question put, That the Clause be read a Second time.

--- Later in debate ---

Clause 51 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

[Sarah Champion]

On a point of order, Mr Owen. May I have clarity on when amendment 70 will be considered?

[The Chair]

We will come to it shortly.

[The Chair]

When we come to clause 54, amendment 221 can be moved formally at that point. That will be followed by amendment 70. Ms Champion, are you happy with that?

[Sarah Champion]

Happy? I am delighted.

Clause 52 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 53

Regulations

Amendments made: 37, in clause 53, page 44, line 15, after “State” insert

‘or the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster’.

Part 7 of the Bill currently requires the Secretary of State or the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster to prepare a code of practice in respect of the English language requirement for public sector workers. The code comes into force in accordance with regulations. This amendment and amendments 38 and 39 ensure that clause 53 applies to regulations made by either the Secretary of State or the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster under Part 7.

Amendment 245, in clause 53, page 44, line 23, at end insert

‘() regulations under section (Private hire vehicles etc)(2),’.

This amendment provides for regulations making provision regarding taxis and private hire vehicles in Scotland and Northern Ireland to be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.

Amendment 38, in clause 53, page 44, line 39, after “State” insert

‘or the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster’.

See the explanatory statement for amendment 37.

Amendment 39, in clause 53, page 44, line 42, after “State” insert

‘or the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster’.—(James Brokenshire.)

See the explanatory statement for amendment 37.

Clause 53, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 54

Commencement

[The Chair]

Amendment 221 is to be moved formally.

Oral Answers to Questions

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Monday 16th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

It is clearly important that we tackle gang violence and look at the exploitation within gang culture, which sees very vulnerable young people exploited and forced into gangs. I will of course be working with all to ensure that there is appropriate support for combating that.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

The British crime survey shows an 87% rise in the reporting of rapes between October 2012 and March 2015. Sexual violence investigations need specialist expertise and supervision to ensure that cases are handled correctly and prosecutions are brought. What assurances can the Minister give that the proposed police cuts will not impact on the training and supervision of officers working on sexual violence cases?

[Karen Bradley]

The hon. Lady, who has significant experience and expertise in this area, will know that the increased recording of violence against women and girls is good news, because it means that more victims are prepared to come forward. I am very impressed by the work that I have seen police forces doing across the country to ensure that victims come forward and receive the right specialist and multi-agency support that they need.

Immigration Bill (Thirteenth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 10th November 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Keir Starmer]

In earlier debates on clause 34 and schedule 6, we have touched at great length on the subject of amendment 226, which is intended to reverse the removal of support altogether. A number of Committee Members quoted from the available evidence. In those circumstances, I do not propose to dwell heavily on amendment 226, but amendment 227 has not been dealt with.

The rates for asylum seekers supported under section 95 of the 1999 Act were originally set at 70% of income support, on the basis that their accommodation and utility bills would be paid for separately. As of August this year, asylum seekers, including children, on section 95 support who would otherwise be destitute now receive the same flat rate of support, as opposed to varying amounts for single adults, lone parents, families with children and so on. That rate set at just £36.95 a week, or just over £5 a day. A number of groups have looked at that rate of support, which is manifestly very low. In 2013, a cross-party parliamentary inquiry into asylum support for children and young people, which took evidence from 150 local authorities, found that

“the levels of support for asylum seeking families are meeting neither children’s essential living needs, nor their wider need to learn and develop. The levels are too low and given that they were not increased in 2012 they should be raised as a matter of urgency and increased annually at the very least in line with income support.”

The inquiry further recommended:

“The rates of support should never fall below 70% of income support.”

The Home Affairs Committee picked up the theme in October 2013, highlighting

“concerns about the level of support available to those who seek asylum in the UK.”

It concluded:

“This relative poverty of those on section 95 support is compounded by the fact that the vast majority of asylum applicants have not legally been allowed to work since 2002.”

We will come to that issue later. Amendment 227 would ensure that any asylum seeker who would otherwise be destitute received no less than 60% of income support, which is currently equal to £43.86 a week.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

I am going to speak to amendments 226 and 227, because they are both fundamental and speak to the humanity that I believe we have in this country.

I shall speak to amendment 226 first. Our immigration system has long recognised the need to afford special protection to families with children. It is heartening to hear the Minister reaffirm that position. However, the Bill will remove those protections by withdrawing support for refused asylum-seeking families with children. Irrespective of whether families should or should not return to their country of origin, it is incumbent upon us to ensure that the wellbeing of children is at the forefront of our asylum policy. The Government, by contrast, are seeking to withdraw all support for children when their parent’s application is refused, and to prevent statutory services from assisting children who become destitute.

The consequences of the complete withdrawal of support are severe. We have heard from witnesses that when refused asylum seekers have their support cut off, it both causes illness and complicates existing health problems. Those effects are even more pronounced given that asylum seekers will have been living below the poverty line, on just over £5 a day, for many months or even years while awaiting a decision. The pilot of section 9 of the Immigration Act 2004, which introduced similar measures, clearly demonstrated their negative impact on the health and wellbeing of refused asylum seekers. Refugee Action and the Refugee Council’s study of the pilot revealed that the majority of families with whom they worked had mental or physical health problems that were exacerbated by section 9. Some 80% of parents were found to have mental health problems and some 36% had significant physical health problems.

The risks to children are worsened still further by the potential to force families into exploitative situations in order to survive. Provisions in the Bill would see the criminalisation of illegal workers, the loss of the right to rent, the closure of bank accounts and the freezing of assets. In such an environment I am gravely concerned that exploitation will increase dramatically and that many of the positive steps made by the Modern Slavery Act 2015 may be fatally undermined.

The Bill will inevitably mean the cost of supporting families being passed to local authorities. The costs will be huge. As asylum seekers are overwhelmingly located in deprived areas, those with the least ability to absorb those costs will be faced with the highest bill. The north of England, for example, has about a third of the UK’s population, but Migration Yorkshire estimates that it will face half the cost. It has also highlighted that the societal impacts of such deprivation will be disproportionately felt in the north of England.

The Government’s view is that the changes are necessary to encourage refused migrants to leave, but a huge weight of evidence, including from the Home Office itself, suggests that that will simply not work. Indeed, the Bill is likely to make effective immigration control still harder. When parents think that their children’s life may be at risk if they return home, whether that fear is justified or not, they will generally opt for destitution in the UK as the lesser of two evils. The impact of the removal of support will be the removal of any incentive for failed migrants to maintain contact with the Home Office. The Bill will not only force migrants from the address at which they were known to the Home Office but ensure that migrants do not contact the Home Office again. How is immigration control to operate under those conditions? How is the Home Office expected to track and ultimately remove migrants with whom it has no contact and for whom it has no address? The Bill fails to address those serious questions.

The findings of the section 9 pilot clearly demonstrate the effect on immigration control of removing support. The Home Office’s own report stated that 39% of migrants from whom support was withdrawn absconded, compared with 21% of those who remained supported. Only one family was successfully removed, compared with nine in the control group, and there was no significant increase in voluntary returns. Section 9 almost doubled the rate of absconding, greatly decreased the chances of successful removal and had no impact whatever on families choosing to leave the UK. How can that possibly achieve the Government’s objectives?

We are facing, then, changes that will place families in poverty, cost local authorities and have a disproportionate impact on poor areas. The changes will make it more difficult to remove failed asylum seekers and will do nothing to encourage them to return of their own accord. The Government should reconsider this ill thought out step and support amendment 226.

In the Bill the Government have sought to withdraw the pitifully low level of support currently provided to asylum seekers. The question of if and when the support should be withdrawn has been widely discussed in Committee. Amendment 227 would instead address the support itself, to ensure that it provides the most basic needs for asylum seekers. As currently calculated, section 95 support unquestionably does not do so. Over recent years, Government cuts and a four-year freeze in the rate of the support have seen its value fall well below the level of 75% of income support at which it was originally set. That level in itself was determined as the absolute bare minimum necessary to stave off poverty.

Section 95 support is currently £36.95 a week, or a little over £5 a day. With that money, asylum seekers must pay for food, clothing, toiletries, transport and all necessities. Asylum seekers’ situation is made even more precarious by the fact that they often arrive in Britain with nothing at all and in many cases are already malnourished and in poor health.

Repeated studies have found that section 95 support fails to meet basic needs. Research in 2013 by Refugee Action found that 70% of those surveyed were unable to buy either enough food to feed themselves, or fresh fruit and vegetables, or food that met their religious or cultural needs. Similarly, all respondents to a research survey by Freedom from Torture stated that their income was insufficient to meet their basic needs. Both surveys indicated that asylum seekers usually had to sacrifice one essential need to meet another.

A 2013 cross-party inquiry found that support was not meeting children’s basic needs. Children seeking refugee protection are some of the hardest hit by the lowest levels of support. Children under 19 recently saw their weekly payment under section 95 slashed from £52.96 a week to £36.95. That will leave a single parent with one child struggling to survive on an amount that is less than 50% of income support, despite the fact that children require extra support, especially to fully meet their social, educational and health needs. Even prior to the cuts, all lone parent respondents to Refugee Action’s research survey reported that they could not buy items for their children’s education and wellbeing, such as toys, books or stationery. No children should be forced to live in poverty as a result of Government policy, especially not those seeking protection from persecution.

One of the stated justifications for keeping asylum support rates low was that both section 95 support and section 4 support were only temporary. However, in the second quarter of this year, roughly 60% of the 29,586 pending asylum cases had either been waiting over six months for an initial decision or were awaiting further review. The Home Affairs Committee has already raised concerns about the impact of living off asylum support for extended periods of time.

In complying with a 2014 High Court judgment, the Government calculated the level of support necessary to meet asylum seekers’ most basic needs, based upon expenditure data from the Office for National Statistics for the lowest 10% income group in the UK. However, the Home Office saw fit to revise those figures downwards. In doing so, it introduced a subjective element to the calculation and ensured that support levels are vulnerable to political or budgetary pressures. Amendment 227 would introduce a level of support based on ONS data for the current financial year and ensure that it was adjusted according to the consumer prices index each year. Without those adjustments, support will continue to be eroded and asylum seekers will be pushed deeper into poverty.

Uprating asylum support levels would ensure that those seeking protection were able to meet their most basic needs. The level proposed in amendment 227 can hardly be described as profligate, amounting to only the absolute minimum necessary to stave off poverty. It is vital that we act now to address what amounts to state-enforced poverty. Failure to do so will inevitably lead to more and more vulnerable people being driven into increasingly desperate circumstances.

[Anne McLaughlin]

I always find—I am sure everyone will agree—that when looking at legislation it is important to remember who we are talking about and think through who will be affected by legislative changes. I will focus on one reason why amendment 226 is so important. I want to share with the Committee the story of Zara, whom I came to know extremely well, though not as well as my sister came to know her.

It took a long time for the trust to build up with Zara. She was extremely religious, came from a middle eastern country as an asylum seeker and had been refused asylum. She was therefore destitute. She came to trust my sister and, in her broken English, eventually managed to tell her what she needed. I do not want to say the words I am going to say, but I am going to say them anyway. What she needed was sanitary towels. She shared two stories—this came later, after more trust was built up—of cringe-worthy, humiliating experiences that she had gone through because she was destitute and had no support.

Once, when Zara was coming off the bus—and before anyone complains that if she had money for bus fares she had money for hygiene products, those bus tickets were given by a Glasgow charity that helps people with getting about—she heard a little boy saying something to his mum. She could not quite make out what he was saying, but he was pointing at her, and she realised was bleeding. Any woman would feel the horror and humiliation of that, but she was extremely religious and that was just the end for her.

Another experience came when a charity had made it possible for Zara to have three nights’ accommodation in the home of a very kind person. The Committee will be able to imagine what I will say. She bled through the night—because of her erratic lifestyle she had no idea that her period was about to come—and she was horrified when she woke up in the morning, went to clean the sheets and discovered the blood had seeped through to the mattress. There was no way of hiding from that very kind person, to whom she was extremely grateful, what had happened.

[Sarah Champion]

As I listen to the story, my heart is being ripped out, but I think what disturbs me most is having to justify someone going on a bus, as if that is an extravagant luxury. Is that what we have come to?

[Anne McLaughlin]

The hon. Lady raises an important point, and I gave the justification I did because in this Committee I think I am getting to the stage when I can read the minds of some of the Conservative Members. As they did not intervene I explained how Zara managed to get on a bus.

I want to make it clear that I appreciate how uncomfortable people in this room might feel at hearing me talk about bleeding and sanitary towels. I would not normally do that; I am normally discreet, easily embarrassed and notoriously squeamish. I feel extremely uncomfortable standing here forcing myself to talk about periods, bleeding and sanitary towels, and repeating myself again and again. I am doing it because I want everyone to feel uncomfortable; I want us all to feel that discomfort, because we need to realise that whatever we feel now is a minuscule fraction of what the women I am talking about experience.

