Judicial Review and Courts Bill

Debbie Abrahams Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 26th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

It has not been broken, but I shall come on to address that when I deal with the devolution dimension in a little while.

Of course there must be accountability, but allowing such a large volume of flawed challenges just skews the system. Allowing a legal war of attrition—not just against the Government, but, as in this case, against the judiciary themselves—undermines the integrity of the two-tier tribunal process, which was set up precisely to deal both fairly and efficiently with immigration cases. That wastes court time and taxpayers’ money, which should be focused on reviewing more serious and credible cases. The Supreme Court Justice Lord Brown foresaw that this very problem would arise in his judgment in the original Cart case back in 2011 and he said then that

“the rule of law is weakened, not strengthened, if a disproportionate part of the courts’ resources is devoted to finding a very occasional grain of wheat on a threshing floor full of chaff.”

Regrettably, he was proved right. It is also worth noting the more recent commentary by Lord Hope of Craighead, another of the presiding judges in the Cart case, who said in the other place earlier this year that these types of reviews have not worked and that it is time “to end them.”

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

I am very grateful to the Justice Secretary for giving way.

Over the past few years, the law has been the only way that any justice has been allowed for social security claimants. Three different judicial reviews were upheld and they said that what the social security Secretary had undertaken was unlawful—both on universal credit for disabled people and for single mothers. Which of these judicial reviews would have been allowed under this Bill?

[Dominic Raab]

Of course I cannot second guess the judicial decisions made in individual cases, but what I can say is that of course we want to protect the integrity not just of judicial accountability, but of the tribunal process, which we have established precisely to deal with those cases as well as others that I have discussed. The Bill will address the problem in a sensible and proportionate way, preventing Cart appeals except in the most exceptional circumstances, such as the upper tribunal deciding a type of case outside its jurisdiction, in bad faith or with some fundamental procedural error, such as not hearing one side of the case, which would clearly be wrong. Our approach will ensure that the 180 judge-days spent on Cart reviews, every year, are no longer wasted. In that way, taxpayers’ money is saved and the immigration system can function more effectively.

I would be interested to know whether Labour will support us in this matter. I have done my homework—[Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) is laughing, but if Labour plans to vote against this Bill on the basis of Cart, I would point out that the shadow Justice Secretary personally proposed a much broader so-called ouster clause back in 2003 in Labour’s Asylum and Immigration Bill—[Interruption.] The right hon. Gentleman said that he was young and naive. I am not sure what that makes him now. Forgive me if I am reminding him of a stressful moment in his career, but it was the Asylum and Immigration Bill back in 2003. It did not have any of the exceptions and it was not as constrained as the Bill before the House today. He did not just support the measure; he proposed the measure. He was a Minister in the Department for Constitutional Affairs. I am not sure whether he has forgotten about that, but I am afraid that the Opposition have zero credibility in opposing a more targeted measure that they proposed before.

The Bill will remove Cart for the whole of the UK, but only in respect of reserved matters. I hope that all hon. Members will agree that we must have consistency in routes of appeal to preserve a coherent and efficient immigration policy and indeed the integrity of the UK’s borders.