Immigration

Andrew Turner Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)]

I welcome the newly appointed Minister to the post. He was a popular Minister in his last job, but he will now find it easier to have every Conservative Member—and many others—supporting him.

Ever since I became an MP, and indeed since long before, it has been clear to me that we needed to take more seriously people’s views about immigration. However, both the Liberals and the Labour party took exactly the opposite view. They believed that there needed to be complete concealment from the public on this issue, and anyone who believed the contrary was a racist. The fact is, however, that many people were becoming so concerned they were prepared to accept being labelled as racists if the consequence was to do anything good on immigration. The number of migrants allowed into this country was far and away in excess of what we needed for economic growth, and many people in all parts of the country were sickened by it.

Let us go back to the year I was born. We took approximately 3,000 people into the country in 1953. By the 1970s, we admitted an average of 45,000 per year, and that did not include the 27,000 Ugandan Asians from Idi Amin’s genuinely racist regime. In the 1980s and early 1990s, 54,000 were admitted each year, rising again in 1999 to around 97,000. Let us make it absolutely clear. It was the intention of the Labour party to admit far more migrants than ever before. Its aim was to create a rainbow coalition—what it succeeded in doing was creating ghettos in many parts of the country. This is something that had long been suspected by Conservatives and was realised with the Labour party’s draft policy paper in 2001, which was thought to have mentioned “social objectives” within its overall migration strategy.

[Kate Green]

I do not recognise the history that the hon. Gentleman portrays, but does he recognise that many of my constituents, who arrived as migrants or are now second and third generation migrant families, will be incredibly hurt and offended by the way in which he characterises them as somehow undesirable in our society?

[Mr Turner]

If the hon. Lady would indicate what is wrong with what I have said, I will change it if necessary.

In the period between 1997 and 2010, we admitted 200,000 people per year. That is the same as creating a new city the size of Birmingham every five years, not including illegal immigrants as we had no idea where they were. When Lord Howard of Lympne led the party in the election in 2005, we were called racists for wanting to impose effective limits on migration. It was the first real attempt by even the Conservative party to stand up for the people who live here.

Labour, under the then Prime Minister, began to see the truth after many years of attack on a small minority of politicians, such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames) and, even more so, the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field) for leading the debate. But even during the last election campaign, the then Prime Minister called a pensioner and lifelong Labour supporter a bigot for questioning the scale of migration.

In the 2010 election, we Conservatives promised to reduce the number of migrants to 100,000 per year by 2015. The question is whether we are doing enough, and the answer is clearly no. Our policy is not to offer free health care except in emergencies, to migrants from outside the EU, but there is no effective system in place to enforce that. The same goes for migrants from within the EU. Spain, unlike us, has this system under control, and migrants from the EU cannot get health care unless they produce the right papers. Migrants who intend to live in Spain for more than three months have to produce a job contract or evidence of their ability to support themselves, otherwise their requests will now be denied. We need answers.

There are other points that we need to press more strongly. First, there are still no controls on people coming from the EU. Quite clearly, we must effect such controls. Secondly, there are students. Some of them are false, and we congratulate the Government on how, even this week, they have been reducing their number. On the other hand, however, we do not intend to keep genuine students away. They must fill in the visa forms, and we must make it clear that they are welcome. Thirdly, there are the illegals. We must keep working at them in order to reduce their number, but the law is not 100% behind the Government in this area, and a change from the judges would be much welcomed. Finally, there must be genuine help for those who wish to return to their country of origin.

[Stephen Phillips (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

My hon. Friend identifies a number of things that need to be tackled. I wonder whether he agrees with me that although we have heard tough words on immigration from both sides of the House, both since the election and before it, what we really need are not only tough words but tough action. That is what we have not seen, but what we need to see from the new Minister.

[Mr Turner]

I am 100% behind my hon. and learned Friend. I must say that the actions of the Minister’s predecessor were very welcome, and I am sure that his own actions will be welcome too.

I was moving on to the question of what to do about those who live here but wish to go home. Europe provides money to pay for some people to get home, and we need to make that clearer, more broadly available and simpler to those who want the help.

[Chris Bryant]

Repatriation?

[Mr Turner]

Yes, that is the word.

[Chris Bryant]

Repatriation?

[Mr Turner]

Yes, that is the word and that is what it means. If someone chooses to go home, we may help them, and if possible that should be determined by our own Government, not the Europeans.

We are working through the system, but it appears to be a case of taking two steps forward and one step back, and it is one of the few areas where I would welcome more progress.