Immigration

Debate between Andrew Turner and Lord Hanson of Flint

Thursday 9th July 2015 Westminster Hall

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

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government policy on immigration.

Immigration is consistently one of the most important issues for my constituents. I am sure that many other right hon. and hon. Members find that the same is true for theirs. In the next 10 minutes or so, I would like to do two things: first, explore the mismanagement of immigration under Labour and, secondly, encourage the Government to tell us about their plans to take back control of the situation.

I would like to mention the boiling frog syndrome—I will explain it for those not familiar. When a frog is dropped in boiling water, it immediately feels the heat and jumps out. That is the natural and instinctive reaction. And yet if one puts a frog in cold water and very gradually raises the temperature to boiling point, the frog will apparently sit quite unknowingly until it dies. I must stress that I have not tried that on myself, but I am sure that it is obvious where the analogy is going. The huge influx of immigrants to our shores did not come all at once. We have a proud history of welcoming foreigners who want to play a positive role in our society, but during the Blair years that changed, and we as a nation did not realise what was happening. When my noble Friend Lord Howard of Lympne was Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition in 2005, he rightly made the point that immigration would be one of the most contentious issues of the coming decade. Hardly anyone listened to him then, and yet how prophetic do his words seem now? Our nation—the metaphoric frog—must jump out of the hot water before it is too late.

Back in 1997, Tony Blair won a huge mandate from the people to govern our country, but he omitted to tell us about his absolute determination to introduce and pursue an aggressive immigration policy, designed to make the UK a multicultural society. Thanks to a certain Mr Andrew Neather, a former Government adviser, we now know the truth. More specifically, he said it was Blair’s intention to

“rub the Right’s nose in diversity”.

In fact, it was not just the right’s nose, but the large majority of ordinary people’s noses, yet people became afraid to say anything about it. They feared being labelled racist or worse for even raising the issue. That cynical policy was ill thought out and badly planned. People are suffering from a lack of housing and pressure has increased on the NHS, our schools, our transport and roads, and so on. More evidence of Labour’s apparent indifference to the people’s concerns over immigration came in 2010, when Gordon Brown called Labour supporter Gillian Duffy a “bigoted woman” simply for voicing her concerns. That sort of dismissive and arrogant attitude must stop. We need to shape the debate on immigration so that those who are concerned are not made to feel bigoted or racist. Rather, we need debate, with everybody free to express their honest concerns. I know our Government support that.

Before I continue, I would like to be clear on one thing: just because I believe that our immigration policy is out of control, it does not mean that I am anti-immigrant. It is my firm belief that many of the hardest working and best contributors to our society are immigrants. I am also aware that many of our public services would simply fall apart without the foreign nationals who work in them. That does not justify an open-door approach. We should welcome those who benefit our society and exclude those who do not.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Could the hon. Gentleman clarify how he proposes to do that if he wants to remain within the European Union?

[Mr Turner]

The Prime Minister is currently negotiating with Europe and Europe must hear what we have to say.

What is a disgrace is the irresponsible manner in which previous Labour Governments allowed immigration to overwhelm our society. When we think of the housing crisis, for instance, we have to look only at past immigration policy to see why it has all gone wrong. The excellent founding chairman of Migration Watch UK, the noble Lord Green of Deddington, made that very point. He said that we simply cannot keep up with the demand for homes required at current levels of immigration. Recently, Fergus Wilson, one of the UK’s biggest buy-to-let landlords, said that the only way to address the housing crisis was to build outwards on to greenfield land. I am not a housing expert, but I take what those people say seriously as evidence of mismanaged immigration policy. The blunt fact is that sooner or later this country will run out of space.

Immigration

Debate between Andrew Turner and Lord Hanson of Flint

Wednesday 11th December 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Turner]

If the hon. Gentleman listens a moment or two longer, he will find that I come to those points.

No one ever thought to ask the British people whether they wanted what happened. Plans and policies were concealed, and mass immigration happened by stealth. One can only speculate whether Tony Blair would have been swept to power had he gone into the 1997 general election saying, “I will oversee an unprecedented increase in immigration.” Perhaps not—but now we must deal with the consequences of his policy.

Other hon. Members and I sit in our surgeries listening to tales of people living in overcrowded social housing or being on the waiting list for years with no hope of ever getting a home. It is no coincidence that with high net migration, from 2002, there was an increase of more than 60% in social housing waiting lists. Foreign nationals now occupy 8.4% of the housing stock, and among those aged 16 to 40 the figure is 12.6%. On the Isle of Wight we have a relatively small immigrant population, and overwhelmingly those residents work hard and make an important contribution to the community—indeed, they are an important and integral part of it. However, that is not the case everywhere.

I have lost count of the number of people who have told me that they moved to the Isle of Wight because they no longer recognised the places where they grew up; that now, in streets where their grandparents lived, no one appears to speak English; and that they moved to get away from ghettos where they felt they no longer belonged. The effects of mass immigration, mostly into our cities, are felt even in rural areas such as the Isle of Wight. We must recognise that.