To continue reading minds, some Members might think that there are charities and good Samaritans, and ask whether help could not be got from them; but it was so painful for Zara to ask for that help. There are charities that go out to offer help, but they are primarily focused on putting a roof over someone’s head, and, if they cannot do that, on feeding them, because food is essential and hygiene products are not. They are essential only to someone’s mental wellbeing, and the charities obviously must concentrate on keeping people alive.

Again, to use telepathy—it is working well—Conservative Members may be thinking that the simple solution would be just to go home. That is all very well, but as we have heard so many times, a significant proportion of the decisions made about people are wrong. It may therefore be assumed that a significant proportion of the people who some Members may think choose to stay here and humiliate themselves with having to ask for sanitary products have no choice.

I cringe when I talk and think about Zara. I do not imagine that anyone in the room is not cringing, and I understand that, but we can do something about it. In this amendment, we are not asking for money for fripperies; we are asking for money for absolute essentials, so that people can, first, stay alive; and secondly, and just as important, are allowed their dignity. Anyone who votes against this amendment today must be honest with themselves and know that they are consciously and deliberately denying that dignity to these women and to many others. I appeal to the Minister and to Government Members to defy their Whip and vote aye—vote in favour of dignity for everyone.

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[Keir Starmer]

I beg to move amendment 228, in schedule 6, page 100, line 16, at end insert—

‘(43A) The Immigration Act 1971 is amended as follows.

(43B) After section 3(9) (general provisions for regulation and control) insert—

“(10) In making rules under subsection (2), the Secretary of State must have regard to the following.

(11) Rules must provide for persons seeking asylum, within the meaning of the rules, to apply to the Secretary of State for permission to take up employment and that permission must be granted if—

(a) a decision has not been taken on the applicant’s asylum application within six months of the date on which it was recorded, or

(b) an individual makes further submissions which raise asylum grounds and a decision on that fresh claim or to refuse to treat such further submissions as a fresh claim has not been taken within six months of the date on which they were recorded.

(12) Permission for a person seeking asylum to take up employment shall be on terms no less favourable than those upon which permission is granted to a person recognised as a refugee to take up employment.””

This proposed amendment would provide for asylum seekers to be able to work if their claim is not determined within the Home Office target time of six months.

The amendment follows amendment 227 in that it would provide for asylum seekers to be able to work if their claim was not determined within the Home Office target time of six months. One of the injustices here is that those who have to exist on the low rates that the Committee has just discussed must do so under a system that prohibits them from working.

More than 3,600 asylum seekers currently wait more than six months for an initial decision on their cases. They are the individuals surviving on just over £5 a day, as we have just discussed. As things stand, they can apply for permission to work only if they have been waiting for more than a year for an initial decision. If that permission is granted, they are allowed to seek employment only in an occupation listed on the shortage occupation list.

This system has changed over the years as a result of a number of challenges and different policy decisions. The evidence that not allowing people to work deters them from coming to the UK is extremely hard to maintain when the position in other EU countries is taken into account. Some 11 EU countries grant permission to work after six months or less, if a decision has not been made on the asylum application. All those countries have had policies in place for many years. The recast EU reception conditions directive reduces the period an asylum seeker can be excluded from the labour market in an initial decision to nine months. Some 27 EU states have more generous policies than the UK as a combined result of those provisions.

This simple amendment would put people who have had to wait more than six months for their decision in a position where they can work, which is what many of them want to do. The net result for the taxpayer is likely to be a saving rather than a cost.

[Sarah Champion]

I would like to build on my hon. and learned Friend’s well made argument. I thank the Regional Asylum Activism Project for Yorkshire and Humberside for their help.

Despite often arriving in the UK with a host of skills and experiences gained in their country of origin, hardly any asylum seekers are allowed to work while their claim is being assessed by the Home Office. Only asylum seekers who have waited over 12 months for an initial decision on their case are eligible to apply for permission to work, but even those granted permission to work are not allowed to work in a self-employed capacity, set up a business, or take up a job that is not included on the highly specialised shortage occupation list. The current restrictions on accessing employment for people seeking refugee protection stops many highly skilled, experienced and educated individuals from contributing to the UK’s economy and society. For example, refugees started Marks & Spencer and brought us fish and chips and the Mini. People seeking refugee protection today will include, among many others, entrepreneurs, doctors, nurses, engineers, teachers, scientists and solicitors. Fundamentally, allowing asylum seekers to work will make economic, social and political sense.

First, on economics, if asylum seekers were granted permission to work, they would be able to contribute to the UK economy immediately through income tax, adding directly to the UK’s coffers. Equally, amounts spent on asylum support would decline, resulting in a net benefit to the economy. That has been recognised by the European Commission, which states:

“Mandatory unemployment… imposes costs on the State through the payment of additional social welfare payments.”

Government research has also recognised that delayed entry to the labour market, loss of skills and confidence, and difficulty getting qualifications recognised in this country can cause problems even when status is granted, leading to high levels of unemployment and underemployment. Allowing people to work while waiting for their asylum claim decision will not only allow them to start rebuilding their lives free from persecution, but allow them to start the journey towards meaningful employment as soon as possible.

Secondly, the indirect costs of enforced poverty are significant. Without the right to work, people in the asylum system are forced to rely on Government support to survive, but with asylum support rates set at £5.28 a day—barely 50% of the income support equivalent—many in the asylum system are forced into institutionalised poverty. As I and other hon. Members have said, extended periods living in poverty have huge impacts on physical and mental health and self-esteem. For some, a reliance on Government support is considered shameful, as they are unable to support themselves and their families; that concern has been raised by the cross-party parliamentary inquiry into asylum support for children and young people. Research from the University of Leeds and the University of Salford found that the experience of poverty was a key factor in pushing many individuals in the asylum process into exploitative and precarious working conditions. I suggest that providing those in the asylum process with the legal permission to work is in line with the Government’s commitment to ending modern day slavery.

Thirdly, the rationale for the current policy does not hold up. The reasons for restricting permission to work for asylum seekers hinge on the idea that it will act as pull factor, but it is important to remember the conclusions of research the Home Office commissioned in 2002:

“There was very little evidence that the sample respondents had a detailed knowledge of: UK immigration or asylum procedures; entitlements to benefits in the UK; or the availability of work in the UK.”

That was confirmed by a review of the 19 main recipient countries for asylum applications in the OECD in 2011, which concluded that policies that relate to the welfare of asylum seekers did not impact on the number of applications made in destination countries. All but one of the countries that granted permission to work to people seeking asylum received fewer asylum applications than the UK in 2012 and 2013.

A change of policy to allow asylum seekers the permission to work is long overdue. In 2007, the Joint Committee on Human Rights described the denial of the right to work for asylum seekers as part of a “deliberate policy of destitution”, which was breaching human rights. In 2013, the cross-party parliamentary inquiry into asylum support for children and young people called for parents and young people to be given permission to work while their claims were being decided. Thirteen local authorities have passed motions condemning the destitution of people seeking asylum. To date, 71 current Members of this House, of all political persuasions, have signed Still Human Still Here’s declaration on permission to work. They join the Trades Union Congress and a broad coalition of organisations, from Refugee Council to Crisis, Doctors of the World to The Children’s Society, in their call for people seeking refugee protection to be allowed to live in dignity, not destitution.

Allowing asylum seekers permission to work will enable many to support themselves through the asylum process. We should grant permission to work to all asylum seekers if they have been waiting more than six months for an initial decision, up until their protection needs are recognised or a safe route back to their country of origin has been negotiated. For this reason, I urge the Minister to support the amendment.

[James Brokenshire]

This is clearly a debate that has been going on for some time. I know there are differences of opinion on the time period that should or should not operate for those who have claimed asylum in this country. The amendment would radically change existing permission to work arrangements for asylum seekers, allowing permission to work where an asylum claim is still outstanding after six months instead of 12 months, removing the caveat that any delay must not be of the asylum seeker’s own making and lifting all restrictions on the type of employment available. Those are the three elements that have been advanced by Opposition Members.

The amendment would enable persons to take any employment of their choice, rather than be restricted to those on the shortage occupation list published by the Home office. The arguments made were initially about compliance with some of our EU obligations and what other EU partners are doing—I will come on to that—and then, separately, what those who are working could contribute. Also, some evidence was adduced on whether permission to work is a pull factor. Let me deal with each in turn.

On the issue of the EU, our current position is consistent with our obligations under the EU reception conditions directive, which sets out the minimum benefits and entitlements afforded to asylum seekers while they await a decision on their claim. That is reflected in part 11B of the immigration rules, but we decided not to opt in to the recast reception conditions directive requiring member states to grant automatic access to the labour market for asylum seekers after nine months, regardless of a decision at first instance being taken, because we considered the Commission’s proposal could undermine our asylum system by encouraging unfounded claims from those seeking to use the asylum system as a cover for economic migration.

It is important to understand that asylum claims cover a range of different circumstances and scenarios. Someone might have claimed asylum at their point of arrival, or been smuggled into this country and then claimed asylum. Someone may already be in the UK, having come via a lawful route, and circumstances change in their home country, so they might claim asylum, or they simply seek to stay here and they use an asylum claim as a means of extending their stay in this country. Sadly, that is the reality of some of the asylum claims that we seek to respond to within the system.

The amendment poses a challenge. Should we be taking steps that are more consistent with our EU partners? I think that in the UK it is right that we should form our own decisions, based on our assessment of our asylum system and what we judge is in the best interests of this country, while supporting the processing and the proud tradition that we have had in this country of granting asylum in this country.

On the labour market issues, an argument was advanced in the context of the asylum support budget, but that argument does not take into account the potential to open up the resident labour market in a way that could blur the distinction between economic migration and asylum. I genuinely worry about measures that blur that distinction. People could apply for asylum but not engage with the process, with the deliberate intent of delaying the process so that they can then be granted the benefit of being able to work after the end of the six-month period. We are concerned that this may lead to an increase in asylum applications that would divert valuable resources away from ensuring that those genuinely in need of protection are recognised quickly, enabling them to integrate and begin rebuilding their lives. That is the approach that we have taken in seeking to ensure that the processing of asylum claims is much better than it was when this Government came in.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

The hon. Gentleman makes the point that I was underlining about the need to see that asylum claims are processed as efficiently and effectively as possible. However, I do think that the amendment would blur the lines and might well lead to spurious or inappropriate asylum claims being made, perhaps by people already in this country coming to the end of their stay, whether they came as visitors, students or via other routes. That is a real challenge. The amendment would undermine the integrity of what we all believe in: providing protection to those who are fleeing persecution, ensuring that we have a system that is efficient, effective and focused on making those decisions and seeing that people receive support as recognised refugees at the earliest opportunity. It risks more claims, of whatever character, being made.

We also have to bear in mind the resident labour market. It is argued that if you give an asylum seeker the right to work, you are, in essence, denying a job to someone who is already living in this country lawfully. Because of the implications of that we judge that it is right to have a system that recognises that if there is delay—we judge that 12 months is the right period—people can work, but they should not be seeking to frustrate or delay the system; that test has to be captured as well. It is about shortage skills, those that are needed. That is why the focus is there, otherwise we get into a blurring of issues in relation to economic migration. We must do our utmost to ensure that people in this country who have the skills and the ability are able to access the job market.

[Sarah Champion]

I hear the Minister’s argument. Does he know—if he does not, perhaps he will write to us—the average length of time that an asylum claim takes? From the casework that I get, it seems to be considerably more than 12 months normally, so does his argument stack up? What is the difference between six months and 12 months if the average is 18 months?

[James Brokenshire]

I can tell the hon. Lady that 85% of cases are straightforward and we have a service standard of dealing with those within six months. We dealt with a big backlog earlier this year—that is why I make the point about the effort that has gone in. Many people in the asylum processing system will say that asylum processing is probably in as good a place now as it has been in for many years, but of course I look for further improvements; we do not sit back. Equally, it depends on some of the pressures in terms of changes or increases in the numbers of those who are claiming asylum. We are very vigilant in monitoring how we are dealing with this. I can say to the hon. Lady that 85% of cases are straightforward and that our service standard is to deal with those within six months. Obviously, it is difficult to know what proportion of the people in her constituency may be in the situation she describes; it is difficult to draw that parallel. However, I hope that it is helpful at least to set out the approach that we are taking and that balance in terms of how asylum claims are dealt with.

We judge that the current policy strikes the right balance. Asylum seekers are provided with support and accommodation, but if their asylum claims are undetermined for 12 months for reasons outside their control, they can apply for permission to work. We believe that that is a fair and reasonable policy that we should keep. For the reasons that I have outlined, we ask that the amendment be withdrawn.

Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Thursday 5th November 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

I think we have different recollections of the evidence sessions. I do not recall just one organisation doing that.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

I agree with my hon. Friend; I did not hear only one organisation say that. I will say that I used to run a children’s hospice and, even when people were told the reality of what was going to happen, they always had hope. Even if it is to someone through the entire process, not everyone listens to reality.

[Mrs Lewell-Buck]

I believe it is clear that whatever happens, the Government intend to introduce stricter conditions than currently exist for supporting failed asylum seekers, to try to encourage people to leave the UK more quickly once an asylum claim has failed. There is one obvious problem with that approach, which is that the evidence shows that it simply does not work. I will return to that when we discuss later amendments, but for the moment it is enough to say that cutting off support will make families less, not more, likely to engage with the Home Office and leave the UK voluntarily. Denying people support will be counterproductive if the Government aim to increase the number of voluntary returns. If those are the consequences of withdrawing support, having a proper right of appeal becomes even important.

