Illegal Immigrants (Criminal Sanctions) Bill

Debate between Edward Leigh and David Nuttall

Friday 4th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. We have to introduce the language of compassion. May I just defend the Government for a moment? There is not a single Government in the whole of Europe who have spent more money on aid to Syria. This Government have a perfectly logical and reasonable point of view, which is that, rather than simply giving comfort to the people traffickers, we should take people directly from the camps. I think that there is widespread support on the Government Benches for what the Government are doing in that regard. If I have not spoken the language of compassion, let me be absolutely clear now that this debate is not about being nasty to people who are desperately seeking a better life.

[Mr Nuttall]

I accept that these people are desperate and fleeing persecution. If that is the case, why are they not seeking a safe haven in the first safe country they reach, rather than trying to get to the United Kingdom? Is that not the question we ought to be asking?

[Sir Edward Leigh]

That is the question that the public ask again and again in the letters and emails we receive. Why is the Dublin convention not being used? My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch was a very distinguished chairman of the migration committee in the Council of Europe, and he is probably one of the House’s leading experts on the whole migration issue. He has spent many hours not just sitting in committees in Strasbourg, but making the effort to go to Lampedusa and all these places to talk about the Dublin convention. That convention basically states, quite rightly, that a person should get asylum or be returned to the first country they enter, so this is what people in this country do not understand: is France unsafe? I quite understand—in the language of compassion—why a person would want to be an economic migrant, but are they an asylum seeker? When they are taken out of the back of a lorry in Lincoln or found at the first service station on the M3, they do not say to the English gendarmerie that they want to get benefits or a job; they say that they are an asylum seeker. The question that the British people are asking is this: if that person is a genuine asylum seeker, given that France is a completely safe and civilized country, with a very generous benefits system, why do they not claim asylum there? It all boils down to why this Bill is needed. I know that this is only a private Member’s Bill, but for the life of me I cannot understand why the Government do not take action on this.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Nuttall]

That is a very nice way of putting it. My hon. Friend makes a good point. It will be interesting to hear the Minister’s response to such points.

One must question why there has been no more recent study. Of course—but I am sure I must be wrong—the reason why there are no more recent statistics may be that Governments of both colours do not want to know the answers. That is the truth of it, is it not? Nobody wants to investigate this problem because if the truth comes out that there are 1 million people in this country illegally, it would be so shocking. No one dares face up to that fact.

It is worth making the point—this is not a criticism, so I think I am in order, Mr Deputy Speaker—that the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) claimed back in 2005-06, when he was employed as deputy general secretary of the Transport and General Workers Union, that about 500,000 illegal immigrants were working in this country. I have no reason to disbelieve the analysis he made some 10 years ago. In view of the figures I gave for what we might call authorised migration—legal migration—it is reasonable to assume on that basis that illegal immigration has also increased.

The Bill is not about reducing migration and this debate is not about our involvement with the European Union and the fact that our membership allows the free movement of people under European treaties, but free movement has an impact on illegal migration. Free movement makes it necessary for Governments to clamp down on migration from countries outside the European Union, making it much harder for people from such countries to come into this country legally, so there is an increased inducement for people to try their hand or to have a go.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

We have the absurd situation that someone from Romania who does not work here and will never want to work here can come to this country, but a most distinguished American professor of Shakespearian literature—one of the most distinguished people in the world—who came to Stratford-upon-Avon to talk about Shakespeare but stayed a few days too long, was arrested, frog-marched to a police station and deported. It beggars belief that we are preventing research scientists and nuclear physicists from India or America from coming here. Mass migration from the EU is therefore pertinent to this debate, because people are so frustrated and that is leading to all this illegal immigration.

Local Government (Religious etc. Observances) Bill

Debate between Edward Leigh and David Nuttall

Friday 16th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point in support of his new clause, but will he confirm that, because of the way in which it is drafted, nothing in it would restrict prayers to those from the Judaeo-Christian tradition? It only requires that that tradition be kept “in mind”. Could not prayers from other religions take place as well?

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I drafted my new clause carefully. It is meant to constitute a serious contribution to the debate. I am not arguing that there should, or must, be prayers before a council meeting. Of course, no one needs to go to them anyway. It is simply a decision that is made at the time of the council meeting. Nor am I arguing that the prayers must be of a Judaeo-Christian nature. I am, however, making the serious point, in this House of Commons, that this is our past. This is our foundation. This is what has made us free.

