Security of Elected Representatives

Beth Winter Excerpts

Thursday 29th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Tom Tugendhat]

Let me be very clear. Security for a Member, whether at home, police protection or whatever it happens to be, is not a luxury or a benefit. It is a burden and an intrusion into their personal life that is essential for the conduct of our democracy in our country. It is not something that any of us would choose— I certainly would not. It is deeply disturbing that anyone’s children should be targeted or threatened, and I hope the whole House will be clear and speak as one that no one should ever be criticised for having security and protection. I am sure that others outside will have heard that.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

MPs must be safe to express their views. As we have heard from hon. Members on both sides, they face real threats, intimidation and abuse. That must be condemned at all times. But at a time of heightened tension, the Prime Minister’s talk of mob rule and some of the Minister’s comments today in relation to legitimate, peaceful protests, dangerously distort those events for political reasons, and detract from real risks. This morning, the Met’s former chief super- intendent, Dal Babu, made similar comments when he challenged unhelpful language, saying that there is a level of frustration, but we are in a democracy and the overwhelming majority of people at protests are peaceful. Do we not have a duty, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) said, to speak very carefully, address real concerns and not abuse events in that way? We must protect MPs, but we must also ensure that the public’s right to peaceful protest is protected.

[Tom Tugendhat]

I am slightly surprised by the hon. Lady’s comments. My prime duty to this House, and to those who elected me to serve them here, is to be honest. There is no point in lying to them or deceiving you, Madam Deputy Speaker. There is absolutely no point in spreading untruths, leading to an outcome that would not serve us well. All I have done today is speak truthfully about the nature of the protests we have seen and repeat the words of some of those who organised those protests: that they would have us lock our doors, that they would close this Parliament, that they would silence our voices and that they would end our democratic processes. That is what they are advocating. If she does not like the truth, maybe she should stop supporting them.

Legal Migration

Beth Winter Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

We asked the Migration Advisory Committee to look into these things—that it why it exists—however my hon. Friend makes a very important point, which speaks to why we are tightening the system to prevent abuse. Anyone looking at the numbers will see that a significant number of people have come through the health and social care visa system over the last couple of years, yet we have lost them from health and social care. That is not what any of us needs or wants. The right thing to do is to ensure that those who come are genuinely employed in that sector, which is where we need them—that is the promise that they have made to us, and that we have made to them. Ensuring that that is the case is the right and fair thing to do.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

The Minister said: “Migration to this country is far too high and needs to come down.” But as others have said, so many of those who come to this country make a critical contribution to our employment sectors, no more so than by filling the gaping holes in our social care and health sector. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s response to Unison, the social care trade union, which says:

“The care system would implode without migrant care staff.”

Does he not agree that a better, more humane approach would be to fund local government to improve social care pay and conditions?

[James Cleverly]

There we go again. As I have said, while the shadow Home Secretary says that immigration numbers are too high, each and every one of her Back Benchers disagrees with any action to deal with it. We have got to bring these numbers down, we have committed to do so, and we have put forward a thoughtful plan, which takes into consideration the needs of the health and social care sectors.

Illegal Migration Bill

Beth Winter Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Monday 17th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Patrick Grady]

A constituent contacted me recently and said that I seemed to be speaking an awful lot in the Chamber about immigration and asylum issues. I suppose that that is correct, but then that is because the Government allocate so much time in the Chamber to immigration and asylum issues. This is the third major piece of primary legislation on immigration since 2015. However, the majority of constituents—hundreds of constituents—who get in touch with me on each of these pieces of legislation tell me just how disappointed, if not horrified, they are at the Tory UK Government’s attitude to people who come here seeking refuge.

In rejecting all the Lords amendments before us today, the Government are showing just how hostile an environment they want to create—not just for asylum seekers, but for almost anyone who wants to make their home here in the UK. The fact that they will not accept Lords amendment 1B, which is a considerably softer version of what we discussed last week, demonstrates that. If the Government are truly committed to the international conventions listed in the amendment—particularly the 1951 refugee convention—they really should have no problem agreeing that they will form part of the interpretation of the Act when it comes into force.

I have also heard from constituents who want to ensure that LGBTQ people who arrive here from places where they can face imprisonment for simply being who they are cannot be removed to those countries. That is what the Lords are seeking to achieve in Lords amendment 23B. Accepting that amendment would save time and public money because otherwise, by the Minister’s own admission, claimants would have to make suspensive claims against removal to their country of origin. That is what the Minister says he wants to avoid. He wants to avoid loopholes and needless court cases. In that case, he should support Lords amendment 23B.

The amendments that seek to protect children from indefinite detention and that maintain human trafficking protections speak for themselves, as does the Government’s insistence on rejecting those amendments. The Government keep asking those of us who are opposed to the Bill for alternative proposals for dealing with irregular arrivals, and these are clearly outlined in Lords amendment 102B and in the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury’s amendments 107B and 107C. The Minister keeps saying that he wants to establish safe and legal routes. Well, that is what Lords amendment 102B will require him to do. I have met many asylum seekers through the Maryhill Integration Network and elsewhere who would much prefer to have come here from Eritrea, Iran or other countries that have been mentioned today through a safe and legal route, rather than the risks, costs and desperation of coming on lorries and boats.

The archbishop’s proposals for the development of a strategy on refugees and human trafficking are perhaps the most straightforward and easily implementable of all the clauses and amendments so far. The Government regularly accept amendments requiring them to publish strategies and reviews on all kinds of legislation. Perhaps they do not want to support this one because the transparency and accountability that would come with requiring the Government to undertake a long-term analysis and make a long-term plan in response to global population flows would reveal the true hollowness of the rest of their proposals—the inhumanity and the self-defeating implications of the hostile environment.