I am thankful that the Government have begun to make a difference. They have made progress in cutting immigration from outside the EU. They cracked down on the abuse of student visas, unjustified family visas and—I am glad to say—bogus marriages. However, they have been unable to close our borders to a huge influx of EU nationals who can come whether or not there are jobs and homes for them, schools for their children or doctors and hospitals to care for them. Many British people believe that that must come to an end.

I have recently, in the words of one of my staff, joined the 21st century: I have signed up to Twitter and exchanged views with the intriguingly named Wight Car Tipper. I tweeted that we should extend transitional arrangements for Bulgarian and Romanian nationals and that our Government should have control of our borders. Wight Car Tipper asked me whether I thought his daughter, who has a French passport, should be able to live in the UK and retain the rights she currently has. I replied that it depends on the circumstances. Presumably, with the fine name of Mr Wight Car Tipper, her father is British, and in that case I think that she should be able to come and live here. However, I do not believe that foreign nationals from the EU or elsewhere should have the same rights as a British citizen, and I strongly believe that our Government must have the right to decide who can live and work here.

There is a fine British principle of fair play—of not getting something for nothing, and of making a contribution to society before being entitled to benefit from it. That principle must be applied to those who come to the UK. Someone who has only just arrived cannot have contributed to society. Some people claim that we need more immigrants to pay the pensions of an ageing population. That, of course, glosses over what happens when the immigrants get old—it is simply an argument for an endless influx of new migrants.

I am grateful to see the Minister here to respond to the debate, and extremely pleased that the Home Secretary has recognised at least part of the problem. She has suggested that free movement for future accession countries could be controlled, and that future member states should reach a certain economic threshold before full free movement is allowed. However, that would not deal with the current treaties that we have signed, or the issues that we will face in only a few weeks.

The Government are seeking to deal with some of the problems—the things that attract those who want to come to the UK to take advantage of our generous welfare system—but that approach does not deal with the basic right of so many foreign nationals to live and work here. They have those rights regardless of how overcrowded our island becomes, or how many of our own people are unemployed.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

How many British citizens live and work in Europe at the moment, and how many of them would be affected by the proposals that the hon. Gentleman contemplates?

[Mr Turner]

I do not know the figure, but it is certainly substantial.

[Mr Hanson]

What would happen to those individuals if the policy that the hon. Gentleman suggests—of immigrants not having the right to live and work in this country—were applied to British citizens in France, Spain or elsewhere in Europe?

[Mr Turner]

That is entirely up to the Governments of those countries. I feel that they should have the right to determine that issue for themselves, just as we should for our country.

The Government must try to deal with the concerns of many British people and, indeed, many settled and integrated migrant communities—those who recognise that we simply cannot retain an open-door policy for all current EU citizens. We need a more nuanced policy that is controlled by our elected Government and that works in the interests of the British nation.

In 1973, we signed up to the treaty of Rome, which established the free movement of people across the then common market. Let me be frank: it was a rich man’s club, and the number of people coming to the UK was small. In 1975, net migration was 3,000. Since then, the club has expanded to places such as Croatia, where the average wage is a 10th of that in the UK. It is hardly surprising that people there want to move to the more prosperous parts of the EU.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth. I congratulate the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr Turner) on allowing us one and a half hours of parliamentary time to debate a very important issue. You will have seen, Mr Howarth, that it is clearly a complex and multilayered issue. We have had discussions about the importance of integration and of the impact of European migration, but we have also heard very strong contributions about the need for business, for students and for tourism. We need to reflect on all those in any positive response to the debate that we are having today.

I start by echoing what the hon. Member for Braintree (Mr Newmark) said in what I thought was—I hope I will not upset him by saying this—an excellent contribution: that immigration has benefited the United Kingdom over many centuries. People have come here to build our biggest companies, to create our national health service and to win our sports prizes. I am struck by the fact that we are meeting just off Westminster Hall, which was built by William Rufus, the son of an immigrant, in 1098. I say to the hon. Gentleman that we have a proud history of contribution from immigration, but I also say that we need to examine the fact that real concerns and tensions are caused by some of the issues that have been raised and accepted here today.

I hope that I can help to assuage the fears raised by the hon. Members for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers), for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth), for Kettering (Mr Hollobone), for Braintree and for Isle of Wight by saying that, yes, mistakes were made by the previous Labour Government. If I may say so, however, I do not think that it was as the hon. Member for Isle of Wight said. There was no mass plan for increasing multi- culturalism, but I think that there was a willingness and a wish to ensure that we had a positive approach to eastern Europe.

