Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Damian Green and Paul Blomfield

Monday 7th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

Many police and crime commissioners across the country have taken different decisions about taxation, and across the country we have seen crime coming down. Of course the great virtue of the system we have introduced is that if people in Gloucestershire or anywhere else are unhappy with the decisions taken by their PCC, they can, unlike under the old system, vote in 2016 to get rid of them. That is why introducing democracy into police governance is a good thing.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

T9. My constituent Peter Hobson works hard, but earning the minimum wage for a 40-hour week will never enable him to pass the income threshold for his wife to obtain a visa to live with him in the UK under the rules introduced by the Government two years ago. In a parliamentary answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) on 6 December 2012, the then Minister for Immigration committed the Government to keeping the impact of these rules on family life “under review”. Will the Home Secretary publish the outcome of that review?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Damian Green and Paul Blomfield

Monday 15th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I am happy to report that the college of policing will be up and running by December this year. The site at Pannal Ash remains open, although the majority of residential training has stopped, with staff now focusing on the development of national standards for recruitment, promotion and training. The freehold of the site transfers to the Home Office on 1 December when the college is established, and the site will then be leased to the college for its activities.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

T7. While working for P&O ferries, my constituent, Mark Hanson, met his partner, a foreign national with whom he is having a child. She has been refused entry clearance because Mark has been deemed unable to meet the sponsor requirements, although his parents have offered him employment and accommodation for the couple and their child. Does the Home Secretary recognise that that case highlights how the inflexibility of her new rules unfairly prevents many British citizens from bringing their partners to the UK? Will she meet me and Mark’s parents to consider their case for their family to be united?

Student Visas

Debate between Damian Green and Paul Blomfield

Thursday 16th June 2011 Westminster Hall

[Paul Blomfield]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point from his huge experience and from the fact that there are two excellent universities in Oxford and I certainly agree with him.

Let me move on to the problems that have been created by the speed of implementation. When the Home Secretary was announcing the revised tier 4 arrangements in March, she said:

“We recognise the need to implement these changes in a staged manner that minimises disruption to education providers and students.” —[Official Report, 22 March 2011; Vol. 525, c. 858.]

We all know, I think, that that is not happening. The new requirements took effect on 21 April at an advanced stage of the university’s admission cycle and at a point where a number of offers had been made and, crucially, had been accepted. In Sheffield, our two universities and Sheffield international college had already made more than 20,500 offers to prospective students for degree-level courses and currently have 1,300 offer holders and applicants for English language programmes. All those offers have to be revisited as applicants may now no longer meet the UKBA’s new subset score requirements. The colleges must now notify students who have accepted offers and who, therefore, have a legally binding contract with them that they must meet new conditions. They are deeply concerned about the legal ramifications of such a change and the damage that could be done to their reputation. They have to alter the terms of the offers that have already been accepted. Could that not be avoided by having transitional arrangements in place to enable students to be admitted in this new academic year on the terms on which offers have been made?

[The Minister for Immigration (Damian Green)]

Let me clarify this matter. If the certificate of acceptance was issued before the new rules came in, the new rules do not apply. There is no retrospection in this. Before this hare is set running, let me stop it because it is simply not true.

[Paul Blomfield]

I thank the Minister for his intervention, but I have to say that that is certainly not clear to our universities.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Blomfield]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. It goes back to the fact that the Government are not achieving the Home Secretary’s desired intent, which is to ensure that these changes are introduced in a non-disruptive way.

I return to the point that the Minister made. Clearly, there is confusion within our universities, so it might be helpful if he undertook to liaise with Universities UK to put out a statement saying that all offers made will be honoured without the requirement to meet the new visa regulations—if that is what he said.

[Damian Green]

If an unconditional offer was made and accepted, the certificate of acceptance would have been assigned before 21 April and that remains valid for six months and therefore for the coming academic year. I met Universities UK and it was as a result of our discussions that the new guidance was put on the website. I am trying hard to meet the needs of both universities and hon. Members in this debate. To those who ask for flexibility and for me to talk to Universities UK, I can say that that is exactly what I have been doing. As a result of that, we have now produced new guidance, and I hope that hon. Members are satisfied with it.

[Paul Blomfield]

I thank the Minister for that contribution, but there is still some need for clarity. As my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood) has indicated, there is still a great deal of uncertainty. A lot of activity is currently under way in our universities to re-verify the offers that have been made.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

No. The problem is that the post-study work route has been abused as much as it has been legitimately used. We are not closing down that route altogether; we are specifically saying, “If you can get a graduate-level job, you can stay.” That seems very reasonable—[Hon. Members: “It is about the salary”]. I thank Members for that. Let me talk about the £20,000 salary that the hon. Member for Sheffield Central suggested was somehow wrong. I have to say, in the gentle spirit of non-partisanship in which I am making this speech, that the £20,000 minimum salary threshold for tier 2 was set by the previous Government, following a recommendation by the Migration Advisory Committee in August 2009. At that time, the tier 2 skill threshold was jobs at national vocational qualification level 3, and this Government have now raised that threshold to jobs at NVQ level 4, at which level the case for a salary threshold of at least £20,000 becomes even more compelling.

[Paul Blomfield]

What the previous Government surely had in mind when they set that threshold was not post-study work but the conventional application for tier 2.

[Damian Green]

It was set as a graduate-level salary, and it still is. We have kept that threshold. We have not inflation-linked it, and we have increased the skill level, so, if anything, there is a stronger case for it now.

I have a fascinating answer about accountancy qualifications for the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough, but given that there are only three minutes to go I hope that he can hold his interest on that topic and bear to have my reply in writing.

In response to a point made by the hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith, it is true that initially universities were automatically granted highly trusted sponsor status, but they were all required to apply for the status by the end of June 2010. All applications were considered against the published criteria. I was puzzled that someone said they were confused about the criteria, because they were published. Universities retained highly trusted sponsor status after June 2010 only if they had met all the criteria.

The hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) made a point about independent schools. Independent schools have been afforded greater flexibility simply because of their extremely low levels of non-compliance. They have earned that privilege because they are practically 100% compliant. The requirement for a secure English language test applies to all users of tier 4 general. Independent schools largely use the tier 4 child route, for which there is no English language requirement. That route is also available to sixth-form colleges that recruit 16 and 17 year olds.

There was a question about the list of financial institutions, and I can say that that list will be available on the UKBA website shortly. The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) asked about quotas, and I am happy to assure her that there are no quotas for UKBA officials to grant or refuse applications.

Once all the rules have been implemented, I expect the reforms to reduce the number of student visas by about 70,000 a year, and I estimate that at the end of this Parliament there will be about 260,000 fewer student visas and about 100,000 fewer dependants’ visas. Members have raised many practical issues that I have not had time to address, but I will take them away and think about them hard, particularly the individual cases mentioned by the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Tony Lloyd) .

I am of course aware of the importance of international students for British educational institutions and for the UK economy, but I believe that the measures strike the necessary balance.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Damian Green and Paul Blomfield

Monday 6th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

The tier 1 system is designed precisely so that we can ensure that we get the next generation of excellent scientists. As the Member of Parliament for Cambridge, my hon. Friend clearly has both interest and knowledge in the matter, and he will know that existing Nobel prize winners will get enough points to come in under the points-based system. Our new tier 1 is designed to ensure that the Nobel prize winners of tomorrow will be able to come to this country. We plan to ensure that objective, outside bodies decide who those people are, so that we get the best expertise in specialist fields not just among those coming into this country but among those who decide who comes to this country.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

7. What estimate she has made of the likely number of police community support officers at the end of the spending review period.