Millions of people will be on the move in the coming years and decades. They will be fleeing wars that we have financed and climate change that we have helped to cause. Experiences in southern Europe and the American midwest this week suggests that they will not just be moving from the southern hemisphere either. Nobody is saying that the United Kingdom should have completely open borders and take unlimited numbers of migrants, but we have to be prepared to take our fair share, just as other countries welcomed refugees fleeing famine and clearances on these islands not that many generations ago.

If Government Ministers and Back Benchers truly respect the role that the House of Lords is supposed to play in the UK constitution, they really ought to listen to the messages that their lordships are sending today and will send in the days to come. As it stands, people in Glasgow North and across Scotland are listening to the rhetoric of the Conservative Government and deciding that they want no more of it. They will be seeking the safe and legal route to independence as soon as possible.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

I will begin by putting on the record my complete opposition to this horrendous Bill in its entirety. It is cruel and inhumane. It will put people at serious risk of further exploitation. It is stoking division within our society, and it undermines constitutional principles and human rights.

We are here today to focus on amendments, so I will briefly say that I support all the Lords amendments before us, particularly Lords amendment 1B, which others have already spoken about, in the name of my friend Baroness Chakrabarti. The amendment sets out the Bill’s intention to comply with a host of human rights conventions, including those with regard to the protection of human rights and the rights of the child, and against trafficking human beings.

It is vital that we underline our commitment to human rights, and, to quote the First Minister of Wales, Mark Drakeford,

“provide a warm welcome to all of those who seek sanctuary”.

That is particularly important as accommodation sites that have been identified by the Home Office for asylum seekers become targets for protests by the far right. That is happening in Wales at the moment. Amendment 1B is a modest and uncontroversial amendment. The Lords have backed it twice. More than 70 organisations have stated their support. The Government must yield and stop voting it down. If the Government are, as they say, confident that the Bill is compatible with the UK’s international law obligations, there is nothing to fear from the amendment.

I also support Lords amendment 102B in the name of Baroness Stroud, a Conservative peer, which provides for a duty to establish safe and legal routes. This is, again, a modest and uncontroversial amendment that could make an unsupportable Bill slightly better. We need to go much further. We need to expand safe routes, as organisations such as the Refugee Council, Care4Calais and the Public and Commercial Services Union have argued, in line with the amendment. We also need to tackle the backlog with a fair, humane and speedy processing system.

The Government have lost control over the asylum system. Their “stop the boats” rhetoric will not stop the boats because people are genuinely seeking asylum from war and poverty, and nobody would go on a boat, risking their life, unless they were desperate. We should be welcoming people to our country. What is contained in the Bill does not represent the type of country that I want to live in, or that I want my children or grandchildren to live in. What I and millions of others want is a country and society that is based on care, compassion, kindness, generosity, respect, inclusivity and, yes, solidarity.

I support today’s Lords amendments, which should be accepted, but if the Bill is passed this week, I and many others in this House—and, more importantly, outside it—will continue to oppose and campaign against this appalling piece of legislation at every opportunity.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I have to reduce the time limit to four minutes. I call Claudia Webbe.

Coronation: Policing of Protests

Beth Winter Excerpts

Tuesday 9th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

Training is very important, as the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) mentioned a little while ago, but, once again, I do not think we saw any trampling on the right to protest. We saw hundreds of people exercising their right to protest. I urge the House to keep in mind that this was a unique, once-in-a-generation event. The eyes of the world were upon us and there were numerous intelligence reports, which I was briefed on and perhaps the shadow Home Secretary was briefed on too, indicating well-developed plots to disrupt the coronation. The policing response needs to be considered in that context.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

Following the arrests of peaceful pro-democracy campaigners on the route of the coronation on Saturday, the Security Minister’s claim that the weekend would “showcase our liberty” has fallen flat. Can the Minister explain why the Home Office, and not the Metropolitan police, wrote what protest groups have referred to as “intimidatory” letters about the public order powers, and will he provide a comprehensive explanation of why journalists are now being arrested when section 17 of the Public Order Act prohibits it?

[Chris Philp]

As I said earlier, those letters were not, as far as I can recall, sent in my name. They may well have been attempting to be helpful by clarifying recently enacted legislation that some groups may not have been familiar with; it is not unreasonable to try to ensure that relevant parties know when the law changes. On journalistic freedom, as the hon. Lady says, this House—supported by the Government—voted particularly and specifically to protect journalists, and that is the right thing to do. If anyone feels that that has not been properly implemented, complaints procedures are available.

Illegal Migration Bill

Beth Winter Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 28th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

I start by congratulating Humza Yousaf on becoming Scotland’s new First Minister, and wish him every success in taking Scotland forward to independence. He, of course, comes from a heritage beyond these shores, and that should be a matter of celebration and pride.