We cannot just say that we must have a “time for reflection” before council meetings, and that anything goes, because if we do that we lose contact with our history. I think that in losing contact with our history of tolerance—which is the foundation, or essence, of the British state—we actually encourage religious extremism. It is often people in whose families there is absolutely no religion who are led astray into following bizarre sects and the like.

House of Lords Reform (No. 2) Bill

Debate between Edward Leigh and David Nuttall

Friday 18th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point. It is entirely conceivable that there will be peers who wish to leave the other place for reasons other than retirement. They might wish to pursue another avenue.

It is often said that the other place is full of retired politicians. The last figures that I saw showed that only about a quarter of the Members of the other place had previously been Members of this House. On that basis, it would be a little unfair to describe the other place as being full of retired politicians.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I have something of a pub quiz question. Can my hon. Friend name a single former Liberal Democrat MP who is not in the other place?

[Mr Nuttall]

I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg).

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Nuttall]

No, not today. Whether one is on the Floor of the House in the other place or in the Gallery, does merely attending and watching count as attendance, or would one be expected to vote? Many of the Cross Benchers, because of the nature of their appointment to the other place, often do not wish to vote on certain issues, so we need to be careful with that provision.

Clause 2 amounts to the compulsory exclusion of a peer from the other place, and in many ways it is therefore much more controversial than clause 1. Clause 1 has its problems, but we can deal with it. Clause 2 is more controversial, because someone would risk being excluded from the other place against their will. They might not be happy about being excluded and we should be careful in our consideration of the provision. It has been suggested that we should go even further and put in a minimum attendance level and link it to the number of votes a peer takes part in. For example, as a minimum, a peer should take part in at least 10% of votes to maintain their membership of the other place.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

That is quite dangerous. I can think of at least one former Prime Minister who would be disqualified from attendance of this place.

[Mr Nuttall]

I agree with my hon. Friend that it would be a dangerous precedent to adopt. We heard from the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett), who suggested that voting should be used as a method of determining whether peers are non-attenders. In a written submission to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee, he stated that peers who have not voted in more than 10% of Divisions for three Sessions out of the last five should be removed from having “a formal role”:

“They would of course remain Peers and could be allowed access to the restaurants and bars (but not offices, research and other working facilities). This would be commercially prudent.”

That may be prudent from a commercial point of view, but it would be the worst of all worlds. We would have Members of the other place effectively treating it is a social club: not taking part in proceedings, just having a drink in the bar. If anything were to bring the other place into disrepute, it would be such a mechanism.

European Union (UK Permanent Representative)

Debate between Edward Leigh and David Nuttall

Tuesday 10th May 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Edward Leigh (in the Chair)]

The hon. Gentlemen may speak if they have had the permission of the hon. Member for Clacton (Mr Carswell).

Broadcasting (Public Service Content) Bill

Debate between Edward Leigh and David Nuttall

Friday 1st April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) on speaking so eloquently on the Bill. He has done a public service. Although we all know that the life of private Members’ Bills is nasty, brutish and short, and we must be realistic about the prospect of such a Bill ever becoming law, it is important that the BBC becomes aware of the strong opinion in Parliament about the way it is funded.

The licence fee paid by the taxpayer is, in effect, a poll tax on the entire population. There is no way of avoiding it, except by not having a television set. Such a tax should provide for public service broadcasting. The definitions in the Bill are not perfect, but they do at least open up a debate on what constitutes public service broadcasting. If we are going to fund television and radio from the taxpayer, it is justifiable to ask whether game shows or programmes such as “EastEnders” are public service broadcasting or whether they are perfectly acceptable programmes, made according to consumer demand, that could be funded in many other ways. One of the purposes of the Bill will be to put pressure on the BBC to justify the nature of its public service broadcasting.

The list in clause 1 is not exhaustive, but it is sensible. There is no doubt that public service broadcasting comprises news and current affairs, programmes that

“inform, educate or entertain children”,

and charitable and religious programmes, but there are other programmes that could be considered to be public service broadcasting. For instance, if the BBC produces a major costume drama based on a Dickens novel, is that public service broadcasting? I would argue that it is. Or if the BBC produces opera, symphonic music or anything like that, I would argue that that is all public service broadcasting because many such programmes would not be commercially viable unless they were supported by some subsidy.

I accept that that argument could be dealt with in Committee. I hope my hon. Friend and the House will recognise that all these are value judgments. That is where a Bill such as this might get into some difficulty. Is it for the House to impose on a broadcaster its own value judgments of what is in the public interest?