Under the communist yoke, that part of Europe was not free, not engaged in free-market economies, not trading with us and not developing some of the economies in which we are going to invest resources for the future. That was the case for many years, so I think that there was a willingness. However, my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) and others have said that there was a lack of transitional controls that should have been, potentially, put in place, and that that has created some community tension. But let us not say that it was in total a bad thing, because I think that we do have some very positive benefits from migration generally.

I can look at my own constituency. The biggest employer there makes aeroplane wings with contributions from French, Spanish, German and British workers. Only last week, there was a £30 billion order for aeroplanes for my constituency. The neighbouring constituency has the site of the Toyota factory—a Japanese factory managed in my area by Japanese staff, creating employment for people in my constituency. Kimberly-Clark in my constituency is also a major employer in my area. That is an American-based company with American staff helping to invest in that company. Immigration brings wealth, prosperity and businesses, but it also brings challenges, as has been expressed.

Particularly in view of the potential for Romanian and Bulgarian immigration from 1 January—like the Minister, I do not know what that figure will be—we must look at labour market issues associated with the exploitation of those who come to this country to work. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) and the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) touched on those issues as being important.

I want the minimum wage to be strengthened to stop exploitation. I want local authorities to step up enforcement, and I want fines for non-compliance to be increased. The Prime Minister and the Minister have alluded to the potential for a move in that direction. It is not acceptable for wages to be forced down in this country by immigration from eastern Europe. I want gangmaster legislation to be strengthened and extended to areas such as catering and tourism, which it does not cover at the moment.

[Mr Andrew Turner]

The right hon. Gentleman is making some fair points. The question that he has not yet answered—he has another five minutes in which to do so—is whether those decisions should be made here in the UK or there in Europe.

[Mr Hanson]

I am a believer in a wider Europe, and I do not think we should retrench into the position that the hon. Gentleman has set out. We might look at what changes are needed, but our position in the European Community is a strong one for our markets. We may disagree on the matter, but that is my view.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central mentioned recruitment agencies. As we discussed in the Immigration Bill Committee, there are websites on which people try, in contravention of the Equality Act 2010, to recruit staff solely from eastern Europe or, increasingly, from southern Italy. I do not think that that is fair or right, and we should look at measures to outlaw such recruitment. In my constituency, local people cannot access vacancies in certain factories because staff are recruited solely from eastern Europe. That has to be wrong, and we should deal with that labour market issue.

We must strengthen and enforce housing legislation. I believe that the Minister agrees, because he has mentioned beds in sheds. We need to end the practice of shifts of people in the same accommodation sleeping for eight hours, working for eight hours and spending eight hours on the street, as happens in my constituency and in many others. We must take action to tackle that, because it undercuts the UK labour market and exploits those who come here legitimately for work.

We must also focus on the positive aspects of immigration. I have had representations from businesses—I even met some this morning—through London First and others. They tell me that, as the hon. Member for Cambridge and my hon. Friend have said, we need to attract people from the student community abroad, to ensure that they not only bring fees and spending power to the country but carry the good will of this country with them into their future work. The Prime Minister of Malaysia, or the future chairmen or chief executives of businesses abroad, will look back on their time in the UK with fond memories. That is an unseen export that we should contribute towards.

In addition to attracting students, we must also focus on tourism. I discovered last week that Chinese tourism is worth £103 billion to the rest of the world, but in this country we benefit from only £300 million of that amount. We need to increase our share of that market. To give credit where it is due—I try to be fair—the Prime Minister has tried to do just that. We must not ignore the fact that immigration is not only about eastern Europe; it is about opening our borders to allow people to get in for tourism purposes and to spend their money. I agree that we also need to look at business issues, which are important. If someone wants to come here to invest £1 million or £2 million in creating a business, we must allow them to.

I share the view of the hon. Member for Cleethorpes that integration is extremely important. In many of our towns and cities, including my constituency, the sudden influx of people speaking different languages in supermarkets and on the streets has created tensions, which I hope will ease with time. We must look at how we can maximise the benefits of Europe while having fair and appropriate immigration controls.

That leads me to say that we must ensure that we have strong borders. The report “The Border Force: securing the border”, published yesterday by the Public Accounts Committee, raised some criticism. No one says that the problem is easy to deal with; it was not easy when we were in charge and it is not easy now. We need to look at strong border controls. We need to ensure that those who have been through the system and have failed the residency test are removed from the United Kingdom in a fair way. We need to ensure that people who come here integrate and speak English and that we have a proper and effective immigration system.

I do not think, however, with due respect to the hon. Member for Isle of Wight and some others who have spoken today, that closing our borders in the way they have described by repatriating powers would be a good thing. I do not think that putting up a “Britain is shut” sign will help the economy or the residents of the country, however long they have been here, in the long term.

We have had a useful debate, and discussion of the matter will continue. I would be grateful for the Minister’s response to the points I have raised. There are real steps that the Government could take, but are not taking, to deal with labour market issues, which would assuage some of the concerns that have been raised today.