The reason to support the amendment is simple. The right of appeal is needed because on far too many occasions, initial decisions are incorrect. Nearly two thirds of appeals are successful, and that amounts each year to hundreds of cases or, to put it another way, hundreds of people and families. When new section 95A comes into force, those people will be wrongly deprived of food and shelter.

The Home Office’s assessments of destitution are very poor. The asylum support tribunal overturns a high proportion of decisions; in 2011, the figure was an incredible 82%. If those people had not had a right of appeal, how would they have accessed the support that they were entitled to? How will they be able to do so in future? Without a right of appeal, the only recourse for those individuals would be judicial review, which is no substitute for a proper right of appeal. Judicial review, as we all know, requires time and money, which are things that people whose asylum claim has failed simply do not have.

Inevitably, hundreds of people who will have every right to support under new section 95A will be unable to access it. I cannot accept that the Minister and the Government are comfortable knowing that hundreds of people who are legally entitled to support will be left with nothing, but that will be the effect of schedule 6 if it is not amended. Ultimately, the debate is about the quality of decision making. Are the Government prepared to accept poor decision making and the injustices that stem from it? If they are not, they should accept our amendment.

[Sarah Champion]

I, too, want to speak in support of amendment 222. Throughout the Bill, the Government propose various measures to remove the right to appeal against Home Office decisions. Reading the Bill, one cannot but conclude that the Government are fundamentally opposed to their decisions being challenged in anything approaching an independent manner.

The consequences of the decision to deny support are potentially catastrophic. A migrant who is denied support has no right to work and no right to rent. Their bank account is closed and their assets are frozen. The choices that people in that position face are bleak. The Bill acknowledges the need to support refused migrants who have genuine obstacles to leaving the UK, but it has not been made clear what a genuine obstacle will be, even though my Opposition colleagues have been pushing for clarity. My hon. Friend the Member for South Shields has just raised the matter yet again. What is clear, however, is who decides whether the obstacle exists. It is the Home Office, without scrutiny, oversight or effective challenge. That is bad practice in any process, but in the light of the Home Office’s frankly miserable record of making the correct decision the first time, it will be disastrous.

There is currently a right of appeal on decisions made about section 4 support. Statistics from the asylum support tribunal should make for uncomfortable reading for the Government, because 62% of appeals between September 2014 and August 2015 were successful. The claims were allowed, sent back to the Home Office for a fresh decision or withdrawn in acknowledgement of a flawed decision.

The Home Office has a similarly poor record in assessing destitution. In 2014-15, the Asylum Support Appeals Project represented 168 asylum seekers whom the Home Office had denied support on the grounds that it did not believe that they were destitute. Of those decisions, 70% were overturned on appeal. Such figures cannot but lead us to the conclusion that there is a serious problem with Home Office decision making. During the Committee’s evidence sessions, witnesses offered various explanations for those failings, from inadequate training to overly complex immigration regulations, and Ministers have given other examples. Whatever the reasons, however, when nearly two thirds of decisions are being overturned on appeal, something needs to be done to address the problem.

The Government’s solution in the Bill and in previous immigration legislation is indeed novel: simply abolish the right to appeal. That will certainly result in far fewer Home Office decisions being reversed, but it is hardly a solution that will in any way contribute to better decision making. Children and families will be badly affected by the loss of appeal rights. Section 95 support will no longer continue for families with children at the end of the asylum process. That poses a serious risk of leaving children destitute with no judicial oversight, as was clearly detailed by my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields.

Given the high proportion of Home Office decisions that will be overturned by the tribunal, the lack of appeal rights will inevitably transfer the responsibility for supporting destitute children to local authorities. We have heard from the Minister that the Department is in good consultation with local authorities, which is great, but the reality is that children who should be being supported by the Home Office will instead have to rely on overstretched local authority budgets to meet those most basic needs.

Much has been said of the need to ensure that our immigration system is one in which the public can have confidence. However, the way to achieve that confidence is not to pander to sensationalist headlines, but to ensure that most of the time the Home Office gets it right first time. Abolishing the right to challenge poor decisions and forcing people into the most abject poverty will not in any way contribute to achieving a goal that I am sure we all share.

[Paul Blomfield]

I am pleased to have an opportunity to contribute to this debate. I will not repeat the woeful statistics that others have mentioned in relation to successful appeals, but I think that all those points should draw the Committee’s concern to the appropriate response, which must be about getting the process right, as opposed to abolishing people’s rights, because the net effect of the proposals will be that people who could otherwise win appeals will be left destitute.

The Minister talked at length about the dialogue between the Home Office and local authorities. I would like to share some concerns that local authorities in the region that I represent have expressed. They come together in an organisation called Migration Yorkshire, from across the entire county. They are anticipating that the impact of the provisions will be to leave significant numbers of refused asylum seekers destitute. They make a point, which is worth bearing in mind when the Minister says that measures such as this are about encouraging people to return: they ask, “Return to what?” We are talking about people who, in many cases, come from unstable and dangerous states. In their evidence, they cite Eritrea, Iran and Sudan. The choice of returning, or being destitute in Britain might not be a hard choice to make for many people, actually. Destitution in the UK is probably better than going back to a war zone and being destitute there.

It is clear that, under this policy, more refused asylum seekers will become destitute without the right to appeal. The local authorities’ concern is that the amount will increase in several towns and cities across Yorkshire, with all the related health and cohesion issues that will disproportionately affect some of our bigger cities, where we already face problems with the rise in rough sleeping and wider destitution. They are worried that local agencies will lose contact with refused asylum seekers, who will have very little incentive to stay in touch. They are concerned that unsupported, refused asylum seekers will feel compelled to use illegal forms of accommodation —to be in overcrowded, unhealthy conditions, potentially putting their friends in breach of tenancy agreements—and that they will feel compelled, in conflict with the Government’s policy objectives, to undertake illegal forms of employment to survive, opening themselves up to exploitation and abuse.

In Committee so far I have cited the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary; now I will turn to the thoughts of another member of the Cabinet. The comment is not contemporary, but arose from a 2008 study by the Centre for Social Justice, which, incidentally, stated:

“Making refused asylum seekers homeless and penniless is hugely counterproductive: it makes it much more difficult to work with them to encourage voluntary return or to ensure timely removal, and in driving them underground makes it harder to keep track of them.”

The foreword to the report was provided by the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith), now the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, who has provided inspirational guidance to the Government in a number of areas. We should pay serious attention to his words. He said:

“It also appears that a British government is using forced destitution as a means of encouraging people to leave voluntarily. It is a failed policy…still driven by the thesis, clearly falsified, that we can encourage people to leave by being nasty.”

I rest my case.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

I will come to that. The issue is equally one of fairness to those who play by the rules—those who put in applications, are here lawfully, and have not sought to overstay their visa or put in an asylum claim to try to drag it out in a further attempt to remain in the country. It is fair to those people who have done the right thing that people who do not have that right should leave. We need a better basis of incentives and possible sanctions and, together with local authorities, we need to engage with families in the process to secure more returns and to underline those clear messages.

[Sarah Champion]

I genuinely do not think that any of my colleagues are disagreeing that we want a strong, robust system. We are trying to argue that, looking at the number of appeals decisions that are overturned, the system is not strong and robust. We want a fair system too, but there are people falling through the net, who then get a fair outcome on appeal. To lose that right of appeal does not seem to provide that justice that the Minister seeks.

[James Brokenshire]

Obviously we have existing arrangements under sections 95 and 4 of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999. We are moving towards a different arrangement under proposed new section 95A, which will apply where there is a genuine obstacle to departure. To be clear, that will be defined in regulations. We expect that obstacle to be either the lack of necessary documentation or a medical reason. Of course, the person will need to show that they are making reasonable steps to obtain the relevant documentation. The Bill does not provide a right of appeal against the decision that no such obstacles exist because that should be a straightforward matter of fact for which a statutory right of appeal is not needed.

Immigration Bill (Ninth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

On top of the points of serious concern that my hon. and learned Friend has already mentioned, does he also share my concern that there is now no safeguard if the landlord pursues a wrongful conviction?

[Keir Starmer]

There is a very serious concern, because as far as I can see there is no ability in the clause for the tenant to appeal the landlord. I am not even sure under these circumstances whether judicial review is available.

--- Later in debate ---

[Keir Starmer]

I am grateful for that intervention, and I ask Government Members to take notice of that evidence. I also ask them not to just nod this change through. This is not just a provision in an immigration Bill in 2015; this will turn the clock back 40 years in landlord and tenant law against a practice that everybody recognized served great injustice. That law does not mean that there cannot be an eviction; it means that there must be due process and it avoids self-help, and self-help by landlords is a very bad idea.

There is no appeal, and I would again like to hear from the Minister, on the record, whether his answer to that point is that there should be a judicial review of the issue of the notice by the Secretary of State in order to challenge the eviction. I want that to be clear, because it would introduce a costly—much more costly—prolonged process than going to the county court in the ordinary eviction process under landlord and tenant law. If not, and there is either no remedy or appeal, what if the notice by the Secretary of State is wrong? Is that to be appealed by way of judicial review? Is that the only prospect? If that is the prospect, why is it better than going to the county court in the usual way, where it could be challenged in the eviction process?

[Sarah Champion]

Another consideration that I have not heard the Minister speak of is that if families are effectively made street homeless, it then falls on the local authority and will put additional pressures on existing housing stock. Going through this route, the local authority may have absolutely no awareness of it until the family literally rocks up on their doorstep.

[Keir Starmer]

That is the situation. The Government may say that I am just exaggerating, but I am not. I had a number of housing cases in my practice and some Government Members probably have as well. Having self-help evictions is a real problem for everybody, because of the injustice and the violence. Under self-help, there is nothing wrong with waiting until the family go out and changing the locks so that they cannot get back in when they come home. That means that families are out and, if there are children involved, it probably leads back to the same route, with the local authority having to carry out an assessment under the Children Act 1989.

This is a thoroughly bad provision. It is innovative—it has never been used, as far as I know, in landlord or tenant law or outside the realm of enforcement of regularised fines. There is no appeal and no regular forms of enforcement. To again clarify, under the existing regime, High Court enforcement officers have special powers of eviction and there are processes of eviction to ensure that there is no violence, that there is due process and that everybody is treated fairly.

There is absolutely no reason to change that scheme for this group of individuals. I hope that Members will not simply nod this change through as another bad provision not worth raising any concerns about. This goes way beyond immigration and into the housing field, where there has been unanimity about this process for a very long time. I ask the Minister to clarify, if necessary in writing, how he sees this provision working and what the routes of appeal are for an individual who says either that the notice from the landlord or the notice from the Secretary of State is wrong. This an area, as heard in evidence, where there are high levels of error.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

The hon. and learned Gentleman has already highlighted the avenue that is available to the landlord in terms of relief that is provided by virtue of the order being from the High Court. That mechanism is therefore available to landlords seeking removal if that cannot be achieved by peaceable means. That is why I made the point that the Criminal Law Act 1977 remains in place.

In that respect there is also the issue of children, and I am aware that what the Secretary of State will do when these duties are undertaken has been of concern. We would not give an undertaking that a family with children will never be evicted under any circumstances. As I have already indicated, a family will not be subject to eviction if there are insuperable barriers to their returning to their home country. Families in private rented accommodation are unlikely to be destitute if they are renting in the first place, but at every stage in the discharge of functions relating to the family returns process and when issuing a notice in respect of a child who would be disqualified from renting, regard will be had to the need to safeguard and promote the welfare of children in accordance with the duty in section 55 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009.

Again, I underline some of the safeguards which we already have within the family returns process. We have a family returns panel that examines the mechanisms and routes that are used to seek a removal of a family with children from the UK. The panel looks at the removal strategy; in essence, as moves are made towards deportation, the panel can and does comment on the removal approach. Equally, there are mechanisms in the context of section 55 that provide safeguards, as well as the practical operational steps that are embodied in the way in which immigration enforcement conducts its duties when removing family groups which, obviously, involve children.

[Sarah Champion]

I wonder whether the Minister can provide clarity on what would happen to the person or family’s bond, which can be quite a hefty amount of money. For a bad landlord, there is quite an incentive to get people evicted if they then keep the bond.

[James Brokenshire]

Again, this is not about rogue landlords and bond arrangements. This is about those who have no lawful right to be in this country and it provides a mechanism to create the eviction process. Obviously, contractual provisions in respect of bond arrangements and returns of deposits would remain in place. We are talking about the eviction process itself. I think the hon. Lady is flagging a more general issue of bad practice by rogue landlords, who do not necessarily return bonds. That is a slightly tangential point, but that is not in any way to undermine its significance or importance. There is a need to ensure that landlords fulfil their contractual duties to repay deposits and other moneys due to the tenant at the end of their tenancy.

