Unaccompanied Children

Tom Brake Excerpts

Tuesday 19th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I will start with a quote that some Members may have heard before. On 14 December 1938, Mr Noel-Baker asked:

“Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these children in Germany in many cases are in really terrible conditions, without adult protection and without the means of finding food, and is he aware that the machinery of the Home Office for granting visas is so inadequate that the visas cannot be obtained in sufficient quantities to save their lives?”—[Official Report, 14 December 1938; Vol. 342, c. 1976.]

Unfortunately, 78 years on, not a lot has changed. We do not have much time to debate that issue, or indeed to debate what we could most effectively do to help children in the camps surrounding Syria, for instance, because this debate, secured by the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes), rightly focuses on what we can do for children who are already in the United Kingdom. As a minimum—the hon. Gentleman touched on this—we should provide a five-year humanitarian protection order, in line with those people being relocated under the Syrian vulnerable person resettlement scheme. That approach is needed simply because it provides security for the children and because it also makes the job of local authorities much easier, regarding what they have to plan for in the future for those children.

We also need the Home Office to extend the guardianship pilots for trafficked children to include unaccompanied children. I know that the Children’s Society is keen that the Minister for Immigration provides an update on the child trafficking advocates pilot, as well as clarification of whether he recognises the importance of there being an independent advocate for separated and unaccompanied children, particularly in their transition to adulthood and in providing support with regularising their immigration status before they turn 18. Indeed, there are strong arguments for extending that support beyond 18 to 21, as is the case with care leavers.

The provisions for transfers or disposals need to be addressed very early on. The worst that can happen to a child is that they remain in one place for an extended period only to be moved on much later. Action needs to be taken very soon on where children will be relocated within the UK.

We need effective and improved co-ordination mechanisms. My understanding is that in London, which was mentioned in an intervention earlier, the Greater London Authority is taking responsibility for co-ordinating certain aspects of the arrival of children, but that the mechanisms are not working very effectively. As I understand it, the latest figures suggest that a maximum of 10 children have been distributed through those mechanisms. Clearly, more action needs to be taken at a London level, so that co-ordination is in place and the boroughs can tap into what has been organised.

We also need to ensure that where family ties exist, every effort is made to ensure that family members in the same local authority area can provide support to unaccompanied children where appropriate. As well as improving conditions for the child, that approach has the advantage of reducing the burden on local authorities.

We need to make sure that there is better resourcing for foster carers, and we would like the regional assessment hub model to be explored further, although that is not a call to reduce the scrutiny of foster carers. A national register would also make a substantial contribution, because it would enable foster carers who move from one local authority area to another to remain available to provide foster care. Of course, the need to check things such as the foster carer’s new home would remain; a national register would not deal with such issues.

Some authorities are clearly on the frontline in providing funding—Kent has already been mentioned. The Home Office needs to model scenarios to compensate local authorities that step up and take responsibility for unaccompanied children. The Government also need to identify which authorities are currently overburdened and have to rely heavily on out-of-county options for their own looked-after population before they take on any additional unaccompanied children.

The target advocated by Save the Children and others—including my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron), who has outlined his blueprint for 3,000 children—is attainable, and it would make a substantial contribution towards dealing at EU level with the 30,000 or so unaccompanied children who are already in the UK. However, we need many of the measures that I and previous speakers have discussed this morning, to ensure that the framework—the support network—is in place before those children can be supported.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Brake Excerpts

Monday 11th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Richard Harrington]

The right hon. Lady will be aware, I am sure, that under our resettlement scheme many children have been resettled—more than 50% of those coming here are children, as I have said. I remind her and other Members that the policy of UNHCR is to keep children in the areas around Syria, and it has been very successful in identifying children with the greater families to make sure that they have a good chance of a better life in the future.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

23. Will the Government expand the current definition of the family unit to include de facto family members and simplify the system so that vulnerable children can come here much more quickly than is currently the case?

