Finance Bill: Money

Debate between Alison Thewliss and Roger Gale

Tuesday 12th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am a big believer in honesty, and that I should correct my mistakes should I make one. In yesterday’s Budget debate I said that 222,000 families are affected by the two-child limit. I failed to read my own handwriting properly—the House of Commons Library briefing confirms that as of April 2023, 422,000 families are affected by the two-child limit. Could you advise me if it is possible for me to correct the record?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

The hon. Lady will appreciate that that is not a strictly a matter for the Chair, but it is now a matter of record, and she can therefore take it that the record has been set straight.

Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism

Debate between Alison Thewliss and Roger Gale

Wednesday 13th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I am glad to follow the right hon. Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox), and I agree entirely with what he said. Many people in this House have for some time been calling for the proscription of the IRGC. I have constituents who are also concerned about the reach of the IRGC and are scared for their own safety, even in this country. It would be useful if the Home Secretary addressed the delay in the proscription in her summing up.

Wagner Group are an appalling organisation. The strength of the atrocities that that murderous organisation have been carrying out has been well documented and well known for years at the highest levels of the British Government. The explanatory memorandum to the order sets out clearly the group’s activities, as a proxy military force, on behalf of the Russian state. It states:

“Founded in 2014, Wagner Group has operated in a range of theatres, including Ukraine, Syria, the Central African Republic, Sudan, Libya, Mozambique, and Mali…in pursuit of Russia’s foreign policy objectives and the objectives of host Governments who have contracted Wagner’s services.”

So why has it taken until 2023, a hot war on European soil and a co-ordinated plane crash killing the group’s leader for this order to come before the House? That is quite astonishing. A catalogue of chaos and destruction has come before today, and as much as we support the measure, it feels to me and many others that the Government have taken far too long to raise the designation.

We in the SNP are disgusted that in October 2021, before Putin’s invasion, the Treasury—then under the control of the now Prime Minister—allowed Yevgeny Prigozhin to circumvent sanctions and launch a targeted attack on a British journalist. We very much want to see action against Wagner Group and all those associated with them—that is a significant point.

In the press release accompanying this announcement, the Minister for Security, the right hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), said:

“Proscribing Wagner sends a clear message that the UK will not tolerate Russia’s proxies and their barbaric actions in Ukraine, and condemns Wagner’s campaign of corruption and bloodshed on the African continent, which has been repeatedly linked to human rights violations.”

That is all fine and well, but why was this not done sooner? I would like answers from the Home Secretary on that. Acting sooner may have stemmed some of that bloodshed and some of what has happened, and may have sent a clearer message more widely at a much earlier stage. If the organisation was indeed founded in 2014, that means that we have now been waiting nine years for this measure, and a lot of destruction has passed since.

Designating Wagner Group for proscription is a response to repeated requests from Ukraine’s President Zelensky, who has called for the group to be treated as a terrorist organisation. Can the Home Secretary tell us when he first made that request of the Government, and what response has been given to him? Clearly, we support President Zelensky and want him to succeed in his endeavours, but it would be useful to know the timeline and when the Government responded to that request.

On the wider situation, organisations that work for Wagner Group depend on the flow of funds that often wash up through bank accounts in the United Kingdom. We know about the UK’s reputation as a hub for laundering dirty money. Prior to this debate, the House dealt with the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill, which could do more still to ensure that we know who owns and benefits from various types of financial structures. Is the Home Secretary satisfied that that legislation will go far enough to prevent the sons, daughters, relatives and associates of Wagner Group members from moving money through accounts here in the UK? We should do everything we can, in light of Prigozhin’s actions to evade UK sanctions, to shut down Wagner Group wherever they might sprout up.

The Foreign Affairs Committee has branded the UK Government’s efforts to deter Wagner Group “underwhelming in the extreme” and recommends that the Conservative party revive at the earliest opportunity the 2019 manifesto commitment to spending 0.7% of the UK’s gross national income on official development assistance. Russia, and China to an extent, are exploiting and seeking to put their influence into the gap left by UK development assistance. As we pull back from that influence that we have had in the world, we do not want countries to be turning to states such as Russia, and to groups such as Wagner that work on their behalf. Will the Home Secretary comment on what more can be done to ensure that we counter such nefarious influence? Once states go down that road, it can be very difficult to come back, and we know from countries in Africa that the result of that will also end up on the Home Secretary’s desk in the form of people seeking asylum in this country, fleeing from wars that we could have done more to prevent had we clamped down and had we provided aid at a different stage. All of this is interconnected, and all of it comes through her Department.

