Nationality and Borders Bill

Baroness Meacher Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 1 & Committee stage
Thursday 3rd February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Meacher (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 64, to which I have added my name. I also strongly support Amendment 65.

The right to work—and the lack of it—for asylum seekers has concerned me for a very long time. I am rather relieved finally to be able to say so. I strongly support the comments already made in excellent speeches by other noble Lords. I shall try to avoid duplication.

First, the current law forces people to try to live on £39.62 a week. We all know that this is completely impossible. Utility bills, council tax, food, transport—you name it—cannot be paid for on this sort of money. These people are forced into something that they would never dream of doing in any other circumstances. It also prevents them from earning and paying taxes. Why would the Government force able-bodied workers to be unemployed and draw benefits at a vast cost to the taxpayer? Actually, the cost is not vast; these are trifling amounts of money, but it is a cost to the taxpayer. The cost to the community is considerable. As others have said, in many cases, these effects last for a very long time.

The Government say that they have undertaken a review of the policy. I believe they have not published the results, nor given any estimate of cost. Can the Minister inform the House whether their review considered the number of normally law-abiding asylum seekers who have been driven to crime by this policy? This is the worst possible thing a Government can do. All the asylum seekers want to do is to earn, pay taxes and lead a good life. Instead, they feel that they have to do something they have never done in their lives before and never dreamed that they would do: commit crimes. Perhaps the Minister can tell us the estimated cost in the review, and whether that includes the cost of courts, prisons and police in dealing with the crimes that these people absolutely do not want to commit.

Believe it or not, 40 years ago I wrote a book about the consequences of a similar sort of policy—a rule which deprived single people of benefits after four weeks. My research showed that the rule caused a dramatic increase in crime among that population. Government officials asked for a copy of my manuscript before I published the book. The policy was immediately scrapped. It did not help the sales of my book but, nevertheless, it was worth doing. I feel that this policy has to be scrapped for exactly the same reason. Noble Lords have pointed out all sorts of other reasons, but there cannot be a government policy which drives people into crime. Continuing it cannot be justified.

My second question concerns the basic cost to the Exchequer. The voluntary sector has come up with a figure of £194 million a year. I believe this is a massive underestimate. I am quite sure the cost is far more than that when all the unintended consequences are considered—if you want to put it that way.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and others have already dealt with the pull factor. We have the evidence. Asylum seekers who are desperate to get away from persecution, rape and other ghastly things—you name it—do not even think about the detail of what there will be when they arrive at the other end. It is just a European country. If I may say so, the pull factor is rubbish, rubbish, rubbish. If it made any sense, it would be the only possible justification for this policy. I implore the Minister to go back to colleagues and see what she can do.

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, it is quite daunting to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher. I very much hope that she will not be driven to writing a book about this, although if she did, maybe we would see some change.

I shall speak to Amendment 65 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, with the support of the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister, Lady Ludford and Lady Prashar. As has been discussed, this aims, quite rightly, to introduce the right to work for asylum seekers who have been in the UK for more than six months.

My noble friend the Minister will know the gist of my argument from my comments on Tuesday. I am grateful for her forbearance then. Suffice it to say, I believe that this amendment is a matter of complete common sense. It is exactly the sort of policy that should underpin global Britain’s new immigration system.

This is a moment when we have to decide who we are as a nation. We want an immigration system that takes back control—one where the British people can see that we are trying to manage our borders and are actually doing so. They can also see that we have compassion for those in need when we, as a nation, have so much already.

This is not a niche opinion. I note that all wings of the Conservative and Labour Parties, the Liberal Democrats, other Cross-Benchers and the Deputy Prime Minister support the extension of the right to work for asylum seekers.

The arguments for this right to work are overwhelming. I will restate a couple of them. I hope that it will be helpful to hear them from these Benches. First, as the noble Lord, Lord Alton, said, the latest figures show that 125,000 people are waiting for asylum decisions. Every study shows that the net benefit to the state would be in the tens or even hundreds of millions of pounds a year in increased tax take if this measure were enacted.

The UK economy is recovering after Covid. A lot of jobs have been created but this has, in turn, created labour shortages. It makes no sense whatever for asylum seekers who can drive HGVs or serve in the NHS to be forced to sit around doing nothing for over a year while they await a decision from the Home Office. The noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, made that point very powerfully.

Secondly, there is very persuasive evidence that the right to work has a large, positive impact on the integration of asylum seekers who successfully settle. As other noble Lords have already mentioned, the Government’s Migration Advisory Committee recently underlined that shorter waiting times have a large, positive impact on long-term employment outcomes for asylum seekers.

As noble Lords have noted, these measures have overwhelming public support. I will mention one niche statistic. According to recent polling, 73% of red wall voters questioned support a right to work. As others have mentioned, business leaders back the easing of the ban on the right to work.

There is a basic human dignity argument for this policy. I believe that every individual should be able to support themselves and their family. I would go further and say that, as Conservatives, we believe that every family has a personal responsibility to do so where they can. I have often made the argument that work is the best route out of poverty. The aim and intention of this amendment are to do precisely that: let people support themselves and create their own pathway from poverty to prosperity while they wait for the decision.

The lack of the right to work leaves people vulnerable to exploitation, declining mental health, poverty and modern slavery. If the human dignity arguments do not seal the deal, the amendment could also be viewed as purely pragmatic. Reforms to the asylum system proposed through the Nationality and Borders Bill will take time to come into full effect. In the interim, while asylum cases are being processed, the asylum system continues to be under considerable strain. By offering asylum seekers the right to work, the Government would take pressure off themselves.

I anticipate that the Minister and other colleagues might be inclined to respond to this amendment using the pull factors argument, and I know others have addressed it. However, let me address those points from these Benches. First, it is push factors such as war and famine which drive refugees to these shores, not pull factors. If there are any pull factors, they are those which encourage people to come to the UK: our language, culture, rule of law, democracy, historic ties through the Commonwealth, family connections, and liberty, not the welfare payments.

It is worth noting that the UK is currently an outlier in enforcing a 12-month wait period for work and then placing long restrictions on which employment can be taken up. No other nation across Europe, USA, Australia or Canada has such stringent requirements. It is worth asking why they have not considered the right to work to be a pull factor. This view is totally backed by the experts. The Migration Advisory Committee underlined that there is no evidence in academic research that people decide to claim asylum based on these kinds of factors. The Home Office commissioned a study, which others have mentioned, that also shows that there is little evidence of this.

All of this is to say that I believe the Government could quite legitimately, without nervousness and in line with their poverty strategy for families working their way out of poverty, adopt this amendment that allows asylum seekers to work after six months of being in the UK.