[Richard Harrington]

As the right hon. Gentleman will know, the Government are currently looking at reports from the UNHCR on precisely the issue of unaccompanied children, and I hope he will agree that lots of efforts are under way to ensure that that happens.

Brussels Terrorist Attacks

Tom Brake Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend is right to point that out. The attack in Tunisia saw the murder of so many British holidaymakers. Action on travel advice was then taken, working with the Tunisian Government. If people do not travel, that will of course have an impact on a country’s economy. I assure him that, in looking at travel advice and in issuing guidance on travel, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office considers a range of issues, but of course what must come first is our desire to ensure the security and safety of British citizens.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I echo the Home Secretary’s condolences. Belgium and Brussels have suffered a severe blow and we stand in solidarity with them. I would also like to echo what she said about the Muslim communities here. The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community and the British Muslim Council of Britain, for instance, have been very quick and forthright in condemning the attacks. After Paris, the Metropolitan police said they would be recruiting an extra 600 armed police officers. Is the Home Secretary able to give us a progress report on that, and does the programme now need to be accelerated?

[Mrs May]

I think there is absolute unanimity around this House in our condemnation of these terrible attacks. There are two elements to the upgrade of the Metropolitan police’s armed response. I think that the 600 figure to which the right hon. Gentleman refers is not the recruitment of new firearms officers but the training of existing officers in certain parts of the Metropolitan police. As I understand it, that training is under way. The uplift in armed response vehicles across the country, which I referred to earlier, is also under way.

Child Refugees in Europe

Tom Brake Excerpts

Monday 25th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

My hon. Friend has made his point concisely and well. It is that risk of the exploitation of people traffickers that we have at the forefront of our minds. Equally, social media is being used to sell false hope and false opportunity, putting lives at risk.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I thank the seven colleagues from seven different political parties, including the Conservative party, who signed a joint letter to the Prime Minister on this subject. The right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) also signed it. We obviously welcome the fact that the Government are still considering this issue, although we would like them to do so with a greater degree of urgency. If the Government are considering taking the 3,000 children, I hope that they will not suggest that that should happen over five years, because then some of those children would be at risk of freezing to death for the next four years or falling into the hands of traffickers.

Childcare Bill [Lords] (Programme) (No. 2)

Ordered,

That the Order of 25 November 2015 (Childcare Bill [Lords] (Programme)) be varied as follows:

(1) Paragraphs (4) and (5) of the Order shall be omitted.

(2) Proceedings on Consideration shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion, at today’s sitting, one and a half hours after the commencement of proceedings on the motion for this order.

(3) Proceedings in Legislative Grand Committee and proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion, at today’s sitting, three hours after the commencement of proceedings on the motion for this order.—(Mr Gyimah.)

[Mr Speaker]

As I informed the House on 26 October, before a Report stage begins on a Bill I will seek to identify in advance those changes made in Committee which I would expect to certify, together with any Government amendments tabled for Report stage which, if passed, would be likely to lead me to issue a certificate. My provisional certificate, based on those changes, is available on the “Bills before Parliament” website and in the Vote Office. At the end of the Report stage on a Bill, I am required to consider the Bill, as amended on Report, for certification. As I informed the House on 26 October, I have accepted the advice of the Procedure Committee not, as a rule, to give reasons for decisions on certification during this experimental phase of the new regime. Anybody wishing to make representations to me prior to any decision should send them to the Clerk of Legislation.

Litvinenko Inquiry

Tom Brake Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the fact that his Committee is undertaking that important review into the British-Russian relationship. He is absolutely right. Our relationship with Russia is already heavily conditioned. As I indicated earlier, shortly after the murder took place sanctions of various sorts were put in place, including visa sanctions. Those have remained. Our relationship with Russia is, as he said, heavily conditioned. As I said earlier, it is also the case—he is absolutely right—that there are issues in the British national interest on which a guarded engagement with Russia may be important. Of course, the future of Syria and resolving the conflict in Syria is just one of those issues.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

A slap on the wrist for Russia won’t do it. President Putin’s heart will not miss a beat if the UK cancels a trade mission here or a cultural visit there, but it will if we expand the scope of the sanctions already in force because of Russia’s illegal activities in Ukraine. Will the UK Government now ban any other Russians implicated in the murder, however senior, from travelling to the UK and freeze their assets? An assault on our sovereignty, which saw a British citizen murdered on British soil in a nuclear attack, requires nothing less.