Once again, the amendments before us today show that this Bill pleases nobody. Opposition Members are trying on a cross-party basis to restore some basic elements of humanity and decency to the process and make sure that the UK actually continues to have something that resembles an asylum system, but it seems that for many Tory Back Benchers, the Bill does not go far enough: Tory extremists want to make it even more punitive. We see that, for example, in amendment 136, tabled by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis), who is no longer in his place. Attempting to ban the use of hotels for temporary accommodation is simply gesture politics. It is probably unworkable and is certainly impractical, and is likely to further increase, not reduce, the cost to the taxpayer. I wonder how often the hon. Member and many others who have spoken today have actually met with asylum seekers who are staying in such hotels—who, incidentally, I am happy to consider as constituents of mine who have a voice that needs to be represented in this place.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) said, too many Tory Back Benchers speak of asylum seekers as some sort of amorphous, dehumanised blob, which I think is completely inappropriate. The asylum seekers I have met, through the Maryhill Integration Network and elsewhere, do not want to live in hotels: they want to be able to work and contribute to society. The way to get asylum seekers out of hotels is to give them the right to work, the right to earn a living—which, by the way, is another fundamental human right—and to let them pay for their own accommodation and pay tax into the system. At the end of their asylum process, if their claim is rejected, there have always been processes for removal and return; however, if their claim is accepted, they will be much further down the road of community integration, and at far less cost to the taxpayer. Instead, this Bill and the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North will channel yet more money into the hands of outsourcing companies such as Mears and Serco, and many of us will continue to hear stories at our constituency surgeries of substandard and unsuitable accommodation being paid for by taxpayers.

Today’s group of new clauses and amendments really gets to the heart of what the Government say this Bill is trying to achieve. Many of us suspect that what the Government are actually trying to achieve is a fight, first with the House of Lords, then with the Supreme Court and then with the European Court of Human Rights, but much of that was covered yesterday. Clause 2 provides sweeping powers and duties that add up to what the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has described as a ban on asylum.

During the passage of the Nationality and Borders Act, many of us asked how the United Kingdom, which is surrounded by water, can ever be the first safe country of arrival for an undocumented migrant, an issue that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry) touched on. How can anyone traveling from Iran, Eritrea, Sudan, or practically anywhere else on the globe be expected to meet the third condition in clause 2(4) about not passing through a safe third country? Maybe there is some inventive way that the Minister can tell us about—he has paid so much attention to the debate. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) should not have been surprised that the Minister was having conversations on the Front Bench, because he has spent most of the debate looking at his phone. I do not know whether there has been an update to Angry Birds or Candy Crush, or maybe it is just a particularly difficult Wordle today.

Nevertheless, what are the inventive ways in which people can reach this country without passing through a safe third country? If someone pushes off from the coast of Eritrea, navigates the horn of Africa, sails round the Cape of Good Hope, makes it up the north and south Atlantic ocean without straying into anybody else’s territorial waters and lands on the south coast of England, will they be allowed to claim asylum under clause 2? In fact, will there even be a way of knowing? That person would not even be allowed to make a claim, so when would they get the chance to prove that that was the journey they had undertaken?

In order to mitigate these ridiculous restrictions, the SNP has tabled amendments 186 to 196. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central for humanising the people affected in the way that she did. The amendments would offer protection to people who are under the age of 18; people already determined as refugees under the terms of the refugee convention; people who face discrimination because of their sexual orientation; people who are victims of torture; people who have been trafficked or face slavery; people who have HIV or AIDS; and people who have come from Ukraine or from Afghanistan. Given the outrage we have heard today from sections of the Conservative party about the treatment of asylum seekers from Afghanistan, I hope the Government will be prepared to accept our amendment 189, or they will face the prospect of their Members joining us in the Lobby in support of it later on.

I asked the Minister yesterday, and he did not bother to respond—again, I am not sure he was listening—where the evidence is for the deterrent effect that these powers and the threat of immediate deportation are supposed to have. Why has the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 not had that impact? Should those powers not have already started to work, because the powers in clause 2(3) are backdated to 7 March, when the Bill was introduced? Surely there should already be a slowdown in the number of arrivals. If there is a reduction in arrivals from Albania, it is because of a separate arrangement that the Government have come to. The reality is that this clause and these powers will not have a deterrent effect.

Freedom from Torture identifies four principal reasons for its clients undertaking perilous journeys to reach these shores. One is

“to join family or community that could offer security and support”,

and another is

“because of familiarity with the UK’s language, culture and institutions”.

The UK Government spend thousands, probably millions of pounds promoting those things abroad, saying, “Britain is great. Come and get a Chevening scholarship. Come to the United Kingdom”, except when someone actually tries to apply, they cannot, unless they have an awful lot of money. Another of the reasons is

“the hope of reaching a place where human rights are respected”,

which is certainly ironic given the Bill in front of us and the clauses we are debating today. The final reason is

“a lack of safety in the countries they were passing through.”

There is very little that the Government can do to address any of those pull factors through legislation. Several stakeholders make the point that many arriving here have little or no familiarity with the asylum rules, so the punitive measures in the Bill, particularly the powers in clause 2, will do nothing to change that.

Amendments 174 and 175, which I have tabled, relate more specifically to the debate we heard yesterday about the clauses on safe and legal routes. The amendments would ensure that this House has a meaningful say on what the cap or target for entrants under safe and legal routes should be. The current proposal for a statutory instrument drafted by Ministers with no room for amendment would mean really no say at all. Brexit was supposed to be about parliamentary sovereignty and this place taking back control of decision making, so why Conservative Back Benchers are so keen to hand over powers to the Executive is not clear at all.

I also welcome new clause 29 tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts). The commitment of Welsh Ministers and Senedd Cymru to making their country a place of sanctuary is hugely encouraging, and she is right to seek to make sure that the clauses in the Bill recognise and do not interfere with that commitment. Perhaps nation of sanctuary status is something that our new First Minister and his team will consider for Scotland, because we already aspire to those ideals, even if we do not use that formal term.