The Home Office will work closely with individuals who are subject to the notification to facilitate removal prior to the service of the notice, so this measure should not be seen in isolation. The Home Office will not simply issue a notice; it will be part of an overall removals approach. Tenants will have access to Home Office support should they consider a notice has been served in error; it is not simply a judicial review route. We anticipate the individuals would have a route of direct challenge to the Home Office, although judicial review provides a further mechanism through the courts. As I have already indicated, the landlord would be able to evict only by using peaceful means. Force or violence could not be used. Where a landlord is not able to evict peacefully, they will need to seek the help of High Court enforcement officers to carry out the eviction.

We have considered the clause carefully because of all the issues. I hope that having clarified the process that is intended, the remedies that are available, the nature of the provision and the safeguards that are provided, the Committee will be minded to include the clause in the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Solicitor General]

Yes, that is right.

[Sarah Champion]

I understand the principles and the motivation behind the provisions, but I have some concerns about clauses 16 and 17. As with the right to rent provisions, they will undoubtedly have an impact on legal migrants, British citizens who cannot easily prove their immigration status and ethnic minorities. The measures could lead to an increase in the racial profiling of drivers. The powers are worrying in that they are, in fact, stop-and-search powers. If they are exercised by immigration officers those officers need to be regulated in the same way as police officers are, with checks and balances to prevent abuse of power. Can the Solicitor General spell out how the rights of individuals will be protected, and what redress they will have for wrongful or repeated searches and arrests?

[The Chair]

Solicitor General, would you like to respond to those points?

--- Later in debate ---

[Keir Starmer]

I can be relatively brief. My underlying point, which I put to the Minister now, is that in the evidence we heard two weeks ago, it was made clear that the police did not seek the new power and that they had not found any gap in their ability to deal with drivers who did not have regular status. Will the Solicitor General, at least for the record, set out the evidential basis for the creation of a new criminal offence? I go back to a proposition I put forward last week that criminal offences should not be introduced unless there is a clear case of necessity and a gap in the provisions available to law enforcement. If the law enforcement witnesses have not found a gap or asked for this, it would be helpful for the Committee to know the basis for the provisions in the first place.

Amendment 75 is in keeping with my other amendments to provide a defence for those who have a reasonable belief that they have a right to remain in the UK. The problem with this offence, as with the offence of illegal working, is that it is quasi-strict liability—in other words, there is no defence in the Bill. I ask Members opposite simply to read the amendment and ask themselves why they think it is necessary to criminalise someone who:

“had a reasonable belief that they had legal right to remain in the United Kingdom and acted in good faith”.

Why is it necessary to criminalise someone in that position? If Members vote against the amendment, that is what they will do.

I use again the example I used last week or the week before, where someone has been sponsored but, unbeknown to them, there is something wrong with the sponsorship. They may therefore find themselves in a position where they do not have the status they should have, although they have a reasonable belief that they have a right to be here and they acted completely in good faith. What is the legal case and the moral case for criminalising a person in that situation? The measure applies only in a case of reasonable belief and only if the individual acted in good faith. What is the case for criminalising such an individual?

If the Minister indicates that amendment 76 is unnecessary, I will withdraw it. It is driven by a concern not for the driver of the vehicle but for the victim of a road accident. It introduces a whole new category of individuals where there is a concern that there is a possible consequence. If I am wrong about this, I will withdraw the amendment. A possible consequence of these measures is that otherwise valid insurance that would have been available to the victim of a road traffic accident will be unavailable, having been made invalid because of the driving offence that has been created by this section. That is a real concern to those who are concerned about victims of road traffic accidents.

[Sarah Champion]

As I said earlier, we do not have a problem with clauses 16 and 17. The two amendments are designed to protect innocents. If the Minister is able to confirm that protection is in place, either in guidance or in the Bill, we would like to hear it.

[The Solicitor General]

Let me deal first with the question raised by the hon. and learned Gentleman about the evidence. There is a loophole involving people who are unlawfully here—illegal migrants—who are driving with foreign-issued licences. The offence will cover all aspects of driving by migrants who are in the United Kingdom unlawfully.

Every year, about 10,000 queries are referred to the Home Office by the police relating to either road-side stops or vehicle stops. We do not have precise numbers on cases where an illegal migrant was found to be driving a vehicle, but of the one fifth of cases related to vehicle stops, about 10% relate to drivers who are in the UK legally. I am talking about a loophole here. I think it is right that we try to close that when it comes to covering all incidents in which the authorities through other intelligence and other reasons to stop vehicles come into contact with people who are here unlawfully. The provision is another important tool to deal with a matter of public concern.

I recognise the reasons behind amendment 75, but in my view it is very broad and very subjective. It will create scenarios, for example, in which a defendant might claim they had reason to believe they were in the UK legally, simply because they had misunderstood the date on which their leave expired. It would be difficult to prove otherwise and then the purpose of the offence is undermined.

Let me deal with offences of strict liability in the context of driving. This concept is not new. For example, the offence of driving while disqualified under section 103 of the Road Traffic Act 1988, as amended, is an offence of strict liability, so this is not a new departure, although the defence would be a new departure when it comes to driving offences of this nature.

--- Later in debate ---

[Keir Starmer]

I beg to move amendment 74, in clause 17, page 21, line 30, at end insert—

‘(10A) Before laying regulations to bring Section 24D into force, the Secretary of State must ensure a pilot of the arrangements takes place.

(10B) Following the completion of the pilot mentioned in subsection (10A) the Secretary of State must prepare a report and lay it before each House of Parliament.

(10C) The pilot mentioned in subsection (1) must take place in a minimum of two police force areas and last for a minimum of six months.”

This amendment would ensure that the Home Secretary conducted a pilot of the proposed powers to allow police forces to confiscate the cars of suspected illegal immigrants before the measures were introduced.

I can deal with this amendment briefly. We have debated the provisions in the clause itself. Several concerns have been raised and several assurances have been given by the Government, but these are new provisions, so the amendment simply provides that they should be piloted before they are rolled out, partly to ensure that those assurances work in practice and partly because, when introducing new provisions of this sort, piloting is always a good idea to ensure that they work in practice. However, the substance of the debate has already been had, in terms of the concerns and assurances.

[Sarah Champion]

I was on the Select Committee for Transport and went out with the DVLA when it was doing some of its stops with police officers. I apologise for raising this question in this debate, but I did not know where else to raise it. I was shocked when the Minister said that 10,000 inquiries were made to the police last year. I know that the DVLA has vast concerns that it does not have the resources to investigate people driving illegal vehicles rather than illegal driving. How will the police, immigration and the DVLA work together? Also, has he considered the resources, which will be considerable if there are already 10,000 inquiries? Acting on those and investigating will be pretty resource-intensive. Can he comment on that?

[The Solicitor General]

I will certainly endeavour to answer the hon. Lady’s queries, but I will deal first with the substance of the amendment. I understand fully the intention behind it, but I view it as unworkable for two reasons. First, the regulations will set out the circumstances in which a vehicle may be released from detention and make provision for how vehicles should be disposed of where conditions governing the release of a vehicle are not met. Without laying regulations, therefore, we will not have the necessary legal powers to conduct a fully functioning pilot. I hope that the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras can accept that.

Secondly, there is a point of principle here that I am sure he will understand straight away. A pilot would require a criminal offence to be enforced in certain parts of the United Kingdom and not in others. Such a piecemeal approach is clearly not desirable from a practical point of view given, for example, that vehicles can be driven across a number of regions. I do not know about you, Mr Owen, but the thought of car chases in 1980s American films is coming to my mind, where people cross a state boundary and offences that might have been committed in one state are not enforceable in another.

[The Solicitor General]

I am sure that the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras would not wish us to go down that particular path—it is axiomatic, but it needs to be said. A pilot could therefore create confusion for migrants and complicate matters for the police when enforcing the offence.

As I have said, the chief superintendent, David Snelling, indicated to the Public Bill Committee in his evidence how the offence could work in practice. He explained that the police would first have cause to stop a vehicle and would then, as appropriate, ascertain the circumstances of the driver. If it is found that the driver is here illegally, the detention provisions can apply. The police are well versed in general processes relating to detaining, releasing and disposing of vehicles, so there are no new processes in the clause that might justify a pilot.

I will attempt to deal with the concerns of the hon. Member for Rotherham. The statistics that I mentioned concerned referrals to the Home Office. There is already a high degree of joint working and information sharing, which is proving an effective means for targeting and appropriately identifying people who are here unlawfully. On resources, for example training, the Home Office has been working with the police on developing the proposals and will continue to examine the potential need for further training with police colleagues. However, as I have said, these are not new types of power, so there is no absolutely overwhelming need for a complete start again on training.

I am assured that immigration resources are already in place and, as I said, this is not about a sudden general expansion in our expectation of how the police are going to behave. This is not an encouragement to the police to start randomly stopping people, which would of course have a huge impact on resources. Intelligence-led policing is not only intelligent, it is efficient. For those reasons, I hope that I have answered the genuine concerns that the hon. Lady raised.

[Sarah Champion]

With respect to the Minister, I am not concerned about resources for training; I am concerned about resources to have the police officers who can go out, stop or go into premises. In the Home Office cases that I get, a lot of the delays in deportation are caused by a lack of staff to carry out the work. Can the Minister reassure us that if we agree to this legislation, the police have the resources to act on it?

[The Solicitor General]

Yes, I can. Perhaps I have not clearly outlined that we do not expect police officers to take on a whole new swathe of different inquiries, independent of already existing intelligence and information; rather, this provision is a bolt-on. It allows police officers to follow another reasonable line of inquiry as a result of the intelligence they have already obtained. The scenario that the hon. Lady is concerned about is not one that is going to come to fruition. This is about putting another tool in the box, rather than an expectation that there are suddenly going to be new independent operations as a result of these new powers. I hope that gives the hon. Lady some reassurance.

Immigration Bill (Sixth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2015 Public Bill Committees

[James Brokenshire]

Matters of resourcing, and indeed the support that the director will require, are under careful consideration by Ministers. They are working on the recruitment of that individual and how that office will operate and be resourced. I would certainly wish to reflect further on the consultation, given its focus on the role and after hearing views in the debate on this Bill. We have not made final decisions about budgets or staffing—those decisions will be taken once there is agreement on the role and following the spending review. Clearly, the operation hub as part of that activity will be part of the overall examination of what is appropriate.

It is right that the consultation seeks views on the need for powers to share data and intelligence across the enforcement bodies and with other organisations. We are consulting a range of partners within and outside Government to understand what information they hold that might be of use to the director in designing the strategy to tackle performance and non-compliance and building the hub itself. We want to reflect further on how the hub is established, given what I have said about resourcing, the nature of the people who might need to be part of it, who would add the most value, and connections with different agencies. We have set the framework for this and I think that I have clearly set out the intent and what we wish to achieve. In implementation, we will certainly reflect on the further submissions received and the comments that have been made.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

This really is not meant to be a difficult question. The Minister is putting a lot of weight on the consultation, as we are. Is there not the facility to pause proceedings on the Bill so that the findings of the consultation can actually affect the Bill and we achieve the best legislation, which is what we all want?

[James Brokenshire]

No, the provisions of clause 6 state that the director must gather, store, process, analyse and disseminate information relating to non-compliance in the labour market. It is important that we provide this statutory mechanism. Equally, in terms of further development and implementation, it is not appropriate for us to legislate while constantly taking into account further submissions. I do not think that that cuts across the need for clause 6 or the manner in which the labour market enforcement director would conduct his duties. I do not see them in any respect as being at odds. I hope that in the light of those points the hon. and learned Gentleman will be minded to withdraw his amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Keir Starmer]

I agree with my hon. Friend and am grateful for his intervention. What is important is that the objective behind the Bill is properly pursued. There is a real risk that introducing an offence against the employee will be counterproductive if it drives underground the very group of people who are the most vulnerable when there is little or no evidence that the offence is needed.

I want to go a little further than that, because this is an offence without any mental element in the Bill. It is strict in the sense that absent the right status, the offence is made out, and then it is an offence without a defence, which is an unusual combination in criminal law. For example, some people will be here working in the belief that they have the right status because they are sponsored by the employer or somebody else. However, unbeknown to them, they may not have status because their employer has not correctly completed all the necessary arrangements for sponsorship. They fall into a category of individuals who are here without the required status, but without any knowledge of that or any intention to be in that position. Given the inflexibility of the offence, they would be immediately criminalised without even the opportunity of raising a defence of reasonable excuse. Their defence would be, “I am working. I had understood that my employer or somebody else had completed all the necessary forms and legalities. It now transpires they haven’t, but I had absolutely no reason to think that to be the case.” At the very least, if the clause is to stand, such an offence—there could be many other examples—ought to have a reasonable excuse defence, and that argument lies behind the amendment.

[Sarah Champion]

I speak in support of my hon. and learned Friend. It is fundamentally wrong to make the employee a criminal—it makes no sense. I have not been convinced by any of the witnesses we have heard or any of the evidence that I have seen that this is the right way to achieve the Government’s objectives.