[Mrs May]

As we have said, it is of course right that we take extremely seriously the nature of the attack that took place and the findings of the inquiry. As I indicated, this is not something that comes as a surprise. An assessment has been made by successive Governments of the responsibility and involvement of the Russian state in the act, as well as of the two individuals who have been named as undertaking the act here in the United Kingdom. We have a series of sanctions in place. The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the reaction to Ukraine. I indicated earlier that it is in fact the United Kingdom that has been leading the European Union effort in placing sanctions on individuals in Russia.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Brake Excerpts

Monday 11th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Karen Bradley]

Our current family reunion policy is already more generous than our international obligations require, and we have no plans to widen the criteria under immigration law. We consider each individual on a case-by-case basis, but we have no plans to change the rules.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

20. The Minister will be aware that 3,500 people died last year trying to reach safety in Europe. Twenty-seven non-governmental organisations and charities wrote to the Prime Minister at the beginning of the year, asking him what the Government would do about extending safe and legal routes to the United Kingdom, and about family reunion. When does the Minister expect a response to be forthcoming, and is it likely to be positive?

[Karen Bradley]

I am proud of the support that this Government are giving to people in the camps and in the region, where we can support far more people for the same amount of money than if they arrived in Europe. We have a relocation policy for 20,000 Syrian refugees, but it is important that we help as many people as possible, and we can do that best in the region. We must not encourage people to get on those boats, because nearly a quarter of people do not get off at the other end and die in the process.

Paris Terrorist Attacks

Tom Brake Excerpts

Monday 16th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I join my hon. Friend in sending our condolences to the family and friends of his constituent, Nick Alexander, who was brutally murdered in the attacks that took place in Paris on Friday night—somebody just going about his business, a business that was about providing enjoyment and fun to other people, particularly to young people; yet he was mown down. I can give my hon. Friend an absolute assurance that we are giving every assistance that we can to the French authorities and others in Europe to ensure that we bring to justice those who were any part of the preparation of that attack.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

For 10 years I lived near Paris and spent many evenings in the area that was desecrated on Friday night. To our French friends I state: le Royaume-Uni est en deuil avec la France and les Français et nous allons combattre le terrorisme ensemble. I am sure the Secretary of State will join me in stressing that Europe’s response to the actions of a small group of fanatical murderous terrorists must not be to pull up the drawbridge on the hundreds of thousands of genuine Syrian refugees who are fleeing terror similar to that which was inflicted on Paris on Friday.

[Mrs May]

The right hon. Gentleman is right. In a number of questions this afternoon, I have responded in relation to the United Kingdom’s plans to bring in a number of Syrian refugees. It is right that we continue doing that. As I have indicated, we have security-check arrangements, but there are many people who have been displaced from their homes as a result of the barbarity that has taken place in Syria and who need protection and assistance, and we stand ready to play our part, as indicated, in providing that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Brake Excerpts

Monday 16th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. What we have proposed in the draft Bill is a double lock, so there will be the necessary accountability—because the decision is made by the Secretary of State—on whether the use of these intrusive powers under warrant is necessary or proportionate, and then there will be consideration by a judicial authority. We will therefore get that independent consideration by the judicial authority and the accountability of a Secretary of State signing the warrant.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

The dreadful events in Paris make it even more important that the draft Investigatory Powers Bill is subject to full and proper scrutiny by the Joint Committee to ensure that it provides both maximum security for our citizens and the toughest protection of our civil liberties. Can the Home Secretary confirm that it will get that full and proper scrutiny and that it will not be fast-tracked?