In conclusion, it is worth reflecting that Greek philosophers figured out in about 500 BC that the world was round. That does not seem to have sunk in on the far reaches of the Tory Back Benches. We cannot just keep pushing people away in the expectation that they might fall off a cliff at the edge of a flat earth. If we keep pushing people around the globe, eventually they will come back to us. Migration is a global reality. It is part of human nature. Over the centuries, people had to flee these islands because their crops were devastated by blight or because they were forced from the land to make way for sheep. It is just as well that America, Canada and Australia were not implementing hostile environment immigration policies back then, and it is just as well that we have global treaties and conventions to protect human rights and regulate how refugees and asylum seekers are treated by countries of arrival. That is not for this Government, however.

The exceptionalist attitude displayed by some Tories, which first led to Brexit, and which we see in amendments that have been tabled to the Bill, now stretches beyond the European Union and the Council of Europe to key United Nations frameworks that have sought to keep everyone on this planet safe since the end of the second world war. Withdrawing from those frameworks might be their ambition, but it is not the ambition of people in Glasgow North or people across Scotland. If the Government continue down the road they are going, the international agreement we will be withdrawing from is the Treaty of Union 1707.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

Having studied and listened to the entire debate today has only strengthened my resolve that we must oppose this rotten Bill in its entirety. It is inhumane. It is immoral, and it demonises and scapegoats the most vulnerable, desperate people who are fleeing violence, terror and poverty. We should be welcoming them with open arms.

As others have said, I have to express my concern at some of the inflammatory and inaccurate comments by some Conservative Members this afternoon. I also want to reiterate the concerns expressed about the lack of scrutiny: 10 or 12 hours to be considering in excess of 130 amendments is totally unacceptable. Notwithstanding my belief that the Bill should be thrown out in its entirety, I want to set out my concerns about some of the clauses and to speak in support of a number of amendments before the Committee.

--- Later in debate ---

[Beth Winter]

I fully agree—[Interruption.]

[The Second Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Lady. [Interruption.] Thank you. I would like the Committee to behave like that all the time. It is most discourteous for conversations to be taking place on the Back Benches, particularly among people who have not been in the Chamber for much of the debate. Some of us want to hear what Members have to say.

[Beth Winter]

Thank you, Chair. I appreciate your intervention.

In conclusion, there is an alternative, as is evident from the number of extremely progressive and positive amendments. We must clear the backlog, expand safe routes, and the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Olivia Blake), in co-operation with Care4Calais and the Public and Commercial Services Union on safe routes, was excellent. We must be welcoming vulnerable people to what I would describe as a nation of sanctuary.

I will finish by reflecting on the words of the First Minister of Wales. A week or two ago he spoke about,

“the basic belief that, in our brief lives, we owe a duty of care…to our family and friends, but also to strangers”.

He said that that simple belief lies at the heart of

“our ambition to be a nation of sanctuary. To provide a warm welcome to families forced out of their homes…all of those who seek sanctuary from wherever, and however, they may come”

to our shores. Care, compassion, respect, dignity, humanity, inclusivity and kindness—those are the values that I hold dear, and those are the values and principles that we should seek to uphold. This Bill does not do that at all. We must reject it.

[Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter). I share her concerns about the Bill, and indeed about the process that we have undergone in scrutinising it.

I want to make three short points. The first and most important one is to try to encourage a little more interest in clauses 30 to 36 that relate to citizenship. They were touched on by the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee and the former Attorney General, but they are incredibly important and quite alarming. It might seem slightly odd for an SNP MP to be rushing to rescue the concept of British citizenship, but citizenship is vital. It is a source of stability and other rights. Deprivation of citizenship, or blocking people from citizenship, as in the Bill, is something that should be looked at closely and seriously.

Clause 30 is entitled

“Persons prevented from obtaining British citizenship etc”

and it sets all the alarm bells ringing. Subsection (4) states:

“A person (“P”) falls within this subsection if P was born in the United Kingdom on or after 7 March 2023, and either of P’s parents has ever (whether before or after P’s birth) met the four conditions in section 2.”

That unbelievably broad clause means that children, and indeed some adults, will face being blocked from accessing the right to British citizenship not because of their own actions, but because of the actions of their parents, potentially even decades ago. To me that is ludicrous overreach, even if someone is in the space of accepting the Government’s premise of deterrence. In many cases, it could be children born here. One parent could become a British citizen and still that child, born in Britain, could be deprived of their own British citizenship. Or that child could be born here and spend the first 10 years of their life here, and be deprived of their British citizenship just because of the actions of one of their parents, potentially many years previously. It could be a child brought here at a young age and whose entire life has been built here. Surely, even to the Bill’s most ardent supporters, depriving kids of British citizenship because of what one of their parents did is a step too far? That is absolutely wild, but that is precisely what clauses 30 to 36 do and that should be looked at again.

The second point I want to make is on the detention clauses. Like many Members have said today, fewer safeguards and protections with more detentions is another tragic and backward step. Other colleagues have set out most of the key concerns. I just want to repeat the point made on Second Reading and by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry) today: any idea that the right of habeas corpus, or a petition to the nobile officium in Scotland, makes all of this fine is absolutely preposterous. These are much more limited procedures for challenging detention, confined to questions of authority to detain rather than errors in decision making. They are also infinitely less accessible and speedy compared with a bail application to the tribunal, especially for vulnerable people. This set of clauses is designed to stop people who should be freed from detention being able to secure their release from detention, and nothing else.