The Foreign Affairs Committee has also commented that it has received no evidence of any serious effort by the UK Government to track Wagner Network’s activities in countries other than Ukraine. That is perhaps not directly within the Home Secretary’s remit, but could she comment a wee bit further on the tracking of the Wagner Group’s activities—on how closely the UK state is monitoring those activities to ensure we understand where they are now and, crucially, where they might be going next? They appear to have a very nimble organisation that can change and evolve, so we need to be mindful that although Prigozhin is gone, there are plenty of people to replace him within that organisation. What they are doing is clearly lucrative, so we need to have that intelligence and analysis of their network to make sure we are keeping a close eye on what happens next, and what more the UK state can do to intervene in it.

Can the Home Secretary talk a bit more about the further sanctions on civilian enablers and frontmen, which I touched on a little when we were debating the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill? There are people in this country, I am certain, who are facilitating a lot of the movement of finance. We have the opportunity to go further than is proposed in the order to look at those frontmen and those who give the organisation its corporate face. Will the UK Government have a regular mechanism for co-ordinating with allies about sanctions—prioritising travel bans, for example—to make sure that those actors involved in Wagner do not get to move around? Is the Magnitsky sanctions list also co-ordinated with today’s action, and will more sanctions on that list follow? I know that it is not the done thing to say who is going to be sanctioned, but it would be good to get some reassurance that that list is continually under review.

Finally, it would also be useful to know what further mechanisms there are for oversight in this House. We need to be keeping a closer eye on this issue: it should not have taken nine years to get to where we are today. What more will be done to make sure that this is an effective mechanism—that we are keeping a very close eye on this organisation and its operatives, and doing everything we can as a good ally to Ukraine to make sure that all our actions are co-ordinated, working with other allies to make sure everything that can possibly be done to shut down this evil terrorist organisation is done, and done quickly?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

Illegal Migration Bill

Debate between Alison Thewliss and Roger Gale

Committee stage
Tuesday 28th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. Before we go any further, I remind Members that we are in Committee. In Committee, Members are entitled to speak more than once. The hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) is entirely in order in seeking to speak again, and the Committee has until 8.12 pm to complete this debate.

[Alison Thewliss]

Thank you, Sir Roger, for that clarification; I am sure that other hon. Members may also find it of interest.

A Bill would usually go upstairs for Committee stage and be scrutinised line by line. Every one of the more than 150 amendments to this Bill would have been discussed and we would have had the opportunity to vote on them all. We would have scrutinised the Minister in significant detail on each and every amendment, and each would have been properly discussed. He would have had to work to get this Bill through the House if it had gone upstairs to Committee rather than being discussed in this farce of a process today.

It is also important for those watching this at home to understand that no evidence has been taken on this Bill. Usually when we would go upstairs to a Bill Committee, we would be allowed to take evidence from experts in the field. The experts in this field have done their absolute utmost to get that evidence to us, and I am holding in front of me just some of the evidence I have received from organisations, which I have tried to present through the many amendments that I have tabled.

[The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. I now do have to call the hon. Lady to order, because she is making a general speech. She is well aware that a series of amendments is under discussion and that we are not having a general debate like on Second Reading. Perhaps she would like to return to the amendments under discussion.

[Alison Thewliss]

Thank you very much, Sir Roger. I would be glad to return to the topics of the Bill.

At the back of the Bill is the schedule, which may be of interest to hon. Members, as it contains a list of 57 countries, including countries from which people are known to be trafficked into sex slavery in this country. The Republic of Albania is the first on the list. We know, because the evidence supports it, that there are people—women—being trafficked to this country to be held in facilities where they are raped repeatedly by men. Those women will now not be able to ask for safety, because if they do, they will be putting themselves at risk of being deported to Rwanda. As we know, traffickers will hold that over women as a threat; this Bill is a traffickers’ charter.

I had a look through the Human Rights Watch profiles of some of the countries on the list of 57 that Ministers deem to be safe countries to which people can be removed, and I had a long conversation with Rainbow Sisters about the difficulties for lesbian and bisexual women being returned to these countries. Men are also mentioned in the list, which reads:

Gambia (in respect of men)…Ghana (in respect of men)…Kenya (in respect of men)…Liberia (in respect of men)…Malawi (in respect of men)…Nigeria (in respect of men).”

Men can be removed to these countries, but Gambia, Jamaica, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritius, Nigeria and Sierra Leone—which are in this list—all outlaw same-sex relations. Ministers are not going to ask when somebody arrives in this country in a dinghy or on a plane—however they arrive—anything about the circumstances of those people. They will quite simply put them on a plane and send them back, if they can. If they cannot, those people will be in limbo in this country forever because there will be no means of removing them.