[Mrs May]

As the right hon. Gentleman will be aware, we consider all counter-terrorism legislation carefully and review the necessary timetables, but this is a significant Bill and I think that it is important that it receives proper scrutiny. As he has said, we have put in place important safeguards and enhanced oversight for the Bill, and greater transparency in the powers that the security and intelligence agencies and the police and law enforcement agencies have available to them. It is right that it gets proper scrutiny.

Reports into Investigatory Powers

Tom Brake Excerpts

Thursday 25th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

No, I am not. I am part way through an argument that there are different kinds of warrant and different circumstances. In cases involving foreign affairs, where sensitive relationships with other Governments may be at stake, the Executive clearly have an important role to play; they cannot be seen simply as judicial matters. However, there are other kinds of warrant—for example, intercept warrants for the purposes of tackling serious and organised crime, where if the action was not intercept, but was instead knocking down someone’s door and breaking into their home, authorisation would be an entirely judicial process. There are significant questions about why intercept in the interests of pursuing serious and organised crime should have no judicial authorisation, whereas knocking down somebody’s door should have judicial authorisation.

That is why I think there is a strong case for introducing judicial authorisation to provide a clearer system of separation of Executive and judiciary and to introduce clearer checks and balances into the process. It does have to be done in the right way and there will be different considerations around crime and national security and foreign affairs, but I believe it is possible because other countries manage it. If we were the only country in the “Five Eyes” that did not have a process of judicial authorisation, even though we have similar intercept arrangements, that would pose a big question for us. Those who simply defend the status quo need to explain why they think the arrangements in all those other countries are inadequate and worse than ours, given the added legitimacy that some judicial authorisation processes should bring.

I recognise the complexity here; that is why it is wise that we hold this debate now, in advance of the Government making their final decisions on the issue and setting out their proposals. It is also wise that we have a period of consultation on the draft legislation, so that people can table amendments and have these debates. However, I do not see why judicial authorisation need threaten or jeopardise the work of the agencies—quite the reverse. If it is a way to provide greater legitimacy, and support from overseas, for this work, it could add strongly to the process, and to agencies’ work.

On the legislative process, I welcome the Home Secretary’s proposal for a period of proper reflection and discussion on the detail before final votes are taken in Parliament. That is the right approach. We are keen to continue discussions with her on this subject, and I welcome the briefing that she provided for me to enable us to do that. When the Snowden leaks first appeared in the media, there was a sense that Parliament was not debating these issues, that the Government were not responding, and that other countries were having a more informed and up-to-date debate about the response and the processes.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

On the subject of having a more informed debate, does the right hon. Lady agree that the Sheinwald report, redacted if necessary, should be published? Many believe that its proposals, including on international treaties, would do away with the need for some of what is proposed for any investigatory powers Bill.

[Yvette Cooper]

I have not seen the Sheinwald report or had prior briefing on it, so I could not say how much redaction would be needed, but the right hon. Gentleman is right that the more transparency we can have in this debate, the better, so I urge the Government to consider allowing maximum transparency in this regard, to the extent possible, given the operational sensitivities and our relationship with the US Government on this. Clearly, the more we can look at the detail of alternative ways of providing the powers, safeguards and legitimacy needed, the better, and the better informed the parliamentary debate will be.

The initial debates and the response from the Government were not sufficient. However, we have since had reports from the Intelligence and Security Committee and David Anderson, and we have another forthcoming external report from the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies. This is the opportunity for Parliament to make sure that we have a proper updated response on the complexities of the digital age and how we maintain our security and liberty in it. More safeguards and checks and balances are needed, but it is also important that our intelligence agencies can deal with the serious and growing threats that the Home Secretary talked about. We need to make sure that our talented men and women in the agencies can face those real and serious threats, but also have legitimacy for the work that they do, and the continued confidence of the public. That is in all our interests.

