Anti-Semitism

Debate between Andrew Percy and Neil Parish

Tuesday 17th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I suspect that I will not be getting a round of applause, but I have to say that it is a real pleasure in one sense but also a real burden to follow the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger), who made a passionate speech. I can imagine what will already be happening on social media after that speech. May I thank her for her bravery? We need more people with her bravery in politics on this particular issue.

Anti-Semitism is racism. There are no ifs or buts—it is simple racism. I want to start by saying that I think Britain is a good place for Jews to live. We are in many ways a beacon in Europe of safety for the Jewish community. I know from my work with the all-party parliamentary group against antisemitism just how different the situation is for many Jews in mainland Europe. On a visit to Brussels to see the Jewish community there, I saw people living in genuine fear not just behind security guards in their schools, but behind 10-foot or 15-foot gates with military personnel and tanks outside.

We know how difficult the situation is for French Jews, and the terrible murder of Mireille Knoll—a holocaust survivor—in France recently is more evidence of that. When I asked young Jews who were students at a school in Belgium whether they saw a future for themselves in Belgium, I was saddened by how many of them said, “Not at all.” Not a future for them in Europe.

The situation is not good in Britain, although it is a lot better than that in many parts of Europe and we should recognise that. But there are difficult questions to be asked about anti-Semitism in this country and where it comes from, and we must ask some of those challenging questions. As I heard from our own Chief Rabbi at the global forum on anti-Semitism in Jerusalem just a few weeks ago, there are questions to be asked about certain communities. A recent study undertaken by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research found that certain communities in this country, particularly the Muslim communities, are twice as likely to hold deeply anti-Semitic views. They are also more likely to be on the receiving end—of Islamophobia, of course, and of racism too, so they are victims, but there are issues that need to be raised, and I urge everyone to read Rabbi Mirvis’s excellent speech from the global forum on anti-Semitism about this particular issue in that community.

However, we know the real issue at the moment is a rise in anti-Semitism on the left of politics. Some of us on this side of the House who try to raise and address this issue are sadly accused of trying to smear the Labour party. I have no interest in smearing the Labour party on anything, but nor do I have any interest in allowing what is happening in British politics, in which we are all vested and invested, to continue to happen, because it is disgusting that in Britain in 2018, in mainstream politics, we have people who are able to operate freely and to—

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

On our recent visit to Israel, as my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) said, we met an Israeli Labour MP who said that they were severing their links with the Leader of the Opposition, not with the Labour party. That is the issue and it has to be sorted out at the top of the Labour party to stamp out this anti-Semitism once and for all.

[Andrew Percy]

Absolutely. The shadow Secretary of State was brilliant in much of what he said and I feel he believes it genuinely. He went on to talk about the far right on social media and the far right in Hungary. Absolutely, there is a problem with the far right. What I did not hear him talk about quite so much, however, are the Labour members who have been defended by some of the people sitting beside him. One Labour member, who said that the Jews were responsible for the slave trade, was defended by a Labour Member who sits behind him.

What I saw throughout this debate was the Leader of the Opposition chuntering repeatedly when anybody stood up and tried to hold him to account for some of the things that people have said and done in his name. This is a leader of the Labour party who found himself not in one, but in four or five racist anti-Semitic Facebook groups by accident. He did not look at the material. He did not read the material. He did not know the material was there. He did not understand the material. He looked at the mural and made a comment on the mural, but he did not know about it. How are we supposed to believe any of this?

Spousal Visas

Debate between Andrew Percy and Neil Parish

Monday 9th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I am delighted to have secured this debate on spousal visas, an issue on which the Minister has responded on a number of occasions. On one of the last such occasions, on 19 June in Westminster Hall, he explained that the spousal visa changes had three aims: dealing with fraud, namely, sham marriages; promoting better integration, including English language testing and tests on life in the UK; and preventing visa applicants from becoming a burden to the taxpayer. I do not necessarily have an objection to any of those aims. Indeed, I would like to see a tougher immigration system, but he also said in that debate that the changes are

“about preventing abuse and setting out sensible rules that people can follow.”—[Official Report, 19 June 2013; Vol. 564, c. 275WH.]

The question I wish to raise on behalf of one of my constituents is whether we are in fact following sensible rules, and whether the changes are affecting the people they are designed to impact upon.

This Government inherited the mess in the immigration system left by the previous Government. I, like all Conservative Members, was elected on the basis of having a tough immigration system and that is what I wish to see. In my constituency, however, the failure of the last Government was broadly around European Union immigration, which these rules do nothing to impact upon.

I pay tribute to the Minister, who has had to respond to issues around spousal visas on a number of occasions. He is a very competent Minister and I am sure he will be able to take on board my concerns, which I raise on behalf of one of my constituents, Gary Smith, who lives in Goole.

Gary is 43 and has been married for five years to his Cambodian wife Shantar. They have a three-year-old daughter, Aaliyhh, a British national of course, who currently resides with her mother in Cambodia; they have lived there for five years. Gary and Shantar have been married since 2008. Gary’s wife is a restaurant manager, a qualified teacher and a business partner in a local charity in Cambodia for which Gary used to work. His wife has been able to visit the UK but, unfortunately, because of these visa changes, she is unable to settle here.