My main concern is that the measure will compound exploitation. I would like to quote Caroline Robinson, one of our witnesses, from FLEX—Focus on Labour Exploitation—who put the three issues more succinctly than I can. She said:

“First, we think that people will be fearful of coming forward to be referred into the UK national referral mechanism as victims of trafficking…The second reason is that we know that traffickers use the threat of deportation, removal and reporting to immigration officials in order to abuse and exploit workers…The third reason is something that was raised a lot on Second Reading, namely the criminalisation of trafficked persons. Although the Home Secretary set out the statutory defence, which is in the Modern Slavery Act 2015, it is quite narrow in its terms. The schedules exclude a number of offences for the victims of trafficking, such as aggravated criminal damage, but if I was to leave the building in which I was held I would no longer be covered by the statutory defence in the Modern Slavery Act.”––[Official Report, Immigration Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2015; c. 24-25, Q50.]

My biggest concern is that the measure will stop whistleblowers. How will we identify bad employers if the very people who can give us that evidence are too scared to come forward for fear of being criminalised? It is not only bad employers that could be overlooked, but health and safety risks that could impact on a number of employees.

I am pleased about the Modern Slavery Act, which is a good and strong piece of legislation. I am also very pleased that the Minister has made it clear that people are protected under the Act if they are trafficked into the country. If they are used as a slave, they are exploited. However, I would like clarification from the Minister about how someone will be dealt with if their status shifts. For example, if someone was trafficked into the country and forced into slavery, but then managed to escape and became an illegal worker, would they be protected because at the start of their journey they were protected under the Modern Slavery Act, meaning that they would be treated as a victim, or would they be criminalised because, at the end of their journey, they were an illegal worker? What happens the opposite way round? If a person comes to the UK as an undocumented worker and is then exploited by their employer, at what point would they be protected if, having come to the country illegally as a worker, they were then used as a slave?

[Chloe Smith]

The hon. Lady and I both served on the Committee that considered the Bill that became the Modern Slavery Act. I looked at the list of exemptions in that Act while we heard the piece of evidence that she quoted. It is worth reminding the Committee that there is a set of defences in the Act, and to that set of defences, there is a set of exemptions. In that set of exemptions—this is rather like a Russian doll, but bear with me—there is an exemption on this point of criminal damage. In other words, an individual might be at risk of being accused of criminal damage only if they had behaved recklessly and endangered somebody’s life. That is in the Modern Slavery Act 2015, which the hon. Lady and I debated. Has she reflected on that before trying to advance this line of argument that the provision is all one thing, rather than being nuanced?

[Sarah Champion]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention; she is always fantastic on detail. My answer is yes, but I am not a lawyer, so I would like the Minister to lay out, in language that a former charity worker can understand, the protections for people who are exploited. To be honest, I am unclear. A number of our witnesses said they were unclear, although I recall that clarification was sought on this point.

I will give the hypothetical example of a woman who paid a criminal gang for her passage here and came expecting a job. She was given a job, but then told that she had to pay additional costs, which took away all of her income, effectively making her a slave without legal protection under our current system. She could be beholden to that employer for an indefinite period and be too terrified to speak out, because I can guarantee that the employer would use the fact that she would be reported and become a criminal if she did.

I do not see how clause 8 helps that person in any way. I would like clarification from the Minister about how that person could have the confidence to come forward when their employer is telling them that they will be criminalised if they do so. Surely the best approach is to stick with clause 9, under which the employer becomes liable for the actions and will be criminalised for those actions.

We know where the employers are. They will be registered at Companies House and they will be filing their taxes. It will be a lot easier to follow that trail to get the prosecutions, particularly with limited resources, rather than spending an indefinite period trying to track down illegal workers when we do not know who they are, where they are working or their status, just on the off chance that we might catch and criminalise them so that we send out the right message. Surely it is better to go for the employers.

[Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow North East) (SNP)]

I wonder whether there is a misunderstanding, or at least an underestimation, of how vulnerable some of these workers are. Does the Minister realise the extent of their vulnerability? If he does, will he change his mind about criminalising those who work illegally?

I will cite an example of not a young vulnerable woman trafficked here as a sex slave, but someone whom hon. Members might use as an example of why we need to criminalise. On my travels a few years ago, I spent time with a man called Mehdi, who was fit and healthy in his mid-thirties. He was married to Rezi, who was pregnant with their first child. They sought asylum in the UK—I met him some years after all this happened—and ended up in Glasgow where, despite their best efforts, they were refused asylum because they could not prove they were in danger. She had a miscarriage and they were made destitute. They were told they would be deported and they embarked on a terrible downward spiral. They removed themselves from all support mechanisms, so frightened were they of being found and deported to certain danger, but they could not survive here, so Mehdi found a job. He knew he was not allowed to do that, as did his employers, who took advantage of that knowledge and made him work extremely long hours for £3 an hour.

Mehdi was abused, exploited and occasionally beaten. He was worked until he would regularly collapse with exhaustion, but he had no choice. Some Government Members might argue that he did have a choice because he could have gone back to his home country. However, he was not working not just to feed himself and get by in life in Glasgow, but to save money to buy false passports so that the couple could get out of the UK and away from the danger of deportation to his home country. Who among us would not do whatever it took to protect our loved ones and our own lives if we had to?

If the Bill had been in force when Mehdi was doing all that, what might the outcome have been for this loving and protective husband? This kindly but damaged man could very well have ended up in jail, followed by being deported to the country that he was so afraid of returning to. For him, the worst part would have been leaving his wife—

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Blomfield]

I take the Minister’s point, but why give those who exploit yet another card to play? The threat of 12 months’ imprisonment and criminalisation is the card that will be exercised both in relation to those who have no right to be here, or to be working, and in relation to those who do.

[Sarah Champion]

One of our witnesses, Caroline Robinson from Focus on Labour Exploitation, said:

“We know that 78% of those exploited for their labour are, in fact, documented in the UK.”––[Official Report, Immigration Public Bill Committee, 20 October; c. 28, Q59.]

[Paul Blomfield]

My hon. Friend makes exactly the point that I was seeking to make. Even where people have rights to work, the lack of rights awareness and the intimidatory relationship between exploiter and exploited make this another card to play. I see the Minister is still shaking his head. Even if we were to restrict the measure simply to those who did not have the right to work, we are still giving the exploiter another card to intimidate and therefore make it less likely that people would be willing to whistleblow. I am happy for the Minister to intervene on me. Perhaps he could illustrate the evidence that suggests the clause will be of assistance—not the intuition, the belief, the view, but the evidence.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Blomfield]

The hon. Lady adds another dimension to my argument that the clause makes those who are already in a precarious situation more vulnerable and open to exploitation. In an earlier intervention, my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham mentioned the evidence given by Caroline Robinson from Focus on Labour Exploitation, which works directly with victims of trafficking for labour exploitation and of which I am the trustee along with some Members from other parties.

FLEX has identified three drivers of labour exploitation. The first is the feeling among migrant workers that they deserve less or have fewer rights than UK citizens. The second is a lack of checks on labour standards in the workplace, including everything from health and safety to minimum wage enforcement. The third is a fear of officials, especially of immigration officials. The Bill makes each of those drivers worse, and clause 8 has a particular effect on the first and third factors.

First, on the rights of migrant workers, the clause puts the focus on immigration status as a condition of asserting labour rights. By criminalising the exploited worker, whether they are committing the offence of illegal working or not, they can be treated and threatened by a gangmaster as if they are. On the second driver, we have talked at length about a number of aspects of labour market enforcement. The Bill seems to reflect the Government’s desire to move further towards an intelligence-based approach to enforcement. Essential to that intelligence is whistleblowing. We need to ensure that we do nothing in the Bill to discourage exploited workers from coming forward and thereby give gangmasters another card to play. Sadly, the clause risks doing exactly that.

On the third driver of labour exploitation, the problem that we identified earlier—the overlap between labour market enforcement and immigration enforcement—is at the heart of the Bill. The clause gives undocumented workers another reason to be worried. The consequence is that labour exploitation is not rooted out and continues to be a pull factor for migration, which is against the Government’s policy objectives.

Mr Bone, I will take your advice. I will not ask the Minister to intervene, but I press him to share evidence from anywhere in the world that shows that the approach of criminalising workers, unlike many other aspects of the Bill with which we agree, assists in the policy objective that he outlined and we share.

[Sarah Champion]

Will my hon. Friend comment on something else that Caroline Robinson said, which gets to the nub of his point that clause 8 does not meet the Government’s objective? She said:

“What we think will prevent people from working here undocumented is to reduce the demand for undocumented workers. To do that, we require enforcement of labour standards across the board. To be clear, the demand for undocumented workers is not because employers prefer undocumented over documented workers; it is because they cannot pay documented workers below minimum wage as easily as they can undocumented workers.”––[Official Report, Immigration Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2015; c. 28, Q59.]

[Paul Blomfield]

My hon. Friend will not be surprised to know that I agree. The quotation adds very much to the case that I seek to make; perhaps it makes the point more clearly than I was doing.

I want to move on and talk about international examples. I have challenged the Minister and I am confident that he will come back with examples later. I have challenged him to give comparisons, but let me share one that was shared with me yesterday when I met representatives of the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings—GRETA. They shared with me the example of Italy. They had done some work and talked about the amendments made to the Italian Consolidated Immigration Act in 2002, the so-called Bossi Fini law, which was aimed at regulating migrant worker flows by introducing a system of entry quotas, and which was supplemented in 2009 by the criminalisation of irregular entry and stay. Their concern was that the requirements of a formal employment contract in order to obtain a residence permit exposed migrant workers who were already at risk of labour exploitation because of their irregular migration status. They were worried that irregular migrants would be afraid to report cases of exploitation to the authorities because they were concerned about being detained and expelled. The United Nations special rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children, reported on the negative consequences of the criminalisation of irregular migration for victims of trafficking.

In response to points made to them by GRETA, the Italian authorities indicated that there were 14 convictions for trafficking in human beings in 2010 and nine in 2011. GRETA was concerned that those conviction rates were very low and urged the Italian authorities to strengthen their efforts to ensure that crimes related to trafficking were proactively investigated and prosecuted promptly and effectively. They asked the Italian authorities to study the implications of their immigration legislation, particularly the offence of illegal entry and stay. As a consequence, in January 2014, the Italian Senate approved Government measures to decriminalise those aspects of illegal immigration. They had recognised that the approach of criminalisation was not only unhelpful and policy-neutral but actively counterproductive.

--- Later in debate ---

The hon. Member for Glasgow North East made an impassioned contribution about an individual case. I am not familiar with it, obviously, and have to take at face value everything she told me. However, the measure we are debating has equal implications for someone in her constituency who is unemployed and cannot get a job. It is part of a broader strategy that links back to discussions on part 1 of the Bill on labour market enforcement and the role of the director, of enforcement and of doing more and better. There are also the offences that we are coming on to and the separate role of the Gangmasters Licensing Authority and how we can better direct its activity to go after those who are acting inappropriately and contributing to the problem. We need to see things in that broader context of the impact of illegal working on legitimate businesses and those who play by the rules, on wage levels and on the availability of work for British citizens and other lawful residents. It is important to underline that broader context when discussing the intent behind a number of provisions in the Bill, which need to be looked at as a whole, rather than always in isolation.

[Sarah Champion]

I could have used exactly that point in my argument, because it is the employer who makes the decision whether to employ the legal person or the illegal person. Why are we going after the illegal people when already, under section 24 of the Immigration Act 2014, we have the power to deport them? The Minister has cited other Acts under which we can deport. Why are we not punishing the employer who is wilfully employing illegal workers?

[James Brokenshire]

The Bill is doing both. It is taking steps in relation to employers and to employees, including with the overall enforcement approach. That is why I put things in that broader context. I will respond later to some of the specific questions on purpose, intent and how things fit in the overall deportation strategy. It is important to contextualise that so that the Committee understands the intent of the Government.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

It is rather that the employer has to show the right-to-work check, which is what the provision relates to. There is certain documentation with which employers should be familiar. We still work on the basis of trying to raise awareness of the issues. We are not trying deliberately to catch out employers. I certainly want employers to know the relatively simple steps they have to take to comply. The obligation was introduced into law in 2006, when the civil penalty scheme was put in place by the Labour Government. That is, therefore, what needs to be shown and it is why the negligence piece sits within the civil penalty regime.

The amendment to the definition of the offence—having reasonable cause to believe—is for those who close their eyes and put their fingers in their ears so that they cannot be liable, trying to get around the existing knowledge requirement of the Act. Those employers are, frankly, trying to play the system, and we are making the changes because of the problems that the pre-existing offence presented for our ability to bring prosecutions. I think that hon. Members would want us to be able to bring prosecutions in such circumstances.

[Sarah Champion]

Building on what the Minister said in response to my hon. Friend, what would be a reasonable defence for an employer?

[James Brokenshire]

It will depend on the circumstances. It is about the distinction between negligence and having reasonable cause to believe. The legal tests are slightly different, and I do not want to hasten into issues of law as I am sure that the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras will be well enough equipped with his knowledge and expertise in those matters to be able to underline the distinction, as will the Solicitor General. I will not hasten to stray into matters of law with such august representatives in the room.