In a democracy, our liberty and security are the targets of terrorists who seek to harm and divide us. Liberal democracy will triumph over extremism and tyranny, but for it to do so, we need to strengthen ourselves by renewing our security and our liberty. The Anderson report helps us to have a debate about how best we do that to protect our democracy.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Nick Clegg (Sheffield, Hallam) (LD)]

I speak as someone who, as the Home Secretary knows, had a hand in the commissioning of this excellent report. The right hon. Lady will remember with fond, misty-eyed nostalgia the debates that she and I had on this complex, fraught and all-important area of public policy. One of the consequences of those debates and disagreements was that a number of reports were commissioned, including David Anderson’s. We look forward, as the Home Secretary said, to the publication of the report by RUSI. I strongly endorse her compliments to David Anderson and to the authors of the other reports, and I join in all that has been said in complimenting the professionalism and integrity of the work of the agencies—professionalism and integrity that I found on display daily in my work with them in government. As I will explain, my quibbles were invariably with proposals emanating from the Home Office about what new power should make its way on to the statute book, rather than with the day-to-day conduct of our highly effective intelligence agencies.

On the back of this excellent report from David Anderson, we have an unusual opportunity to try to reset the balance between privacy and liberty on the one hand, and safety and security on the other, in a digital age. As the Home Secretary rightly pointed out, all too often this debate is falsely caricatured, as if people who worry about security do not worry about liberty, and people who worry about liberty do not worry about security. In this area, as in so many other walks of life, it is necessary to strike the right balance. To somewhat misquote Benjamin Franklin, if we give up our liberty to gain a little security, we will deserve neither and lose both. As the shadow Home Secretary said, we should be striving to strengthen both liberty and security in tandem.

I am certainly no slouch when it comes to introducing new surveillance powers on to the statute book when it is demonstrably the case that doing so makes us safer and is necessary in order to keep up with new technologies. That is one of the reasons, as the Home Secretary is aware, why I always advocated legislating, as we have done, to enable enforcement agencies to match IP addresses to handheld devices, and why we legislated in the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act 2014—the acronym is DRIPA, unfortunately—to improve data-sharing between UK and US enforcement agencies. However, I have always drawn the line—I did in government and I do now—at proposals that I feel are either not based on proper evidence or not adequately proportionate and transparent. It is in that light that I would like to turn to a few of the points made by David Anderson.

I will not dwell on the points that have already been made about introducing a judicial role in the issuing of warrants, but I want to underline the shadow Home Secretary’s point that David Anderson made his case on the basis not just of principle, by pointing out that our practice is significantly out of line with how warrants are issued in other analogous jurisdictions, but of his observation—this was surprising, at least to me—that there might be operational value in introducing a judicial element in the issuing of warrants, as it would enable us more readily to secure data from American communications service providers, which are used to that kind of system.

I want to dwell on David Anderson’s comments on the draft Communications Data Bill—the so-called snoopers charter. David Anderson is scathing in his report about the proposals in the Bill to force UK network providers to collect and store third-party data relating to services operated by companies based overseas. He says quite unambiguously that,

“there should be no question of progressing this element of the old draft Bill until such time as a compelling operational case has been made”.

It is worth reflecting on that for a moment. I was told categorically and repeatedly in government that that was absolutely necessary for the safety of the public; that public safety would be in jeopardy if I did not endorse it. David Anderson has now found that no operational case has been made for that. Echoing an earlier question to the Home Secretary, I seek clarity from the Government on whether the forthcoming Bill will contain third-party data provisions, which David Anderson has said it should not.

In the light of that, I think that we should treat other proposals that do not have a clear evidence base or rationale—most importantly, the Home Office’s proposal to require CSPs to store so-called weblogs—with an equal amount of healthy and considered scepticism.

[Tom Brake]

Is my right hon. Friend aware of any reason why the Government should be intent on joining Russia as the only liberal democracy in the world that captures weblog information?

