Brexit: Refugee Protection and Asylum Policy (EUC Report)

Debate between Baroness Barker and Baroness Meacher

Tuesday 22nd September 2020 Grand Committee

[Baroness Meacher (CB)]

My Lords, I too congratulate the EU Committee, whose report is comprehensive, clear and informative; it is really quite excellent. I want to put a number of questions to the Minister. No doubt her wind-up speech will respond quite automatically to some of them but, in so far as that is not possible, I wonder whether the officials might respond to some of the unanswered questions today.

As the report says, a UK withdrawal from the Dublin system after Brexit would result in,

“the loss of a safe, legal route for the reunification of separated refugee families in Europe”,

as my noble friend Lord Jay quoted. In a no-deal scenario, the impact on refugees really could be appalling. Can the Minister give an assurance that a temporary extension of the current arrangements will be put in place in the event of no deal until a satisfactory alternative system can be generated? It does not seem a lot to ask.

Very concerning is the fact that the UK does not participate in the family reunification directive, under which the participating EU countries have common rules governing the exercise of the right to family reunification by their country nationals, including special rules for refugees. The report points out that:

“The Government has indicated its intention to establish a new strategic relationship on asylum and migration with the EU—replicating some of the key principles of Dublin”.


I emphasise “some”. Can the Minister indicate which principles the Government do not plan to include in their new strategy, and why not?

I share the concern of the committee about a potential reduction in the reunion rights of vulnerable unaccompanied children; a number of noble Lords have already referred to this incredibly upsetting issue. Can the Minister assure the House that the Government will actually increase the protection against disruption to family reunion afforded by the Immigration, Nationality and Asylum (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, and can she spell out what the additional protections will be? Future UK-EU asylum co-operation should include a framework for the speedy resolution of refugee family reunion cases, ideally based on continued UK access to the Eurodac database. Can she give the House any information about these issues?

Can the Minister comment on the conclusions of David Bolt, the UK Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration? He said—I thought very tellingly—that

“the Department had handled family reunion applications as if they were visit visa applications”,

and that the Home Office had been

“too ready to refuse family reunion applications on the basis of insufficient evidence”,

instead of giving the applicant more time to produce more evidence, which might result in a much fairer and more efficient outcome. Bolt made the point that the readiness to refuse came from seeing these applications as “the wrong thing”. I do not fully understand all that, but it certainly sounds deeply worrying. Despite an improvement following the Bolt report, evidence from other witnesses shows that stakeholders continue to have significant concerns over the process for reuniting refugee families in the UK.

Probably the most upsetting aspect of the refugee tragedy is the fact that unaccompanied children are not allowed to sponsor their parents to come to the UK. The Refugee Council said that these restrictions condemned some of those children never to see their family members again. I find that shocking. Can we really continue with such a policy? I think not.

Not quite as bad as the position of unaccompanied children, but nevertheless also unacceptable, is the rule that family reunification does not allow so-called non-dependent children to be reunified with their families in the UK. What this means in practice is, of course, that the family has to leave behind an 18 year-old or so daughter or son, and we know that, in a number of countries, a daughter on her own with no family protection at all could be in serious jeopardy. Again, I hope that the Minister can reassure us that this will be dealt with.

The report rightly refers to the Home Office’s failures to assess the evidence available and its tendency to apply an

“excessively high standard of proof”

in family reunion cases. It also states that the Home Office regularly exceeds the time limit to conclude these cases under the Dublin regulation, and the time taken is, as we all know, no small matter. Delays can have long-lasting and serious impacts on the mental and physical health of vulnerable child refugees, who have already suffered enough before they arrive here.

An anomaly that should surely be sorted out when we leave the EU is that local authorities receive £25,000 over five years to support a child with a family who arrive through a resettlement scheme, but nothing to support an unaccompanied child and help with the costs of the care system. How can that be justified? Perhaps the Minister can comment on that.

Finally, lengthy periods of detention for asylum seekers need to be thought about. The Refugee Council noted that the UK was the only country in Europe that did not have a maximum time limit for immigration detention. As noble Lords know perfectly well, thousands of people are detained each year for long periods, costing £100 million annually and affecting the health and well-being of the detainees—and, of course, many of those are children. Again, do the Government plan to right this wrong? I sincerely hope so.

After all that, I suppose that I need to say something positive. I understand that the UK has a good record on implementing the refugee resettlement programmes. Indeed, I understand that the UK can claim to be a global leader in resettlement, so we are able to do things properly. I congratulate the Government on that success and hope that they can extend that good practice to the other areas that I have mentioned.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Barker) (LD)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Quin, has withdrawn from these proceedings, I now call the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra.