Refugee Family Reunion (Immigration Rules)

Alan Meale Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Sir Alan Meale (in the Chair)]

Before the Minister begins, I ask him to leave a small period of time at the end so that the hon. Member for Bristol West (Thangam Debbonaire) can wind up.

Immigration

Alan Meale Excerpts

Thursday 9th July 2015 Westminster Hall

[Sir Alan Meale (in the Chair)]

Before I call you to speak, Minister, may I remind you to allow a minute or two for Mr Turner to wind up the debate?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Turner]

I want to raise two issues that I think I have mentioned already but which the Minister did not touch on in his response. First, what are we going to do to control immigration from within the European Community? How much of that will we do ourselves, and how much will be done on our behalf, but effectively? We do not want 120,000 people coming here unless everyone approves. I want to know more about that.

Secondly, I see that the cap on skilled economic migrants from outside Europe will be maintained at 20,700 during this Parliament. Therefore, 100,000 are being admitted who are not part of the skilled economic migration cap. What are their qualifications for coming to this country?

[Sir Alan Meale (in the Chair)]

Order. The Minister will respond to that in writing—we have run out of time.

Police Forces

Alan Meale Excerpts

Tuesday 5th July 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Burley]

No, I do not. A good chief constable should not be retiring officers who have such experience and who they think can make a huge contribution to their force. The point, as I said earlier, is that they do not have to do that. The Government are not forcing any police force to retire officers with loads of experience, and the best forces are not doing that. However, the point remains that they have to deal with the cuts.

We are not blaming police forces. We are not blaming Chris Sims for getting rid of his officers with 30 years’ experience. Police forces have to deal with the massive budget deficit that the Labour Government left us, so it is the previous Government whom we are blaming for the cuts having to be imposed on police forces, which are doing their best to deal with them. We blame not the police forces or the chief constables, but the previous Labour Government.

[Sir Alan Meale (in the Chair)]

I am well aware that only one more Back Bencher wishes to speak. My difficulty is that we need to bring the Front-Bench spokesman in, so that he can get answers and responses to the questions that have been posed. However, as the hon. Member for Lewisham East (Heidi Alexander) is the only one and has quietly waited all through the debate, I shall call her to speak. I ask her to be very brief.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

I am sorry, I really cannot.

We have talked a lot about whether the cuts can be achieved without damaging the front line. Denis O’Connor of Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary estimated that £1.15 billion could be saved if the least efficient forces brought themselves up to the average level of efficiency. We want forces to reach the standards of the most efficient, not just the average.

There are also areas outside the remit of HMIC’s report, including Government and IT collaboration, where further savings can be made. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary made an announcement about that yesterday, which will be significant. In terms of officers opting out of the pension scheme—

[Sir Alan Meale (in the Chair)]

Order. We must now move to the next debate.