[Mr Clegg]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention, which I will come to in a moment, because David Anderson has made some specific recommendations on how we compare with other jurisdictions.

David Anderson has managed to do something that I certainly did not manage to do in government: to get the Home Office to define the somewhat nebulous term of weblogs. Weblogs, according to his report, are

“a record of the interaction that a user of the internet has with other computers connected to the internet.”

The House should take a long, hard look at that definition. It encompasses just about everything someone is likely to do on an internet-connected device—every step they take, every app they open, every edit they make to an online document—and that would be stored for the entire population for 12 months. David Anderson says that, remarkably, at no point was he presented with a “detailed or unified case” for such sweeping powers.

David Anderson also makes it clear—this relates to the point my right hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) has just raised—that we would be seriously out of step with the rest of the world. He states:

“I am not aware of other European or Commonwealth countries in which service providers are compelled to retain their customers’ web logs for inspection by law enforcement. I was told by law enforcement both in Canada and in the US that there would be constitutional difficulties in such a proposal.”

The House will also be interested to know that the new Australian data retention law specifically excludes the collection of weblogs precisely because the Australian police told their Government that it would be a disproportionate invasion of privacy.

It is entirely reasonable for law enforcement to want to identify how a known suspect is communicating online, but that is a completely different proposition from the one that the Home Office has now been putting forward in one form or another for eight years. David Anderson sets out a strict process, including using existing powers better but less intrusively than planned by the Home Office, and the presentation of a proper operational case before any detailed proposal is put forward by the Government. I am obviously keen to know from the Government whether that reasonable approach that he advocates will indeed now be pursued.

Finally, I welcome the Home Secretary’s announcement today that the Bill will be published for pre-legislative scrutiny, which will allow further debate on its undoubtedly complex and important provisions. The Bill must be as comprehensive as possible. Both the Intelligence and Security Committee and David Anderson have argued that it should incorporate all the powers that exist in different statutes at present. In that spirit, I hope that the Government will undertake to avow all undeclared surveillance capabilities and major programmes as part of that process.

I have come to the view that the Government’s standard blanket position of “neither confirm nor deny” is simply no longer tenable. Recent disclosures mean that the public are able to read detailed accounts of alleged surveillance capabilities, but Government Ministers are unable to explain or defend the need for them in this House or in public. I believe that undermines public trust, feeding a suspicion that there are parts of the system that somehow operate beyond proper scrutiny and transparency. Although we cannot and should not reveal details of operations and specific investigatory techniques, will the Home Secretary ensure that large- scale programmes, such as those referred to in recent revelations, are properly avowed at some point in the near future?

In conclusion, it seems to me that, as has already been said, and as the Home Secretary herself has suggested, we have a big opportunity. The deadline of December 2016 is approaching, when the current data retention powers will fall. Decisions must be taken—they simply cannot be ducked any longer—and they must be taken as consensually as possible, and on the basis of clear principles of necessity, transparency and proportionality. Surveillance powers are a necessary part of a liberal society, as we must have the ability to prevent criminals from curtailing the liberty of others to live their lives free from crime, but those powers must be based on evidence that they are both necessary and proportionate to the threat we face. I suggest that this House should not entertain proposals for significant, intrusive new laws based on assertion and rhetoric alone.

Border Management (Calais)

Tom Brake Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I am very happy to answer, briefly, that I am pleased we are not in the Schengen area. That is absolutely the right decision. We need to be able to maintain control of our borders and we will not be joining Schengen.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

Does the Home Secretary think that deeper UK engagement in resolving the problems Italy and Greece are facing in handling large numbers of refugees and economic migrants would maximise the chances of securing a European solution to the European problem at Calais?

[Mrs May]

We are working with a number of Governments across Europe. Indeed, as part of the Greek action plan agreed across Europe and put into effect by Frontex some time ago, we have been putting resources into that plan to help to support the Greek authorities to deal with the numbers they have coming across their border.