That leads me to the points that I have been making in interventions about the National Audit Office. I do not intend to delay the House very long. I want to make the point as strongly as I can. In that respect, my hon. Friend is in severe difficulties. The BBC has said all along that its entire ethos is that it is independent of the Executive. That is absolutely right. Nobody here wants the Executive or Parliament in any way to interfere to the slightest extent with the editorial content of the BBC. We all know that in other countries public service broadcasting has been manipulated by regimes to support the regime. We must make it clear in the debate that nobody—I hope—on our Front Bench, on the Opposition Front Bench or even on the Back Benches is trying to tell the BBC what sort of programmes it should put on and what should be in those programmes. It is not for us as politicians to do that.

Parliament is surely entitled, however, to say that as that organisation is funded by tax—a licence fee, a poll tax—we want to make sure that we get value for money, and that the organisation is run, in the words of the National Audit Office Act 1983, in a way that is economic and efficient. That is why, for years, my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon), whom I see in the Chamber, and I, sitting on the Public Accounts Committee, have been running a campaign, which at last is meeting with some success, arguing that it is wrong that the BBC, virtually alone among Government-funded organisations, does not have any parliamentary controls over its expenditure.

That has been a long-running campaign and the BBC constantly resisted us, saying that that was the thin end of the wedge. It argued that we would start by asking questions about whether a studio was run properly in terms of its lighting or whatever, whether it was efficiently run, whether a private finance initiative project was run efficiently or whether a building was procured efficiently. “You will start with that, o Parliament,” the BBC says, “but—thin end of the wedge—you will eventually want to get involved in the editorial content. You’ll be summoning the director-general and saying that some programme was too left-wing or too right-wing.”

We finally won that argument, and we said yes, the National Audit Office should be allowed to audit the BBC. My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, who is a friend as well as a colleague, is in some difficulties here. I was not persuaded by the replies that he gave me. Clause 1(2) states:

“‘Public service content’ is content which is primarily produced in the United Kingdom and which satisfies one or more of the following criteria—”

It could be religious, educational and so on. Then we come to subsection (2)(d), which says

“The content would not otherwise be likely to provided by the market responding to consumer demand”

and subsection (3), which states:

“Where the only criterion of public service content is that contained in subsection (2)(d), the judgement relating to the likelihood of market failure shall be made by the National Audit Office”.

The National Audit Office is composed of some 800 highly skilled people. Their job is concerned with the public sector. They are not qualified to deal with the concept of market failure in a broadcasting organisation.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point. I appreciate his long experience of dealing with the National Audit Office. Does he think there would be scope for the NAO to establish as a separate unit, perhaps, with new employees who have the necessary experience to perform that role, based in the general office? Is that a possibility?

[Mr Leigh]

That is a helpful intervention because it takes me on to my next point. A couple of weeks ago the House did me the great honour of electing me as the Chairman of the Public Accounts Commission—not the Committee, but the commission. Members may not be aware of this, but it is very important that the National Audit Office budget is not controlled by the Treasury, because of course the NAO audits Government Departments. We do not want the situation that arises in other countries, where the Treasury gets its fingers on the budget of the National Audit Office. We, as a commission and a Committee of the House, keep a close eye on the overall budget of the National Audit Office.

My hon. Friend lightly throws into the pot the suggestion that we set up a new unit in the NAO, employ more people and increase its budget. There is a price to pay for all this. How many people will the National Audit Office have to employ to carry out its duties under the Bill? Those duties could be quite onerous.

I think that we are in very dangerous territory, because bit by bit we are dragging the National Audit Office into editorial policy. It is difficult to determine the possibility of market failure without judging whether a programme is likely to be a success in the marketplace, and how is such a judgment to be made without judging the editorial content? I am very sympathetic to what my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough is trying to do in the Bill, and I think that the whole House would like to apply more pressure on the BBC to use taxpayers’ money to produce more serious programmes, but I hope that he will not put at risk the campaign that is now nearing fruition. The current Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport has been part of that campaign, and he made a commitment in the Conservative party manifesto—it was repeated in the Labour party manifesto—that for the first time the BBC’s finances, but not editorial policy, would be subject to the National Audit Office and, therefore, to Parliament.

My hon. Friend gets into even more trouble in clause 2(3), which states:

“In pursuance of its duty under subsections (2) the National Audit Office must conduct, in each calendar year after the year in which this Act is passed, a value for money audit of the expenditure incurred on the broadcasting of public service content”.

I would like to know exactly what he means, because value for money is really a term of art in these matters. It means looking at how efficiently a contract was procured, how many staff were employed and what were the finances for it, but is he suggesting—perhaps he is not—that the value for money in some sense will relate to whether the programmes are of interest to the public and have public service content?