My third and final point relates to clause 4 and the permanent state of inadmissibility of claims. This is the problem at the heart of the Bill. It is a permanent ban on making certain claims, which our amendment 294 seeks to address. Permanent inadmissibility means that, over time, thousands of refugees and others who qualify for protection will be left in limbo, because the Government will not have the capacity to remove them all to Rwanda, but also, because of the Bill, quite simply will not be allowed to process and recognise their claims here. Refugees will end up spending year after year after year in hotels or in dismal former military barracks without any hope of being able to move on.

The penny that does not seem to have dropped right across the Committee is that it also means that many who are not refugees will also be left in limbo in the United Kingdom. Again, the Government will not have the capacity to remove them all to Rwanda and, because of this very Bill, the Government will not be able to remove them to their home countries. If you do not process their asylum claims, you cannot—with a few exceptions—remove the person to their home country. That is recognised in clause 5. So thousands of people will also be left in limbo forever. In fact, the Bill almost creates a perverse incentive. If you are an overstayer—one hon. Member spoke about overstayers—probably your best bet is to make an asylum claim and then be left in that permanent state of limbo. It is an absolutely mad Bill. It does not make any sense at all. That, I suspect, is why we have not seen the impact assessment—it will reveal most of that.

The Bill will not solve any backlog. The backlog is going to balloon. More people will be jammed into hotels and military barracks, not fewer. The backlog will essentially just be given a different name: inadmissibility. That is what the Bill achieves and nothing more. A different backlog and incredible cruelty—that is what the Bill is all about and that is all it is ever going to achieve if it is passed.

Western Jet Foil and Manston Asylum Processing Centres

Beth Winter Excerpts

Monday 31st October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Suella Braverman]

As my hon. Friend will know, one of the promises in the 2019 manifesto was to reduce overall numbers when it came to migration, and also to fix the problem of illegal migration. He and I both campaigned to leave the European Union, and 17 million people voted for control over their borders. That is what this Government will deliver.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

The Refugee Council has demanded a taskforce to clear the 120,000 backlog of asylum seekers, most of whom are living in appalling, overcrowded, unsafe and inhumane circumstances, and the cost of those in hotels is, by the Home Secretary’s own admission, about £5.6 million. The council has also called for the Government to convene a summit of refugees and migration experts, local authorities and housing providers to examine options for short and long-term suitable accommodation for people seeking asylum. Will the Home Secretary do that?

[Suella Braverman]

As I have said, I am very concerned about how we accommodate people who are waiting for their asylum claims to be processed. We need to bear down on that backlog so they are not waiting for so long and can get a decision, whether that be to remove them, or for them to be here on a legal basis. We need to ensure that the accommodation is cost-effective, lawful and reasonable.

HM Passport Office Backlog

Beth Winter Excerpts

Tuesday 14th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Kinnock]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. The cost of this issue is not just in broken-hearted families who were not able to go on long-planned holidays, or to go to weddings and funerals; there is a direct cost to the British economy and to productivity, and the huge cost of people having to pay through the nose for fast-track applications. The cost, when it is finally calculated, will be eyewatering.

To give a few examples of the nationwide cases, one family in County Durham had to cancel a dream holiday of a lifetime just before Easter, at a cost of £6,000, because they had been waiting 10 weeks for their six-year-old’s passport to come through. The guidance at the time of application was that it would take a maximum of three weeks.

Two parents from north Wales had been living and working overseas in France for two years and were due to return home once the father’s visa had expired, with their rent agreement ending this month. They applied for a passport for their new-born baby in mid-February but, four months on, they have still not received that passport, meaning that they have been forced to pay for a hotel at huge personal cost because they are unable to travel back to the UK.

Another set of parents in the west midlands were desperate to get their two-year-old boy, who was having medical difficulties, away on holiday. Despite applying for a passport on 2 January, poor communication from the Passport Office meant they were still waiting several months later.

In my constituency of Aberavon, one individual applied for her first adult passport on 26 February, yet had to cancel her plans to attend a wedding on 4 June. Another of my constituents applied for a passport on 23 March, yet is still waiting 12 weeks on and does not know whether they will be able to travel on 21 June. What does the Minister have to say to those families? Will he apologise to them from the Dispatch Box today?

These failures date back further than the past few months and are about not just resources, but levels of Home Office competence. One man living in east London applied for his first adult passport in September 2021. He was told to send his old passport back. Then, after 12 weeks, he was told that the application had been cancelled. The Passport Office maintained that his old passport had never been received. The man was then advised to make another application free of charge. That application was rejected. Then, after several weeks of telephone and email exchanges, he finally received confirmation that the old passport had been received with his original application and that his original application should never have been cancelled. He was advised to make a third application, which he has done. You could not make it up.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

Like Members from all parts of the House, my office has been inundated with queries from constituents distraught at the fact that they either cannot go on holiday or could lose the cost of holiday travel. The situation is chaotic, unacceptable and must be resolved immediately. Does my hon. Friend agree that this could be resolved by the Government if they improved staff retention by meeting the Public and Commercial Services Union’s pay demands, worked with the PCS to end insecure agency staff and outsourcing, and completed the roll-out of the digital application programme as soon as possible?

[Stephen Kinnock]

Is it not extraordinary that the Government’s response to the crisis we are seeing is to cut the civil service by 90,000 jobs? In what world is that going to work, when we clearly need more resources, and people focused on customer-facing services? We need to build morale, not destroy it, and we need to show people that they should have good jobs on which they can raise a family. Instead, it is about cutting, undermining and passive-aggressive notes from the Secretary of State for Brexit Opportunities, I think he is called, put on the desks of his civil servants. It really is a disgrace.