At the moment, if a document that looks legitimate and real is presented to someone, that is often a defence in relation to the negligence argument. The employer has not been negligent. They have checked. We are not trying to make employers, or landlords—we will come on to them, I am sure, under the right to rent—into some sort of extension of immigration enforcement teams. If it is shown that the basic checks have been conducted in good faith, the civil penalty regime would not apply, even on the test of negligence—let alone the criminal sanction in clause 9. On that basis, the measure is an important step forward and fits within the broader enforcement strategy. I hope the clause will stand part of the Bill.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 9 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 10

Licensing Act 2003: amendments relating to illegal working

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Immigration Bill (Fifth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. If I may add to what my hon. Friend is saying, Caroline Robinson, the policy director of Focus on Labour Exploitation, said in her witness statement,

“The point about the protective purpose of the director is very important. For us, the core purpose of that role should be the protection of vulnerable workers and the prevention of exploitation.”––[Official Report, Immigration Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2015; c. 27, Q54.]

That is what the amendment is trying to get at.

[Paul Blomfield]

I thank my hon. Friend for her helpful intervention. Throughout our deliberations, we should seek to draw on the evidence that we heard. The evidence cited by her and by my hon. and learned Friend the shadow Minister has powerfully made the case that the confusion of immigration functions and labour market enforcement is damaging and counterproductive to our objectives for the labour market and for immigration. The amendment seeks to provide absolute clarity. I hope that the Government will accept it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anne McLaughlin]

If the hon. Gentleman was asking me to agree with him then I agree with him.

[Sarah Champion]

It is a clarification, courtesy of Google. The UN defines trafficking as

“the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability”.

As my colleague has just said, this gets to the nub of the problem. My understanding, and perhaps the Minister could provide clarity, is that when we are talking about trafficked people, the legislation is in place already so it can be enforced. What we are saying here is that a large number of people are in a grey area. They might, as in the example given by the hon. Member for Gower, have paid to come into this country to work but then, very quickly, find themselves in an exploitative situation.

We need clarity about the role of the labour market enforcement director. Is he very clear that he is responsible for enforcing good labour practice? Does he have the resources to do that and can he work collaboratively with the other agencies to make sure that when something like the Modern Slavery Act 2015 is enforced, that vulnerable person is taken care of?

[The Chair]

Just before we move on, I want to say that I have allowed the debate to go fairly wide of the mark on trafficking as it does indeed go to the heart of the Bill. If you recall, I did ask for one of the witnesses to define trafficking. I myself was none the wiser after she had finished speaking, unfortunately.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

I would point to the fact that immigration enforcement—the directorate within the Home Office that is responsible for the enforcement of immigration rules—is not one of the structures that the director has responsibility for. I will cover in turn the point about remit because there is an important aspect to this. When hon. Members have heard what I have to say, I hope that they will understand that the hon. and learned Gentleman’s concern about some sort of merger is not what this is about. We intend the director’s remit to cover labour market breaches, not immigration offences. The director and the enforcement bodies will work closely with Home Office immigration enforcement wherever labour market breaches are linked to illegal immigrants or people working in breach of their visa conditions, but that is an adjunct and not the purpose of the director.

I was asked why this measure was in an immigration Bill. There are two reasons. First, immigrant workers can be particularly vulnerable to exploitation by rogue employers, a point that has been flagged by hon. Members already this morning. I am sure that that will be a continuing theme during our consideration of the Bill. Secondly, by ensuring that workers are treated fairly, we are preventing businesses bringing in cheap labour that illegally undercuts the wages of people already in this country. Good labour market enforcement has knock-on effects.

Modern slavery has been a theme of some of the contributions this morning. With the Modern Slavery Act, Britain is once again at the forefront of the fight against the inhuman crimes of slavery and forced labour—the hon. Member for Sheffield Central and others made comments on this—but it is important to understand that exploitation occurs in many forms and can start with abuse of employment law. We must step in to protect not just the vulnerable—I will address the point about vulnerability—but also local workers and responsible businesses affected by those who are prepared to exploit cheap labour. That is why there is the need for this strategic approach and for the director to work with the different organisations that are in place. This is not a merger, as the hon. Member for Sheffield Central highlighted in his contribution, but rather we have an over-arching strategy of looking at ways in which we can promote good practice.

I would direct hon. Members to the consultation published alongside the Bill to set out some of those details. It says that:

“The Director will lead and co-ordinate work to promote compliance by employers and labour providers with labour market legislation, and to encourage and enable people to report infringements and exploitation.”

We are conducting a consultation at the moment around the director. We look forward to receiving feedback and input so that we are able to reflect fairly and appropriately.

Our employment law framework guarantees decent minimum rights for workers, including from next April the national living wage for over-25s, and promotes fair competition between businesses. The majority of employment law is enforced by individuals taking their employer to an employment tribunal to seek redress if they believe they have been wronged. State enforcement bodies step in to enforce legislation where there is a higher risk of exploitation or vulnerability.

As I have indicated, clause 3 already defines the director’s role by reference to the legislation and enforcement functions that will be within his remit. It makes it clear that the three enforcement bodies for which the director will set the strategy are the Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate, HMRC’s national minimum wage team and the Gangmasters Licensing Authority. We want the director to bring co-ordination across the whole spectrum of breaches of employment law—from employers who do not know the rules right through to organised, criminal exploitation of workers. That will be the director’s broad remit. However, I am concerned about some of the pictures we see of organised immigration crime and organised criminality more generally that seeks to exploit labour markets and uses the front of employment. We are dealing with a broad spectrum, which ranges from vulnerability all the way to good practice and compliance. It is right that the director should have that remit—setting up strategy, commenting on the balance of resources across each of the three agencies and reporting to the relevant Secretary of State.

[Sarah Champion]

Could the Minister give clarity on how the director would work in collaboration with the Independent Commissioner for Modern Day Slavery? Whether it is in guidance or within the Bill, it would help if the two roles could be clarified, because there is a grey area.

[James Brokenshire]

It is important to stress that they are separate roles. We make that point clearly in the consultation document, where we say that the director will have a role that is distinct from the commissioner’s role. Obviously, the commissioner looks at all types of modern slavery, whereas the focus of the director will be on labour market exploitation and enforcement. The practical roles are equally different:

“The Director will set the strategic plan, priorities for targeted action and overall approach”,

whereas

“the Commissioner has a broad role to look at the effectiveness of all the bodies engaged in the fight against modern slavery, encourage best practice, and make recommendations for improvements. That role will in future include looking at the effectiveness of the new Director and the reformed GLA”,

which we are consulting on now. I hope that is helpful and explains that these are complementary roles. I think that the commissioner, Kevin Hyland, is doing an excellent job. He has a great deal of practical experience from his time in law enforcement. I remember a couple of years ago going out with Mr Hyland on an enforcement raid to do with trafficking, so I know the real passion he has for that job. I think that he will use and work with the new director in a very positive way to continue to confront the appalling evil that is slavery and trafficking, with people being horribly exploited and enslaved for gain. We continue to need to shine a light on this, so that it is seen for what it is.

--- Later in debate ---

[Keir Starmer]

Yes, I thank my hon. Friend for his contribution. I will come later to where the director will put his or her emphasis—on what might be called the higher end breaches, or on more routine breaches. I welcome that contribution and I ask the Minister to deal with it if he can in his comments.

Amendment 59 is intended to clarify the relationship between the director of labour market enforcement and the UK’s existing labour inspection agencies, ensuring that the current role, remit and resources of labour inspectorates are safeguarded. By way of background, I give an example, because practical realities follow from what we hope is a very good initiative. This year we saw the pay and work rights helpline merge with the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service. The pay and work rights helpline used to provide vital advice; it was a service with an annual cost of £500,000, yet, when it was merged, the money did not go with it, which has led to a strain on the service. As a result, ACAS struggles to meet extra demand with no extra resources. There is some evidence that representatives have been asked not to use it. By making explicit the resource implications in the strategy, we hope to avoid this sort of implication. Where there is a merger of various functions and enforcement without the resources, it becomes ineffective.

[Sarah Champion]

I give another example. During the witness session, I asked Professor Metcalf whether he believed that there were sufficient resources and he said,

“Probably not, but in the consultation document and, I think, in the Bill, it does not actually set out quite what the resources are.”

I went on to ask him what he thought they should be and he said:

“One understands the difficulties with the public finances, but we probably do not have sufficient resources. In the low-skilled report, we calculated that you would get an inspection from HMRC once every 250 years and you would get a prosecution once in a million years. That suggests that we do not have enough resources. In turn, that takes you to the potential trade-off between the resources and the punishments.”––[Official Report, Immigration Public Bill Committee, 20 October 2015; c. 19-20, Q36-37.]

[Keir Starmer]

I am grateful for that intervention, which is another example from the evidence that we heard last week about resources. Unless we tackle the resources issue head on, all that will be achieved is the creation of a director without any real powers to carry out the functions, which I think everybody accepts need to be enforced and enhanced. In a sense, if we try to do more with less, services are jeopardised and, in truth, the vulnerable workers suffer and we will not succeed in reducing the pull factor for illegal migration because exploitation will not be uncovered and penalised.

By way of example, the number of Gangmasters Licensing Authority investigations into the illegal activities of gangmasters dropped from 134 in 2011 to 68 in 2014, and prosecutions were down from 19 in 2010 to three in 2014. I accept that underlying this reduction will be some intelligence-led work, but those figures are stark and they underline the general point made by the witnesses last week, namely, that the concern about labour market enforcement is not so much about the agencies and the enforcement powers as about the fact that the resources are simply not there to allow for investigations and action to be taken very frequently. Unless that problem is addressed head-on, there is the danger that all we will create is a director who does not actually carry out the enhanced functions that it is hoped will be carried out.

Sticking with the GLA itself, its budget, of course, has been cut by 20% since 2010, so we are in an environment where the enforcement agencies are already suffering quite significant cuts. It means that the GLA regulates labour in a £100 billion sector with a budget of 0.004% of that figure.

I have some questions that I hope the Minister will be able to address in his reply. On page 8 of the Government’s consultation document, “Labour market exploitation: improving enforcement”, it states that there has been

“a shift from abuses of employment regulation towards increasingly organised criminal activity engaged in labour market exploitation.”

That shift has occurred during the past 10 years. But what is the evidential basis for that assertion? In other words, that is the shift of abuse from, as it were, lower-level routine abuse to increasingly organised criminal activity. Linked to that is another question. Does the Minister agree that if we do not enforce employment legislation effectively at the lower end of abuse—if you like, minimum wage, health and safety and so on—we will create conditions for higher levels of abuse to develop. So, as I say, where is the evidence to support that assertion? And if we abandon the lower end or do not put resource into it, do we not run the risk of creating conditions in which unscrupulous employers will get away with whatever they want?

Amendments 65 and 66 would include the functions relating to health and safety at work and child labour within the remit of the director. May I just be clear about the spirit in which amendment 65 was tabled? It aims to explore the thinking behind the division of functions here, and to understand why all the functions are not brought together under this director, while also recognising—as we do—the work that the Health and Safety Executive is currently undertaking. So, amendment 65 was tabled in that spirit of properly understanding the Bill’s limited remit. The health and safety at work aspects of the Bill speak for themselves; I think that the child labour functions are enforced by local authorities.

Earlier this morning, the Minister said that the purpose of the Bill was to cover the whole spectrum of labour market enforcement, and therefore the ownership of the HSE and of the legislation to deal with child labour were obvious. There may have been a good deal of thinking behind that, but it would be useful through this exercise to understand that thinking properly, because the exclusion of those functions from the remit of the director of labour market enforcement could have an influence on the issue addressed by amendment 55, namely, the primary purpose of the director. Why is the HSE excluded and what is the thinking behind that exclusion?

Of course, there is also a budgetary consideration. The budget of the three labour inspection agencies covered in part 1 amounts to just over £14 million. That is compared with the £81 million for the Health and Safety Executive, which adopts a cross-labour market role. If the aim is to cover the whole spectrum and there are already resource considerations—of course there are—why do these provisions not cover the whole spectrum and leave out the health and safety and child labour aspects?

Amendments 63 and 64 aim to ensure that labour market offences committed against all workers are included within the scope of the director of labour market enforcement’s work, irrespective of immigration status. I will try to explain our concern clearly. Trafficking offences, as we understand it, are outside the remit of the Bill, save where they touch on the role of workers. That makes sense on one level because we would not expect the director of labour market enforcement to be looking at trafficking offences outside the employment or labour context. The problem as we see it—which may simply require clarification or may require amendment—is that the definition of “worker” within the Bill is then not wide enough to cover all those who may be in the labour market, including undocumented victims of trafficking. Perhaps there is a clear explanation; there may be a simple amendment. We follow the logic of the scheme, but we are concerned that the definition of “worker” is in fact too narrow and will leave some who it is probably the intention of the Government to include outside the scope of the protection. The amendment is put forward in that spirit.

[Sarah Champion]

On that point, I wonder if the Minister could also clarify why clauses 3 and 9 use two different pieces of legislation relating to workers? It seems to be a bit of an anomaly. Some clarity on that would be welcome.