Shantar’s visa application has been rejected on a number of grounds. Two of them were technical issues to do with some lost paperwork. The embassy in Cambodia apparently lost her English language certificate, which I have managed to get a copy of, and it is hoped that that problem will be solved. Another issue regards accommodation in the UK, which has been, or is being, resolved.

Unfortunately, Gary, a street sweeper with the East Riding of Yorkshire council, because of his income level, is unable to hit the £18,600 minimum income requirement to bring his wife of five years and the mother of their child to this country. With overtime, Gary earns £17,000 and, being a local government employee, he has had no significant rise for the last three years. He is currently supporting his family in Cambodia, sending out what will shortly amount to £200 a month just for school fees to educate his child, along with other support. That is as opposed to supporting his wife and child in this country. He lives in Goole, and the property in which he lives costs £450 a month. Council tax is less than £100 a month, and in our town there is no question but that on an income of up to £17,000 he could support his wife and child.

Moreover, Gary’s wife has been offered a job in the United Kingdom, and I have a letter from the employer—a very good employer—who says that the skills that she has as a restaurant manager would be greatly needed in the new project that the business is hoping to start in Goole. However, under the rules, the letter offering her a job means nothing and has no impact on the income threshold. Despite the fact that there are huge concerns in Goole about immigration, bearing in mind the fact that up to 25% of its population are EU migrants—that issue is raised regularly—800 Goolies have signed a petition in support of my constituents, and there is real support for Gary on the issue.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for introducing the debate. I have a constituent called Mrs Celia Elizabeth Parr who is married to a doctor from Ecuador, and they have a little child. Mrs Parr lives in Colyton, and she has enough self-employed income, but she has experienced huge problems getting her husband into the country. We very much support tighter immigration controls, but we seem to be stopping people who have a legitimate right to be here putting their family back together again.

[Andrew Percy]

I thank my hon. Friend, and I shall come on to the impact that that has had on decent people who just want to bring their family together and make a life here.

In relation to the income rule that has impacted on my constituent, I shall give the House the average incomes in our area, which has a low-wage economy. The average income in the East Riding of Yorkshire is £5 above the threshold. I represent the poorest part of the East Riding, and Gary lives in one of the bottom 25% most deprived areas in the country, so achieving £18,000 is something of which many people in our area can only dream. The average income in inner London is £34,749.

We may have low incomes, but we also have low house prices. The average house price in our area is £150,000, compared with the average in Greater London of £454,000, which is even more than my house cost. Gary could have the same job earning slightly more than that arbitrary £18,600, and he would be able to bring his wife in, despite the fact that he would have greater outgoings and a much lower disposable income than he has by virtue of the fact that he lives in Goole. I am grateful for a figure provided by the Royal College of Nursing to the all-party parliamentary group on migration, which has done a good job on this issue. The RCN points out that the majority of national health service care support workers earn a maximum of £17,253 a year. Anyone who is an NHS care support worker is not allowed to find love outside the country.

Since this issue came to light and I secured the debate, I have learned of several examples of the problem around the country, two of them involving US citizens who have been caught by the requirement. That is what concerns me most. The measure was supposed to impact on sham marriages, but who is it really affecting?

European Union

Debate between Andrew Percy and Neil Parish

Tuesday 13th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

To continue the party analogy introduced by the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan), I am certainly a willing attendee, although judging by his speech he is a bit of a party pooper. I did not agree with much of what he said, but I certainly agreed with the speech by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) and others who have spoken from the Opposition Benches—if not always in opposition to us.

I want to mention the response from my constituents. Since the Prime Minister’s action on Friday, we have been inundated with e-mails, Twitter messages, answerphone messages and telephone calls to the office from people—people who voted for all different political parties—saying that the Prime Minister was absolutely right to draw a line in the sand. It has been interesting listening to the people who criticise us on this issue and the language that they use. It is the usual sort of Euro-fanaticism that we hear from them, the usual patronising guff, as I called it the last time I spoke.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is right. The Prime Minister used the veto to stop this European integration. Sitting in the European Parliament, of course, one finds that people are ever driving for greater union. This is one Prime Minister who has actually stood up for the British people. We must commend that.

[Andrew Percy]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend, who, having been not at the heart of the EU but certainly present, knows a lot more about its workings than I would ever wish to know.

I was talking about the language used by those who object to or criticise the Prime Minister’s actions despite having no alternative plan. They say that it is ill thought out, that we are ill informed and ignorant and that we do not understand the issues. My response is this: we understand the issues perfectly well, we understand how the EU works; we just do not like it—and you know what, Mr Deputy Speaker? They need to wake up because the public do not like it either, if the response to opinion polls and in our constituency offices and e-mail inboxes is anything to go by.

Of course, these are exactly the same people who argued for us to be in the euro. We hear this nonsense from Labour Members that they were the party that kept us out of the euro. They were not at all. They would have had us in there had it not been made so politically inconvenient and difficult for them. That is why they spent so much money trying to prepare us for the euro. I suspect that quite a few of them, if they were honest, would have us in the euro at the first possible opportunity. So we will not take any criticism from the Opposition Benches—I mean the Labour Benches, not the finer Benches occupied by Irish Members.