Some applicants are having to travel the length and breadth of Britain to get an appointment. One man, as has been mentioned, had to travel all the way from London to Belfast to get his passport sorted. Others are having to pay extortionate costs for fast-track passport services or face losing hundreds of pounds. The number of monthly fast-track applications has more than doubled since December 2021. In April 2022, British families spent at least £5.4 million on fast-track services. The Passport Office’s own forecasts show that it expects to receive more than 240,000 fast-track applications between May and October this year, amounting to up to £34 million.

Public Order Bill

Beth Winter Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 23rd May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

The Bill is a draconian piece of legislation that undermines our democracy. It is the sort of Bill I would expect from an extreme and authoritarian Administration anticipating opposition, and perhaps even fearing for their continued existence. As Members across the House have said, the provisions are not necessary. Existing laws are sufficient. The provisions would leave the UK in breach of international human rights law, would clearly restrict fundamental human rights, and severely compromise the UK’s ability to promote open societies and respect for human rights internationally. They have rightly been condemned by Members from across the House today.

[Paul Bristow]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Beth Winter]

No, I will not give way because of time. Causing obstruction at a site of key national infrastructure was something the Prime Minister proposed doing at Heathrow a few years ago, when he threatened to lie down in front of bulldozers. That was, of course, before he became Prime Minister. I wonder what his actions would be now. The offence of locking on, or being equipped for locking on, is far too broadly drafted and far too wide-ranging—purposefully so, I would argue, in order to restrict individuals’ willingness to protest. Those measures must be thrown out.

The “stop and search without suspicion” measures are an over-extension of police powers. Given our knowledge of the racial bias in the application of stop and search, the measures are a green light from the Government to create further racial tensions in policing. Those measures must also be thrown out.

The serious disruption prevention orders risk depriving people of the fundamental human rights of assembly and movement. As commentators and colleagues in the House have said, they are like the protest powers in Russia or Belarus, but even more extreme. They, too, must be thrown out.

I take issue with some of the comments and approaches of Conservative Members. The Conservative Benches are empty now, unfortunately, which I think says a lot about the Conservatives’ position. Their comments have been very selective and subjective, and a lot of the language used has been extremely offensive. The measures in the Bill are extremely broad and far reaching. For example, the protest banning orders are extremely broad in scope and allow the police to put restrictions on processions and assemblies beyond those mentioned in recent debates. They can include religious festivals and activities, community gatherings, football matches, vigils, remembrance ceremonies, and trade union disputes and pickets. These are absolutely terrifying proposals.

The powers in the Bill will be extended to Wales, but have the Welsh Government been consulted? I doubt it, given past experience. This is how the Government normally act towards our devolved, democratically elected Governments. They change the laws affecting Wales, but do not ask Wales its views. The Welsh Government were clearly opposed to the measures on protest in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. I believe that they will make clear their opposition to this Bill. Furthermore, there is concrete evidence that the Welsh police are not supportive or likely to make use of such powers, given what was said by four constables at a recent session of the Welsh Affairs Committee.

[Paul Bristow]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Beth Winter]

No, I will not. I believe that Welsh MPs will reject the Bill tonight. I will wrap up with one final point. This Conservative legislation has been presented as a necessary measure to deal with climate protesters. We are facing a climate catastrophe, and the Government should be addressing its root causes now. The overwhelming majority of climate protesters are using democratic rights that we have fought over for many, many years. Among those protesters, I include myself, my parents and my children, as we have been on many a protest in our lives, locking arms, so we would probably be criminalised and called eco-hooligans, which is how the hon. Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) shamefully described protesters earlier.

[Paul Bristow]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Beth Winter]

No, I will not. As I said at the outset, there are sufficient laws in existence to deal with protests.

I believe that there is another reason for the Bill: the current cost of living crisis will drive such poverty and polarisation that the Government are concerned that their economic policies mean that public protest is increasingly likely. Rip-off energy bills—like the poll tax—pushing people into poverty and debt will lead to more protests on our streets. Is the Prime Minister readying himself for his Thatcher moment, confronting those on a low income in Trafalgar Square? How proportional will that be? I hope that we do not see such violence from this Government, but I fear that that is what the Bill is about.

Hundreds of civil organisations, legal academics, cross-party parliamentarians and UN special rapporteurs condemned the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and they will do the same with this Bill. I urge Members to listen to them and to us and to do the right thing today: vote against this absolutely rotten Bill on Second Reading. Throw it out.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Beth Winter Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Tuesday 26th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

You are right, Madam Deputy Speaker, that the House is considering narrower and narrower aspects of the Bill, but despite the fact that this is the fifth time it has come to the House, still no Minister has been able to explain how the United Kingdom, which is surrounded by water, can ever be the first safe country of arrival for an undocumented asylum seeker.

The proposals in the Bill, and the Government’s determination to overturn repeated amendments of the House of Lords on this aspect, are literally inhumane. The Minister stands at the Dispatch Box and says that we fully comply with the refugee convention and therefore an amendment to put the refugee convention into the Bill is unnecessary. He is contradicting himself in his own terms. Instead the Government want to make criminals out of Eritrean human rights defenders fleeing for their lives, LGBT+ women and men from Rwanda seeking a more tolerant society in which to live, and Ukrainians who, for whatever reason, cannot get through the interminable Home Office visa processing system to reunite here with friends and families.