[Patrick Grady]

I am sure that lots of Members in the House and lots of people watching at home will want my hon. Friend to continue the line-by-line scrutiny of the Bill in the time that is available by the order agreed to by the House. She mentions Malawi as an example. I am proud to chair the all-party parliamentary group on Malawi. Is not precisely the point that the individual circumstances of any asylum seeker who comes here need to be assessed? We cannot arbitrarily make decisions about individuals, because we do not know their individual cases. But the clauses in this Bill, and the schedule that she is talking about—

[The Second Deputy Chairman]

Order. I know that this measure arouses strong opinions, but we do have a process in this House: we have to stick to the amendments. There are no amendments to the schedule and the hon. Gentleman was not referring, so far as I can see, to any amendment. In the remaining stages of this debate, can we please now confine our arguments to what is on the amendment paper, not to what is not on the amendment paper?

[Alison Thewliss]

Yes; my hon. Friend would be referring to amendment 191—in clause 2, page 2, line 33—which would disapply the section

“where there is a real risk of persecution or serious harm on grounds of sexual orientation”

if a person

“is removed in accordance with this section.”

This is important. We think that people’s individual rights and risks ought to be assessed by the Government, but that is not happening; the Government are not looking at individual risk.

It was interesting to find Nigeria on the list, because if LGBTQ people are returned to Nigeria, they are at significant risk. Nigeria topped a danger index of countries for LGBT people. Men would face the death penalty by stoning and women whipping and imprisonment if they were found to be LGBT. So the very real risk that we are trying to prevent through this amendment is to prevent people being returned to these countries. Jamaica is No.18 on that same danger list, but it is listed here as a country that the Home Secretary is perfectly happy to return LGBT people to, even if it is to an uncertain future where they would be outlawed from living their life and expressing the rights that they have.

Sir Roger, there are many amendments that we could speak to, because all of this Bill is an assault on human rights. We believe that human rights should belong to everybody. The Home Secretary should not get to deny them to a group of people just because of how they happened to arrive in this country. We know that there are many people who will flee very dangerous circumstances and will try to reunite with a family member who is already here—that family member might be the very last person in their family who is alive. They could have seen the rest of their family killed in front of them, and have an uncle here in the UK, but if they cannot get here by any safe or legal routes to that uncle, to that last remaining family member, as is referred to in our amendments, then how will they possibly be able to live their life?

We are sentencing people to a life in limbo—a life that they will no longer be able to live. The Government have not thought through the full consequences of the Bill. What will happen to these people who are forever left in limbo?

I wish to mention amendment 246, which says that these measures can be put forward only with the consent of the Welsh Senedd, the Scottish Parliament and the Northern Ireland Assembly. The Government will not get legislative consent for these measures. I have a letter signed by a significant number of Members of the Scottish Parliament who do not give consent for this, who do not accept the Bill, and who do not think that it is something that they want to see. It is an affront to our human rights in Scotland. It is not the kind of country that we wish to build. I was very proud to see Humza Yousaf become our new First Minister in Scotland. Humza’s family—

[The Second Deputy Chairman]

Order. Let us try again. The new First Minister of Scotland, however honourable he may be, is not part of this legislation. Will the hon. Lady please stick to the amendments that are on the Order Paper? Otherwise I shall have to ask her to take her place.

[Alison Thewliss]

This matter is certainly pertinent to the amendments that we have tabled. Humza’s grandparents came here as immigrants. Under this Bill, they would not be able to find their way here in the same way. That is true of many people in this country who have come here and built their lives. Some of them have ended up as legislators in this place and are drawing the ladder up behind them. Humza has made it incredibly clear how grateful he is that he has this opportunity. His grandparents could not have imagined, when they came to the UK with very little and with no money in their pockets, that they could work their way up through society and that their grandson could aspire to achieve the highest position in Scotland—to be the First Minister of Scotland.

Instead of demonising immigrants, instead of demonising the people who come to this country, instead of saying to people such as Mo Farah that they would not get to come here in the future, we should listen to the experiences of people who have come here, who have made their lives here. We should thank those people for what they have contributed. We should thank them for doing us the honour of choosing to come to this country and making their home and life here. When we do not recognise that contribution, when Ministers pull the ladder up behind them, and when they prevent people from coming here, it makes this country poorer.

--- Later in debate ---

[Patrick Grady]

Am I not right in thinking that Sabir Zazai has been made an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire? That is what asylum seekers can achieve in this country if they are allowed to flourish. That is what our amendment—

[The Second Deputy Chairman]

Order. Hon. Members are in danger of abusing the House. I am being scrupulously fair and trying to ensure that everything that is said remains in order. The hon. Gentleman was out of order. Now, will the hon. Member for Glasgow Central please conclude her remarks so that the Minister, if he wishes to, may respond? We will then move to the Divisions.