[Keir Starmer]

Finally, amendment 62 touches on the annual report and is intended to ensure that the director of labour market enforcement’s annual report links with his or her assessment about non-compliance in the labour market and the remedies secured by victims and threats and obstacles to effective enforcement. The bullet point is this: as drafted, the director’s strategy does not link with his or her assessment of non-compliance in the labour market and his or her annual report does not link back to the assessment of non-compliance as a baseline. The amendment aims to ensure that the strategy covers everything that it should and that the annual report is tied into the same process.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

I thank all hon. Members for their contributions in this mini-debate. Equally, I should celebrate and recognise the contribution from the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North. I appreciate that this may be a rare moment in the consideration of the Bill—he is supportive of the measures—but, in good spirits, I welcome his comments and the support he has given. I think that there is a shared recognition that we need to deal with exploitation and to achieve better co-ordination, and that we need the strategic response that is provided by the Bill. I welcome his comments in the spirit in which they were made.

The hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras asked me at the outset about organised criminal activity and the evidence base. It is feedback from enforcement officers that tells us that the incidence of forced labour may be growing at a faster rate than other types of exploitation. It appears to be due to criminal gangs infiltrating the supply chain, which I know is a broader issue that was debated during the passage of the Modern Slavery Act. I will not stray widely, but perhaps that will give him a sense of what we have been looking at.

Amendments 57 and 58 relate to the contents of the director’s annual strategy to address non-compliance in the labour market in the forthcoming financial year. Although I agree entirely with the intention behind the amendments, they are unnecessary because it is the Government’s expectation that the director will feed information of that nature into the planning and reporting cycle. Page 24 of the consultation document says of the strategy:

“It will set out, for the financial year ahead: the priorities for enforcement; the outcomes required from the enforcement bodies; and the budgets for the enforcement bodies, within the total envelope of available funding.”

So we have been quite clear about our expectations.

The issue of how non-compliance in the labour market should be addressed is at the heart of the strategy, which is why clause 2(2)(b)(i) requires the director to propose how labour market enforcement functions should be exercised, or, to put it another way, how the three enforcement agencies under the director’s remit should operate to address non-compliance.

The Government would not consider the strategy to be effective if it did not identify the threats and obstacles to effective labour market enforcement. We expect the director to turn over stones to tell us where the gaps are and to propose how they can be addressed. That is a crucial and valuable aspect of the role. Similarly, the Government would not consider any strategy or report to be effective if it did not examine the important issue of securing remedies for victims, which would naturally include recovering wages owed to workers and sanctions against employers for labour market offences.

[Sarah Champion]

Therefore, will the Minister confirm that, as in amendment 62, non-compliance will be reported on and used as a baseline for forthcoming reports?

[James Brokenshire]

As the hon. Lady will note from the consultation document, the strategy is about setting out information and issues concerning the work of different bodies and agencies, including some themes of non-compliance. How that feeds into communication, good practice and sharing information is at the heart of the matter and needs to be reflected in the strategy.

Amendments 56 and 59 bring me to the director’s role in setting the resources of the enforcement bodies. It is the Government’s intention not that the director of labour market enforcement decides the budgets of the three enforcement bodies, but that the director should recommend how resources should be allocated within the total envelope of available funding. Hon. Members will be aware that the Gangmasters Licensing Authority is funded by the Home Office, and the Employment Agencies Standards Inspectorate and HMRC’s national minimum wage enforcement teams are funded by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. Funding for those agencies is secured via the usual departmental bidding process. While the Government intend that the relevant Secretaries of State will take the director’s proposals on resources into account during the preparation of those bids, it is right that the Government set the overall level of resources devoted to labour market enforcement in the context of the totality of pressures on public spending. I point out that HMRC has increased its budget for enforcing the national minimum wage; for 2015-16, that has increased by £4 million, meaning that the total budget has increased to £13.2 million.

--- Later in debate ---

[James Brokenshire]

The hon. Gentleman will be aware that information sharing is a specific point in our consultation. There are barriers—legal and otherwise—to sharing data between enforcement bodies. That is why we are consulting on that point, and some suggestions have been highlighted in the consultation document.

We are reflecting carefully on that and have put it out to consultation to consider the most effective and appropriate ways to do so. We want these gateways to information sharing, which we have in other enforcement spheres. I want to reflect on the responses to the consultation on that point to ensure that we act appropriately.

I hope I have set out why we think this role is different in character and nature, in terms of workplace safety and the best interests of the child, and why we do not think it would be appropriate to include the proposal in this part.

[Sarah Champion]

Does the Minister believe the consultation will be complete by Third Reading and able to influence the Bill?

[James Brokenshire]

We have today announced an extension to the consultation period. It was originally due to close at the beginning of November, and it has been extended by about four weeks—I can come back to confirm that. I want to ensure that we get the provisions right on some of these detailed points. The consultation may inform later parts of the Bill. Our judgment is that we should ensure that the consultation is framed to get the right responses from those actively engaged at the front end. That is why we have announced a time extension, which I believe will be welcomed by the different sectors.

There were comments about redefining the term “worker”. The clause and the proposed amendment do not redefine “worker” for the purposes of the Employment Agencies Act 1973, the National Minimum Wage Act 1998 or the Gangmasters (Licensing) Act 2004. The coverage of those respective Acts continues to apply. That means that the Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate and the GLA will still tackle non-compliance by employment agencies, businesses and gangmasters, regardless of whether the affected workers have the right to be or to work in the UK.

We see the director as being focused on improving the way we enforce labour market and employment law rules. The Bill is not about extending labour protections to illegal workers, and we think that the director’s focus should be on making sure that workers who are properly here are better protected.

However, we are committed to tackling serious crimes against individuals, whatever their status. We have set out in the modern slavery strategy and the Modern Slavery Act 2015 enhanced powers and an improved approach to tackling slavery and human trafficking, whether victims are trafficked for sexual exploitation, exploitation involving criminal activity or indeed labour exploitation.

That is why we have implemented life sentences for modern slavery offences, new preventive orders to stop harm before it takes place and improved protections for victims such as a statutory defence. We see an important but specific role for the director in supporting this crucial work. The director’s remit includes modern slavery offences where they are committed against a worker or person seeking work, or where a person is subject to slavery, servitude or forced or compulsory labour. We are also consulting on additional powers for the Gangmasters Licensing Authority to include tackling such offences in their proposed enhanced enforcement role. I draw Members’ attention to that.

We think the balance is right. The director’s role is focused on workers who are here legally, although he can include in his plans action against forced labour as well. Trafficking people from around the world to work in brothels in the UK is an absolutely unacceptable crime, but we judge it is right for the director of labour market enforcement to tackle those aspects that are within the remit outlined in the Bill.

Immigration Bill (Fourth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Keir Starmer]

Q 244 Back in 2008, Mr Duncan Smith—obviously he is now in a different role—described it as a “failed policy”. That may explain why it has not been used since the pilot. Do you disagree with that conclusion?

Councillor Simmonds: It manifestly did not work at the time. Therefore, if we were to revisit that as an approach, we would need to think very carefully about how it could be made effective. That would require a different approach on many, many levels.

Paul Greenhalgh: I agree with that comment. We have been working with the Home Office to explore areas in which we wonder whether further safeguards might make such an approach more effective.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

Q 245 On that point, Mr Greenhalgh used the phrase behavioural change. I think we all understand what the Government are trying to achieve, but you do not believe that the Bill does that. What should be in the Bill to get the behavioural change that the Government are trying to achieve?

Paul Greenhalgh: One of the difficulties with the Bill as currently framed is that there will be a number of what we would perceive as unintended consequences. They are twofold, mainly around our duties to provide support and care in certain circumstances arising from the Children Act 1989 and the Care Act 2014. Mainly, section 17 of the Children Act is something that would come into play in these sorts of cases.

At the moment, 80% of those cases are funded by no recourse to public funds arrangements as a result of a Children Act assessment. As a result of the current drafting of the Bill, a lot of families who would receive no further support as a result of their asylum status being confirmed would come to the local authority if they were about to become destitute. The local authority would be bound to make a human rights assessment and, if there are children involved, a children in need assessment. Those assessments take some time, so if a family are at immediate risk of destitution, we would have to put immediate measures in place.

So the first of our significant concerns is that this could result in a huge increase in demand on local authorities, which would in effect be a cost shunt from the Home Office to local authorities in an unfunded way. The other consequence is the danger that people will not come to local authorities but will go underground, and therefore be more at risk of exploitation and less able to be supported by the authorities.

If those are our concerns, we think some measures need to be put in place to provide appropriate safeguards. First, there should be a clarification of assessment processes, to reduce the burden falling on local authorities and the difficulty for families of having to go through what at the moment are two assessment processes. If the assessment process could be streamlined, that would be one improvement to the Bill.

The other significant issue is funding and the extent to which, however we frame the Bill, it will result in more cost to local authorities to support people on an interim basis. If there is recognition that those costs are a new burden, and if there is engagement between local authorities and the Home Office to work together on a practical level to support those families and help them to engage, we could see some of the intention of the Bill working more effectively.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

Q 246 Perhaps I could just pick up on that last point and ask the witnesses about that engagement. Are you engaging with the Home Office and working through some of those details that you suggest may be needed?

Paul Greenhalgh: We are. We had meetings with Home Office officials during the consultation period. We put in a joint response, and 48 local authorities sent in individual responses. The feedback from Home Office officials is that there was a consistent response from local authorities. We made it clear that we were very happy to continue to work with Home Office officials, and we have been doing that. We have had three technical meetings so far, and we are trying to work through how we can try to address together those issues that I have raised.

Councillor Simmonds: I thank the Minister for making himself available for those discussions. The one challenge that we have found at a political level is that there are sometimes differences of opinion between officials in different Government Departments. For example, on Children Act duties, traditionally we have had feedback from the Home Office that broadly says, “We are seeing people through our role in asylum and immigration, which we are here to manage.” Those in the Department for Education would say, “We’re not interested in that. We see them as vulnerable children, and therefore the duties are absolutely and unambiguously clear, and at the highest possible level.” The more consistency that we can get on some of those challenges, the better.

--- Later in debate ---

[Craig Whittaker]

Q 253 So the cases that you are primarily dealing with do not apply to the Bill, because the Bill talks about removing support for those who have gone through the process and are deemed to be unlawful immigrants.

Henry St Clair Miller: It is both. Sorry—I will try again and then I will give up. It is both, because you are also looking at measures to tackle illegal migration in the UK such as landlord checking and the rest, which might give rise to more of those.

Paul Greenhalgh: Our concern is about families who have been given that status in terms of how the Bill is currently drafted. The onus will be on the families to leave rather than there being an enforcement to their departure. While they are still in this country, local authorities still have legal duties to them under the legislation that we have previously cited.

Councillor Simmonds: It is probably worth giving you some figures. When we look at the numbers for local authority responsibilities in providing support to irregular migrants, around 80% of those who are supported are those under the section 17 Children Act responsibilities. The remaining group tend to be with care needs under the Mental Health Act and the Care Act, so the vast majority will be entitled to support through their status as families with children, and there will always be further legal avenues by which they can regain that entitlement should one avenue be closed off.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 254 I have just a small question. Currently, when someone has failed their last appeal, what is the average time before they actually get deported? I just want an idea of the timescale in which they would be destitute.

Henry St Clair Miller: I have not learnt of that particular statistic, so I do not have an answer.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 255 Ball park. Is it hours, weeks, months?

Henry St Clair Miller: It is tentatively months. The main thing, whether it is data from our NRPF Connect database or independent research, is that the time on support for an individual case is currently well above two years. That is a statistical fact. I cannot determine the exact timescales from an actual refusal or how many claims are made within that period. I guess there is a concern for local authorities that, if we have to engage these safety net responsibilities, there should not be an assumption that it will be just short term. Obviously, we are very keen to work with the Home Office to try and reduce the time. I think we are making progress and I think the Home Office has been good in respect to hearing about our difficulties, so this may change, but I can only give the stats that we have currently.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 256 So, to clarify, if this legislation is enacted, your assumption is that a family would be without any support for a couple of months.

Henry St Clair Miller: It is hard to define this. I am saying that, when support is engaged under the safety net, historically it has not been something that is over and done with in a couple of months. Historically, it has taken longer to resolve the issues.

[Sarah Champion]

I am sorry. We are not trying to trip you up.

[Chloe Smith (Norwich North) (Con)]

Q 257 Does the Committee have any reason not to accept the figures in the Home Office’s August consultation document? I am referring to the public consultation on reforming support for failed asylum seekers and other illegal migrants. I am looking at the figures given for the scale of the situation: an estimated 15,000 refused asylum seekers with an estimated cost of £73 million. Do you accept those figures or have any concerns about them?

Paul Greenhalgh: We broadly accept those figures, yes.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Q 270 We will now hear evidence from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the British Red Cross. I am afraid that for this session we only have until 3.15 pm. Will the witnesses introduce themselves for the record?

Peter Grady: I am Peter Grady, legal officer at UNCHR.