When the Minister winds up, can he explain whether the effect of the Bill and the agreement is that if a young Ukrainian man arrives at the UK border without documentation, he will be criminalised—or will he be sent to build a new life in Rwanda? Indeed, when an asylum seeker from Rwanda arrives here on a small boat, will they be sent back to Rwanda to seek asylum and rebuild their life? How is that possibly supposed to work? In what world could that possibly match with the provisions and duties that this country has under the terms of the refugee convention as outlined in Lords amendment 5?

It is not just the Archbishop of Canterbury who is speaking out on this—and incidentally he has every right to do so, because he is a member of the legislature as a Member of the House of the Lords—because religious leaders across the country have written to us. In amendment 7, the Lords calls once again for asylum seekers to be granted the right to work—not granted the right to work but for their right to work to be recognised, because the right to work is a fundamental human right that cannot be taken away. Using your labour to earn your keep is such a right. I echo the tribute that my hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald) paid to the work of the Maryhill Integration Network in this regard. Denying that opportunity to asylum seekers, along with the denial of access to public funds in some cases, is not only degrading to them but actively harmful to our own economy and to wider society.

This Bill has been of huge concern to constituents in Glasgow North who have followed it right the way through every single level of amendments that we have had from the House of Lords. Over the course of the Bill’s progress, I have had literally hundreds of messages, ultimately asking for the whole Bill to be withdrawn, but if not, then at least to try to humanise it wherever possible, as their lordships have tried to do this evening. If the Government will not listen to the House of Lords and will not listen to people in Scotland, where is the precious Union? Where is what we are supposed to be doing in working together? The Scottish Parliament is ready and willing to accept responsibility for immigration law, and the people of Scotland are ready to accept it and all the other powers that go along with being an independent country.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

I rise to speak in support of Lords amendments passed earlier today. It is clear that, even today, Members of the Lords have made efforts to table new text to find a route to conclude debate on this Bill. Let us remind ourselves that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has warned that the Bill undermines the 1951 refugee convention and that its policies would risk the lives and wellbeing of vulnerable people.

I wish to support, in particular, Lords amendment 5D, moved by Baroness Chakrabarti, who has worked tirelessly in her opposition in tabling significant amendments to this horrendous Bill. This amendment sets out that the provisions of this part of the Bill must be read and given effect in a way that is compatible with the refugee convention.

I express my concerns about the Bill’s compatibility with our international obligations, particularly following the announcement of the memorandum of understanding between the Home Secretary and the Rwandan Government. Senior legal representatives have commented on that agreement, including Stephanie Boyce, the president of the Law Society of England and Wales, who recently said that there are

“serious questions about whether these plans would or could comply with the UK’s promises under international treaty”.

We all know that the Government’s proposal of pushbacks of boats in the channel has been abandoned this week in the face of legal scrutiny in the courts. I put on record my thanks to the Public and Commercial Services Union—the trade union of Home Office staff, including Border Force staff—and the charities Care4Calais, Channel Rescue and Freedom from Torture for taking on this legal challenge. As PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka, a fellow Welsh person, said:

“This humiliating climbdown by the government is a stunning victory for Home Office workers and for refugees. There is little doubt that lives have been saved.”

This action has demonstrated that the Government’s bluster about a legal basis for the pushback policy was just that. Are we now meant to take at the Home Secretary’s word that the “New Plan for Immigration” and the horrendous, inhuman, unethical Rwanda policy are just as legally watertight? Forgive me if I am sceptical.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. Will the hon. Lady please stick to addressing the Lords amendments?

[Beth Winter]

I remain totally opposed to this Bill. These proposals are deeply—

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. The hon. Lady is opposed to the Bill, and she was perfectly entitled to say so on Second Reading and on Third Reading, and I think she probably did, but at this point, her opposition to the Bill is of no interest to the House; we are talking about the specific amendments. Will she please stick to the specific amendments?

[Beth Winter]

I therefore urge Members of this House to back the Lords amendments tonight.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Beth Winter Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Monday 25th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

My inbox—I do not know about the Minister’s—is full of emails asking us to vote against the Government’s provisions today. I have not had a single one asking me to vote in favour.

[Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

I may be able to enlighten the Minister as to why there is no need for the provisions on noise. The Minister for Social Justice in Wales, Jane Hutt, has been quoted as saying that the current legal framework already provides sufficient scope, and that

“this means there is no requirement or need to include a new, far more draconian measure”.

We have sufficient laws in place, and there is no need for these provisions. The Bill rides roughshod over the devolution settlement.

[Sarah Jones]

My hon. Friend is right. I am proud to have campaigned with Jane Hutt. She knows what she is talking about, and she delivers results—something that this Government could learn from.

Recently published guidance on this bizarre change to the law gives us the helpful tip that

“a noisy protest outside an office with double glazing may not meet the threshold”

in the Bill. The guidance is seriously asking the police to base their consideration of whether a protest is too noisy on how many buildings around it have double-glazed windows. How on earth will the police know? Is it fair to our police if the law is so peculiar that they could interpret it in a million different ways, and would stand accused of bias whatever they did? I urge Ministers to bear in mind the consequences of these provisions on the police officers trying to put them into practice.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)]

A noise annoys. That was a common reproof from my mother in my early days, and indeed to her grandchildren today. I think we all recognise, in the course of the debates we have had in this House, that there are occasions when noise is a part of the democratic process that helps the atmosphere and the challenge, and there are times when it becomes extremely disruptive to the democratic process and begins to get in the way. I rise to support the Minister and the Government on that point. I would like to set out briefly the particular reasons why I take that position.