[Alison Thewliss]

With reference to amendment 189 and the contribution of Afghans, Sabir Zazai tells a story of when he was given a letter from the Home Office saying, “You are a person liable to be detained and removed.” More recently, at a celebration to mark his being awarded an OBE, he said he had received a different letter telling him he was being awarded this great honour of the British state. He said he would put those two letters on the wall next to one another, because they show that, regardless of the circumstances by which someone came to these islands, there ought to be nothing they cannot achieve.

There ought to be nothing—but this Bill pulls up the drawbridge. It makes this country smaller, it makes this country meaner and it makes this country crueller—for every Sabir Zazai, for every Abdul Bostani, for every person that the right hon. Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood) is outraged about. People can come here and make a contribution. They could live a dull, boring, ordinary life, they could be an OBE, they could be the First Minister of a country, but they have a contribution to make and they deserve to get to make that contribution without the UK Government pulling up the drawbridge and saying that they are unwelcome.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison Thewliss]

I absolutely agree with the hon. Lady. I sat through many phone calls at the time with Ministers and with constituents who were terrified for their family members. Many of them still do not know whether they will get to safety at all, despite having applied through the process. They are waiting with an uncertain future in Afghanistan, where their lives are under threat, where their daughters cannot go into education and where they are pursued by the Taliban day in, day out. The point about Afghans in this Bill is particularly serious.

However, there are other nationalities of whom we could equally say that: Iraqis who helped to support British forces, and other people from other countries where Britain has a footprint. Many people come here because of the footprint Britain has had in the world, and we have a particular responsibility to those people. The Afghan interpreters in their exhibition used the phrase, “We are here because you were there.” That speaks also to the legacy of empire, the legacy of the English language and the legacy of Britain around the world. That is why people seek to come here.

I believe very firmly that we have a duty and a responsibility to people around the world. This Government renege on that responsibility. That is what the Bill is all about. My real fear is that, having seen Britain do it, other countries will pull up the drawbridge; that they will renege on their international obligations, saying, “If Britain can do it, other countries can do it, too. If Britain will not stand up for human rights, why do we need to bother? If Britain does not stand up for the refugee convention, why should we? If Britain does not stand up for the UN convention on the rights of the child, why should we bother either? Let’s get children back into slavery to be trafficked all over the place.”

This Government are not protecting children. That is why we have tabled these amendments: we seek to protect people who are being trafficked and exploited. This Government, by ignoring our amendments, seek to refuse people that protection, that human dignity, the rights that they have under our international obligations. We have those rights because of the things that we have done in the past. We should no longer have to put up with this Government. Scotland needs independence. It cannot trust this Government to look after it.

[The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Roger Gale)]

Does the Minister wish to respond?

[The Second Deputy Chairman]

Does the hon. Lady wish to press the amendment to a Division?

[Alison Thewliss]

indicated dissent.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment proposed: 189, page 2, line 33, at end insert—

“(1A) This section does not apply to a person (“A”) who is an Afghan national where there is a real risk of persecution or serious harm to A if returned to that country.”—(Alison Thewliss.)

Question put, That the amendment be made.

Security Threat to UK-Based Journalists

Debate between Alison Thewliss and Roger Gale

Monday 20th February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I thank the Minister for his statement and for advance sight of it, as well as for the way in which he has approached this very serious issue this afternoon.

We in the SNP are alarmed and deeply disturbed by the serious threats to UK-based journalists by the Iranian regime, and we condemn in the strongest possible terms the horrifying threats to journalists, their family members and all others involved. We owe a great debt of gratitude to the brave independent Iranian journalists, particularly those from Iran International, who have shone a light on the recent protest movements and shown the world the continuous and shocking human rights abuses by the Iranian security forces and the Iranian regime. We commend their courage in continuing to do so in the face of threats that have come in a place where they should expect to feel safe.

It is very welcome that the Minister is talking about more sanctions today, and I appreciate what he said about not announcing the proscription of organisations such as the IRGC on the Floor of the House, but I would strongly urge him to consider doing so and to consider doing so quickly. This is the source of great uncertainty and great fear for many Iranians who are living in the UK, including those who have come to visit my surgeries, and he may remember that I raised the case of a constituent a few weeks ago. Those Iranians I have spoken to in Glasgow are scared. They do not know where they are safe, and that should not be the situation for anybody who has come to live in these islands. They should be able to go about their lives in Glasgow or anywhere else without fearing who might be coming to get them, and without having to look over their shoulder whether out in the streets or even in universities, where they do not feel as though they can be quite as safe as they should be.

Could I also ask the Minister what approach he is taking with colleagues in the Home Office to the issuing of visas for those who fear that if they return to Iran they will be persecuted, for those—perhaps if they are on a student visa that may run out—who are in limbo at the moment and are not certain as to what their future will be, and for visitors? What is the further approach to those who may actually pose a risk to people in the UK in getting visas for here?