Baroness Lister of Burtersett
Main Page: Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Lister of Burtersett's debates with the Home Office
(2 years ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, while supporting all the amendments in this group, I speak to Motion D1 in my name, taking up the baton from the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, whom I thank for her persistent commitment on this issue, which remains undimmed. As previously, the amendment would give asylum seekers the right to work in any occupation after six months, but it introduces a review after three years—rather than four, as previously—to assess whether government fears about such a right creating a pull factor are founded.
The Commons reason for not accepting the previous amendment states that
“the Commons consider that asylum-seekers (save in limited circumstances) and their adult dependants should not be permitted to work while a decision on their claim for asylum is pending”.
This is the equivalent of a parent telling a child that they cannot do something “because”. It is not a reason.
During the debate in the Commons—such as it was—the Minister reiterated concerns about undermining the economic migration scheme, and our old friend the pull factor. But there is no reason why a right to work after six months should undermine the economic migration scheme, and, as Sir Robert Buckland pointed out, he and others
“have said on many occasions that there is simply no evidence to suggest that a limited right to work is a pull factor.”—[Official Report, Commons, 20/4/22; col.240.]
In fact, the academic evidence suggests the opposite, and the Migration Advisory Committee has expressed considerable scepticism.
The other argument put by the Minister in the other place, which was repeated by the Minister here, was that the Government want to see claims settled within six months. However, when he was asked by one of his Back-Benchers to confirm that the Bill and other measures
“will mean that there should be no asylum seekers still in a state of limbo, waiting for their asylum status to be determined, after six months”,—[Official Report, Commons, 20/4/22; col.253.]
thereby making the amendment unnecessary, answer came there none. It would be wonderful if the amendment proved to be redundant, so that there were no longer 62,000 people awaiting a decision for more than six months, but the Government’s resistance to it suggests they are not confident that claims will be settled within that timescale. The Minister this afternoon suggested that the amendment would create significant operational costs for the Home Office. I am not quite clear what those costs are, but presumably there are savings from asylum support, and calculations have been done, which I know are contested but suggest a considerable fiscal saving overall from the amendment.
If we believe in integration, for which, according to MAC, the right to work is a key foundation stone, in preventing poverty and in protecting mental health, we should not give up on this amendment. In the Commons, 11 Conservatives, including a number of former Ministers, supported its previous iteration and 53 abstained. Earlier, the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, in this House, emphasised that, on basic Conservative principles concerning paid work, current policy fails dismally. Public support has been growing steadily to a point where the latest poll last month showed that at least four in five support the reform, regardless of political affiliation.
Once more, I would like to give the final word to asylum seekers themselves. MIN Voices, which I recently had the pleasure of meeting virtually, in its call for the right to work, asks us to
“remember that we are human beings and we have dignity”.
I fear that, in its refusal to countenance change, the Home Office is failing to remember. Let us, at least, accord to asylum seekers their humanity and dignity by asking the Commons to think again.
My Lords, I will speak to Amendment D1, and I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, for her eloquent introduction to the amendment. This is a common-sense change. It would be a boost for the Treasury, for recruiters and, not least, for asylum seekers themselves. They often wait years for a decision on their claim while battling poverty, isolation and mental ill-health. However, the Government appear to want to maintain a ban on employment for asylum seekers, even after the introduction of their offshoring policy. They say that giving people the right to work will still encourage more people to come to the UK.
This pull-factor argument, however, is simply not supported by the facts. Evidence for it remains unclear, unshared or—as many suspect—non-existent. A challenge to Ministers from the Government’s own Migration Advisory Committee to show proof of a link between the employment ban and a pull factor has so far gone unanswered. Publicly available and up-to-date figures show no correlation. If such a correlation, or even causation, existed, asylum migration would look very different from how it does today. Certainly, 28,000 refugees would not have risked their lives crossing the channel in boats in 2021 to come to the UK, where they cannot work; they would have headed to Sweden, which received just 10,000 applications for refugee status, even though asylum seekers can work after day one.
The 62,000 people who claimed asylum in Spain last year, where they must wait for six months to work, would have simply crossed the border into Portugal, whose 1,300 asylum applicants can get a job after one week. The people who applied for asylum in France—over 100,000 of them—where they must wait six months to work, could have just stopped in, or headed to, Italy, where they can work after two months. That some countries with stricter labour access laws often receive more asylum seekers, while, in many cases, fewer refugees go to countries with more relaxed rules around work, shows the lack of link between application numbers and employment rules. As we have repeatedly said in these debates, what the overwhelming evidence does point to as pull factors are those things that make almost all of us feel safe: our families, our friends, our communities, our language, a sense of shared history, and a country with a stable Government and respect for human rights.
We have an environment in which Ministers are nervous of appearing soft: I understand that. They are so nervous that even a widely beneficial, evidence-based, common-sense policy such as the right to work has yet to be accepted because it might make Britain a magnet. But I believe that this is wrong, and, while the negative and costly effects of this ban might not seem obvious, they are real. The ban costs the taxpayer an estimated £210 million a year. It leaves asylum seekers in poverty and institutionally dependent; it leaves businesses up and down the country without extra hands at a time of record job vacancies; it takes a terrible toll on people’s mental health; and it damages any attempt at integration and future employment success.
It should not be so hard to reach agreement on a policy that has so much cross-party support and so many benefits. I spent years at the DWP, as a Conservative special adviser, working to support people into work and off welfare, only to be hindered from advancing the same opportunity to those who have sought the protection of this nation.
The instinct to work, to contribute and to provide for one’s family is universal and integral to who we are as human beings. It is what it means to be human, each one according to their talent, gift, capacity and capability. We damage people when we forbid them to contribute. I urge the Government to keep thinking and to think again.
At end insert “and do propose Amendments 7F and 7G in lieu—