Like the Minister and a number of colleagues across the House, I have spent a lot of time in local government. I am very aware that one of the most common complaints to local authorities is about disruption caused by noise. This element of the Bill deals with a very specific subset of noise where it is caused by protest, and I agree with what the Minister and the Government have said. It probably depends where in the country someone is and what their experience has been. Certainly for local authorities in places such as my area—I speak with experience of a local authority where Heathrow has occasioned many protests over the years—where relatively low levels of noise carry on 24 hours a day, sometimes for days on end, or where extremely loud noises are generated by the kind of portable amplification technology that has become available even to lone protestors, such things can cause enormous disruption.

That disruption is not just to residents who live in those places—I appreciate that for central London Members of Parliament it is certainly a very big factor—but to businesses. I have many constituents who either work or have business interests in central London. Hoteliers may struggle to sell their hotel rooms in a location where there is constant disruption caused by noisy protest, which means that people cannot sleep and the normal business of an office is disrupted.

In my view, given the development of tactics used by some protests that aim specifically to make persistent noisy protests that do not cross the thresholds set out in existing legislation, it is right that we update the law. We have heard a lot that existing powers are available, in particular to local authorities, to address concerns about noise. I have heard that argument made at the Joint Committee on Human Rights, and we have heard it in a number of debates on a lot of different aspects of the Bill.

However, it seems clear to me that there are occasions when the role of this House is not simply to respond to what the police are asking for, but to recognise when constituents, businesses and residents have concerns and find that the powers available, for example to local authorities, are not sufficient to remedy the problems they are experiencing. It is then the duty of the House to consider how we increase the penalties and powers available, so that those problems can be properly addressed. For example, as the Bill contains provisions to deal with trespass that crosses a criminal threshold and powers to increase sentencing, in my view it is right that it also increases the powers of the police to deal with persistent and noisy protests.

For people experiencing disruption to their sleep, disruption to their family life and disruption to their business—disruption to normal lawful activity that these types of protest can cause—waiting for the processes available to a local authority is simply insufficient. By law, councils have to go through various processes to gather evidence, which takes a long time. It can be enormously difficult to identify the cause in a way that meets the legal test, whereas the police have powers to act, when an offence is being committed, to deal with those things and ensure that residents and businesses are no longer impacted inappropriately. For those reasons, although it is right that the Government have listened to what has been said in the other place, I think it is right that we push ahead with this.

The powers will be required for a relatively narrow subset of occasions. In my view, however, the disruption that is caused to businesses, my constituents’ business activities and interests in central London, and many other people around the country—in places such as Heathrow, where persistent, long-running protests can cause this kind of disruption—demonstrates that there is a need for an improvement in the powers. I wholly support the Minister in defending them at the Dispatch Box.

[Beth Winter]

We truly are in a remarkable situation of political crisis for the Government, who seem determined to pursue an assault on the rule of law, democracy, the devolution settlement and human rights. In the week that the Government intend to prorogue the House, multiple Bills are coming before us, following repeated Government defeats in the Lords. The Government are seeking to pursue this assault on democracy just a few days after the Prime Minister was found to have broken the law.

Much of this legislation was not part of the Tory Government’s election manifesto. The Government cannot therefore claim, in pursuing this legislation, that it commands the support of the electorate. That is certainly the case regarding today’s amendments. The mass of public opinion is better demonstrated by the joint coalition of non-governmental organisations opposing the Bill, which stretches from Amnesty International to 38 Degrees, End Violence Against Women and many, many more. The Lords have reflected that civil society concern. I welcome their decision to insist on their amendments to clauses 55 and 61.

My noble Friend Lord Coaker, the former Member of this House for Gedling, spoke plainly when the other place last considered the Bill. As he highlighted, the Government proposals make a bad Bill even worse by lowering the threshold from establishing policing powers in relation to

“serious unease, alarm or distress”

to simply “alarm” or “distress”, making shutdown of protest even more likely. He highlighted that the Government’s fact sheet guidance for the clauses on “too noisy” protests make it clear that this is unworkable and, in reality, makes protest unpoliceable.

If the Government cannot clarify whether a protest would meet the noise threshold under this legislation because of double-glazing, they do not know what they are doing. Therefore, amid the confusion, we can only conclude that the Government are simply creating powers that can be exploited to shut down noisy protest and scrutiny of the Executive.

In referring to the earlier comments about the devolved settlement, I wish to share with the Minister—if he is not already aware of this—the fact that the Welsh Government have withheld legislative consent from the provisions of the Bill that come within their competence, including clauses that relate to the right to protest and noise nuisance. I have the legislative consent memorandum with me today, if he is interested in seeing it. The Welsh Minister for Social Justice, Jane Hutt, stated that the wish was to

“send a united message to the UK Government that this eradication of the fundamental right to have our voices heard cannot and will not be tolerated.”

The Government should and must respect the devolution settlement. The Welsh Government have withheld legislative consent from 17 Bills so far. This is absolutely unacceptable.

Colleagues on the Government side have said that the police want this legislation, but police constables in Wales have expressed significant reservations about the Bill in recent evidence to the Welsh Affairs Committee. Carl Foulkes of North Wales Police said that police officers could choose not to enforce part of the Bill. Jeremy Vaughan of South Wales Police insisted that

“protest…by its very nature, needs to be disruptive”.

He insisted that “most” in the police would be “vociferous and protective” of the public’s right to protest.

[David Simmonds]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Beth Winter]

No, I will not.

As with the Judicial Review and Courts Bill, the Elections Bill and the Nationality and Borders Bill, which we will discuss later this week, the Government are in chaos, thrashing around to restore order. The Government must accept the Lords amendments, although we would be in a far better position if they dropped the Bill completely.