Karl Pike: I am Karl Pike, the refugees and asylum policy and advocacy manager at the British Red Cross.

Andrew Hewett: I am Andy Hewett, the refugee development manager at the British Red Cross.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 271 I have three questions. What types of non-asylum cases would be affected by the repeal of section 4(1) of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 and can you quantify the number of cases potentially affected?

[The Chair]

No conferring.

Andrew Hewett: I do not have the exact figures but our understanding is that the majority of people on section 4 are asylum cases. We could come back to you with some figures and an update on that if that would be helpful.

[Sarah Champion]

That would be very helpful.

Peter Grady: I do not have figures for you but it is our understanding that stateless persons could also be affected by the section 4(1) revisions.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 272 What could the consequences be?

Peter Grady: For stateless persons, if they are denied support?

[Sarah Champion]

Yes.

Peter Grady: They could be driven to destitution. There is that risk, just as there is for others. One of the concerns we outlined in our briefing is that there appear to be no replacement support provisions for stateless persons under section 95A, for example. There is a concern that if section 4 is withdrawn, there would not be a replacement form of support or a dedicated support that could benefit stateless persons in the UK.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 273 So there would be no other avenues for them?

Peter Grady: There might be other forms of support, as we heard recently, through local authorities in their obligations to individuals, including on human rights grounds, but not through section 4.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 274 What obstacles to leaving the UK do refused asylum seekers and other irregular migrants face? Which of those should justify eligibility for the proposed section 95A support?

Andrew Hewett: We see examples every day. The British Red Cross supports over 7,000 destitute people a year, some of whom will be able to apply for section 4 support. Some of them will then experience real practical barriers to leaving the UK. I have got some examples. One real, very recent example: a Palestinian male claimed asylum in 2004. He became appeal rights-exhausted the following year, 2005. He applied for assisted voluntary return through the voluntary return scheme; he applied for section 4 support. He was not able to progress his application for voluntary return because there is no direct route into Palestine. Therefore, he was not eligible for section 4 support. He cannot find a solicitor to make a stateless application, so he is really stuck. He has literally spent the last 10 years homeless and destitute in the UK, having pursued every legal avenue. So there are some real practical barriers with challenges to returning people from particular countries that have no embassies in the UK or those with no viable route of return or other practical challenges with documenting or proving their nationality. Where people have proved that they have done as much as they possibly can to effect their own voluntary departure and there are some obstacles in their way, absolutely that needs to be considered.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 275 The Bill allows extension of support where there is a genuine obstacle, so how do you think genuine obstacles should be defined in the Bill?

Andrew Hewett: We can provide some examples, but I think it would be more useful for the Home Office to consult on what the genuine obstacles should be and define them. At the moment, genuine obstacle is not really defined anywhere, so it is open to interpretation and we see some cases approved, but others are refused because they have not met that threshold. We need further clarification, but certainly where people have tried to pursue voluntary return and there is a bureaucratic or embassy issue, that is one credible example. There are others and we can come back to you with those, but that is the one that springs to mind.

[Sarah Champion]

That would be helpful.

Karl Pike: There is a list of countries where assisted voluntary return is not possible, which I imagine you have seen. It is fairly extensive—there are quite a few countries on it. That would be a good place to start for the people who should definitely get support. There is also a common problem that Andy knows quite a lot about, which is embassies that will not provide travel documents to a person on the basis that they no longer have original ID. Ethiopia is one.

Andrew Hewett: If you are an Eritrean national and the Home Office contests that you are from Eritrea—perhaps it says that you are from Ethiopia—you would be expected to attend both the Eritrean and Ethiopian embassies and almost go through the process of applying for a passport. Then the Home Office would want to see written confirmation from that embassy as to why it cannot issue you with a passport.

Practically, you could make an appointment at the embassy, go down there and go through the process, but neither of those embassies currently provides any written confirmation. So some of those people are in positions where they have to take an independent witness with them and then that person provides a witness statement to say, “Yes, the person did attend. This is what happened at the embassy” because there is no viable way of getting that confirmation from the embassy. The Home Office does not commonly accept those witness statements. These people are in an incredibly difficult situation. They have done everything humanly possible and followed every instruction, but there is some other barrier preventing them from meeting that very high threshold.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 276 So, for clarity, you think that that needs defining either in guidance or in the Bill?

Andrew Hewett: Absolutely, it needs crystal clear clarification and definition.

Karl Pike: We would like “genuine obstacle” to be defined in the legislation rather than allowing it to be subject to the regulations after the Bill has been voted on.

[Rebecca Harris (Castle Point) (Con)]

Q 277 I want to ask you the question that I missed the opportunity to ask this morning. We have a lot of problems with our immigration service—it sounded terrible at some stages this morning—and I wondered whether you had any relative knowledge of immigration procedures and enforcement in other countries. How do we compare with some of our European partners?

Peter Grady: Which aspect of immigration and enforcement procedures?

--- Later in debate ---

[Simon Hoare]

Q 302 Can I come back very briefly? I was interested in what you were saying because you made that point in an earlier submission. You are right to be worried about the social cohesion perspective. I suppose I look at it from the other end of the telescope. Do you agree that if everybody in society, irrespective of colour or creed—I put that in inverted commas—had safe knowledge that their neighbours and the people who lived in their communities were all bona fide, were all legitimate, were all citizens, or had right to remain in this country, it would ease the growing tension in many communities? That, in fact, of itself eases what in many communities is a growing tension—a tension between the settled, legal immigrant community and the illegal immigrant community. In my judgment, that is causing quite a lot of tensions in towns and cities across the country.

Saira Grant: You raise a very interesting and valid point, but I do not think that the answer is to create more suspicion and mistrust among members of civil society. It goes back to border control at the start; it is the Home Office’s responsibility, not that of civil society to be policing each other’s immigration status. We need to go back to the beginning. If the Home Office was making correct decisions, issuing correct visas and making it easier for people to lawfully go through the process, we would see a reduction in the numbers of those who are now irregularly here.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 303 Ms Grant, have you or your organisation had time to assess the west midlands pilot on landlords? Are you able to come up with some recommendations of how the pilot could be strengthened or any weaknesses in the Bill?

Saira Grant: Sure. You will be aware—I hope that Members are aware—that our organisation did an independent study of its own as well. We have sent copies of the report around. I have had a chance to go through it, although not in as much detail I would have liked, because it only came out on Tuesday, but looking at the evidence that they provided in the evaluation, it matches and mirrors a lot of the claims we have been making.

The first point to make is that the terms of reference are very different from our evaluation, because the emphasis is not on tenants; it is about landlords and the understanding that landlords have. Discrimination that we found has been alluded to—cases through mystery shoppers of indirect or potential discrimination—but that has not been the focus, and the tenants who are part of the survey are again a very low number, mainly students, so a very different group of people.

Something that really strikes me is to do with whether the reason behind these provisions is to ensure that those who do not have status do not stay in the UK and are encouraged to leave. If enforcement is the aim, look at what the results show: the claim is that 109 people have been “caught”, if you like, as a result of the right to rent checks, but break that down and at best you are looking at 15 people who directly came through the right to rent checks inquiry line and who came to the Home Office’s attention. That in itself is a very interesting statistic, because, of the 109 people, 94 actually had status and the right to remain, but the inquiry was made because landlords could not understand the complexity of immigration status. From the 15, it is really interesting. That is direct, but then we have a breakdown of the 109: 25 people had barriers to removal, 15 were progressing family cases, nine were granted leave by the Home Office and a further four had judicial reviews.

Whichever way you look at it, all of those who have outstanding legal cases need to reside somewhere. Because of the way we have changed our immigration rules, people might not have section 3C leave, which continues their leave, but if they have outstanding legal cases and therefore a barrier to removal, what is supposed to happen to them? Are they now just supposed to be destitute?

Going through their evidence, I would say that there needs to be a longer evaluation period; it needs to be not over the winter period, when no one really moves tenancies; and it needs to look at the impact on tenants, not just landlords. How can we possibly have a roll-out announced on the same day as the publication of this evaluation?

[The Chair]

Rebecca Harris wants to come in on this point.

[Rebecca Harris]

Q 304 It is not particularly on this point. Within the provision of the Bill, do you think that there is sufficient resource and support for landlords to be able to make the assessment?

Saira Grant: No, quite the opposite; the Bill is now going to criminalise landlords, which will exacerbate the sense of “I don’t want to rent to anyone who looks or appears different.” Landlords have said that the code is hard to understand. I understand that the code is being revised—I see the Minister shaking his head, but I am looking at the evaluation and quoting from it, Minister. So no, there is not any further provision, but what we do have is a situation that will exacerbate discrimination, and that is not being tackled at all in the Bill. And I am not quite certain why the haste. Why are we rushing to strengthen the provisions before the provisions of the 2014 Act have bedded down and we have even looked at the impact properly?

[Sarah Champion]

Q 305 My final question is about immigration officers. Their remit is being extended, so that they will become more police-like in their areas and in their reach. Do you think that there is enough oversight and independent scrutiny of immigration officers in the Bill or existing legislation to ensure that they act responsibly?

Saira Grant: No, I do not and that is a real worry. So many enhanced powers are given—arrest without warrant, especially the driving licence provisions, no warrant needed to enter premises and to search people—and it was interesting that in your earlier evidence session when the police were talking about it. These powers are not just given to the police, but given to immigration officers and to anyone designated by the Secretary of State. There is no regulatory framework for immigration officers that I can see. It is extremely concerning that ever increasing powers are given to immigration officers, with no checks in place to prevent any kind of abuse of those powers.

[Sarah Champion]

Q 306 Do the rest of the panel members share those concerns?

Steve Symonds: I do. I would add this: I have followed immigration legislation over many years in different capacities, and I cannot think of a Bill over the last 15 to 20 years that has not extended the powers of immigration officers. I cannot think of a time when that has not been questioned in Parliament, and when the answer has not been that there will be better oversight, training and supervision this time. Actually, I cannot think of a time when it has resulted in a more efficient and effective system, let alone fewer concerns about instances of abuse of those powers.

It strikes me as inappropriate to be constantly expanding powers when, as has been referred to in an earlier session—the first session you had this morning—even the inspectorates themselves constantly refer to lack of management records of how the powers are used, inconsistencies in how they are used and inconsistencies about the guidance to officers about how they should be using the powers. We should stop giving more powers and concentrate on the ones that have been given now, at a minimum, and get those right before thinking ahead to expanding the range of powers given to officers and the expectations on those officers, who are much pressed and who no doubt find it difficult, given the range of legislation and guidance pressed on them. Sort out what they have got now before thinking of moving ahead. Oversight is not going to be the answer. I am not criticising oversight, by the way—I am all for it—but it will not provide the answer.

Rachel Robinson: Can I come in on the point about enforcement powers? I echo many of the points made by other speakers, but I add the very serious nature of the problems with the use of enforcement powers identified by the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration. A report covering an inspection period ending in 2013 found that in terms of, for example, the power to enter business premises without a search warrant, officers in 59% of cases lacked the required justification to exercise that power. In a further 12% of cases, there was not sufficient information to determine whether justification was there, so in only 29% of cases was the power being used properly. Yet, in the Bill, we see a massive extension in how intelligence is used by immigration officers.

We have had similar concerns from the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration about the approach to so-called intelligence. One example given in a recent report involved a raid on a fast food restaurant. The intelligence for that raid was that previous raids on fast food restaurants had uncovered irregular workers. That is not intelligence; that is a generalisation and a stereotype. We have serious concerns about how the powers are being used, and we urge the Government to consider looking again at those powers, how they are being used and whether there are ways to make them more effective, safer and more accurate, rather than giving immigration officers a whole range of new powers.

[Rebecca Harris]

Q 307 You might want to reassure our witnesses that we had a housing officer as witness who thought that giving housing officers the responsibility to ask anyone to verify who they were might reduce problems with prejudice and so on. My question to all of you, with your expert knowledge of this area, is what measures you think we should be introducing to encourage people with no right to remain in this country to leave, or ensure that they do so when they refuse. What would be your solutions to that problem, if this is not the answer?

Rachel Robinson: What we see in the Bill is a shifting of responsibility from the Home Office to private citizens, when what we should be seeing is an improvement in processes within the Home Office. I think that the Committee has had ample evidence that the provisions in the Bill are liable to undermine enforcement of the immigration rules by making it more likely that people will abscond. The Committee has heard ample evidence on the provisions on asylum support.

We would say that the solution is not to foist immigration powers on members of the community with no training or expertise and expect them to carry out the functions that the Home Office has failed to carry out effectively itself. The solution is for the Home Office to do its job better.

Rebecca Hilsenrath: We start by wishing that an equality impact assessment had been produced; it might have helped to look through the draft provisions with a closer eye on equality impact. In terms of general proportionality, you could take the same approaches and consider whether, in fact, the same measures could be looked at through the lens of greater compliance with human rights legislation. If we look, for example, at the provisions giving private landlords eviction powers where tenants have been found to be disqualified from renting, we do not really understand why that process cannot involve a review by the court instead of being, as it is at the moment, enforceable as a court order.