Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Baroness Laing of Elderslie Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Monday 15th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Relevant documents: Second Report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill, HC 435, and the Government response, HC 647.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I can confirm that nothing in the Lords message engages Commons financial privilege.

Clause 1

Introduction

[The Minister for Countering Illegal Migration (Michael Tomlinson)]

I beg to move.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following Government motions:

That this House disagrees with the Lords in their amendments 3B and 3C.

That this House disagrees with the Lords in their amendment 6B.

That this House disagrees with the Lords in their amendment 7B.

That this House insists on its disagreement with the Lords in their amendment 9 but proposes additional Amendment (a) to the Bill in lieu of that amendment.

That this House disagrees with the Lords in their amendment 10B.

[Michael Tomlinson]

Here we are, back again debating the same issues and amendments that we have already rejected. We are not quite at the point yet of completing each other’s sentences, but we are almost there. The issue before the House is whether the clearly expressed views of this House throughout the entire passage of the Bill should prevail. We simply cannot accept amendments that provide for loopholes that will perpetuate the current cycle of delays and late legal challenges to removal. We have a moral duty to stop the boats. We must bring an end to the dangerous, unnecessary, and illegal methods that are being deployed. We must protect our borders and, most importantly, save lives at sea. Our partnership with Rwanda is a key part of our strategy.

The message is absolutely clear: if a person comes to the United Kingdom illegally, they will not be able to stay. They will be detained and swiftly returned to their home country or to a safe third country—Rwanda.

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Tomlinson]

I will not; I will make some progress. Lords amendment 9 undermines provisions in existing legislation and is completely unnecessary. It is vital that the Government take steps to reduce or remove incentives for individuals to enter the country illegally. These illegal practices pose an exceptional threat to public order, risk lives and place unprecedented pressure on public services.

As I have set out, under article 13 of the treaty, the Government of Rwanda will have regard to information provided relating to any special needs that an individual may have as a result of them being a victim of modern slavery. Rwanda will take all necessary steps to ensure that these needs are accommodated. To that end, the Government have tabled amendment (a) in lieu, which requires the Secretary of State to publish an annual report about the operation of the legislation as it relates to modern slavery and human trafficking provisions. With that in mind, I invite the House to reject Lords amendment 9 and agree with the amendment in lieu.

  On Lords amendment 10B, as I have set out, the Government recognise our commitment and responsibility to combat veterans, whether our own or those who showed courage by serving alongside us. We will not let them down. Once again, I reassure Parliament that once the UK special forces and Afghan relocations and assistance policy review has concluded, the Government will revisit how the Illegal Migration Act, and provision for removal under existing legislation, will apply to those who are eligible to stay as a result of the review, ensuring that these people receive the attention that they deserve. This is a commitment that both Lord Sharpe and I have made on behalf of His Majesty’s Government.

This, the elected House, has voted to give the Bill a Second and Third Reading, and voted down each of the Lords amendments. I invite all right hon. and hon. Members to stand with the Government in upholding the will of the House of Commons, and to support the Government motions.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

It is just over two years to the day since the Rwanda scheme was first announced from the Government Dispatch Box, so it would be remiss of us not to take stock of progress to date. Well, hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money have been sent to the Rwandan Government; civil servants, courts, parliamentarians and journalists have spent countless hours, days and weeks discussing and writing about the scheme; and not one, not two, but three Home Secretaries have flown down to Kigali. But apart from that, there is not a great deal to report. The boats have kept coming, the backlog has kept growing, and the people smugglers are still laughing all the way to the bank. We have had two years of headline-chasing gimmicks; two years of pursuing a policy that is fundamentally unworkable, unaffordable and unlawful; two years of flogging this dead horse.

I am an inveterate optimist, so I truly believe that one day Government Members will come to understand that hard graft and common sense are always more effective than the sugar rush of a tabloid front page, and they will come to accept that they should have adopted Labour’s comprehensive plan to restore order to our border by redirecting the vast amounts of money set aside for the Rwandan Government into a new cross-border police unit, and a new security partnership with Europol to smash the criminal gangs upstream.

Analysis conducted by the National Audit Office has revealed that if the Government manage to send 300 asylum seekers to Rwanda, which is just 0.5% of the 60,000 people earmarked for the scheme, it will cost the British taxpayer a truly staggering £2m per person. It is crystal clear that the scheme is doomed to fail on its own terms because people who are prepared to risk life and limb crossing continents will not be deterred by a 0.5% chance of being sent to Rwanda.

The mind-boggling costs of the scheme are quite difficult to grasp, so I have done a bit of homework—a bit of research into what else we could get for £2 million. My hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Neil Coyle), who is not in his place, got the ball rolling during our last debate on the Bill by pointing out that £2 million will get someone five trips to outer space on the Virgin Galactic spacecraft—Madam Deputy Speaker, you look impressed, and suitably so. I have calculated that someone could live for three decades on one of the world’s most expensive cruise liners. They could charter, for a year, the Lady M yacht, which is, of course, the yacht that belongs to the “noble” Baroness Mone—it is her vessel of choice, as some Government Members may be aware—or they could even fly the Prime Minister’s favoured helicopter to Australia and back.

Speaking of the Prime Minister, I noticed that during the Easter recess, he found time to offer his services as a financial adviser to small businesses via Zoom. I do not know about you, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I have concerns about a guy who is happy to pump billions of pounds into a failing fiasco like this Rwanda scheme offering his services as a financial adviser to unsuspecting members of the public. Let us hope that the Financial Conduct Authority will intervene as a matter of urgency.

[Sir Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman is proving most entertaining, but as this is consideration of Lords amendments, will he get on to dealing with the amendments? I want him to be in order!

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. If the hon. Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) was not in order, I would not have allowed him to speak. He has been drawing some very interesting facts to the attention of the House. I, for one, am likely to explore some of them—but not the yacht.

[Stephen Kinnock]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I always enjoy taking interventions from a fellow Welshman, but I feel that the right hon. and learned Member for South Swindon (Sir Robert Buckland) was well and truly put in his place by your riposte.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I do not really feel that there is anything terribly useful I can say at this stage—I have heard all this before. The hon. Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock), who speaks for the Opposition, is simply repeating what he has said before. Not only that; it is perfectly apparent that these amendments are just wrecking amendments, and the hon. Gentleman has not even addressed the arguments about international law. He knows perfectly well—because he cannot answer my questions on this issue—that we have a dualist system, and if we decide to legislate in our own Parliament, the courts themselves will implement that legislation.

The real point is this: let us get this Bill done, and let us get the House of Lords to calm down a bit. At the same time, let us wait for what is inevitably going to be another claim and then see the judgment of the Supreme Court on the wording of this Bill, provided that it is clear and unambiguous. That is all I need to say. I may come back again, however, if the Lords insist again on these ridiculous amendments.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I call the SNP spokesman.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

Here we are again, debating this outrageous and unworkable Bill. We are no further forward, and the Government will fail to get any further forward, because the Bill is a complete waste of time and money. It is a ruse to get tabloid headlines, and at this stage I am not even sure whether the Government have any intention that this plan will work at all, given the incompetence they have shown so far. They are scrabbling around this week, trying to find airlines, because not one single responsible air carrier wants to be associated with the Government’s state-sponsored people trafficking plans. They have been trying to find other countries that they can try to send people to; Armenia, the Ivory Coast, Costa Rica and Botswana might be interested, but far more countries rather sensibly told the Government to go and get raffled.

I am not convinced that even Rwanda believes this plan will work or that people will be sent, because it has gone and sold off the housing that it built—that the former Home Secretary, the right hon. and learned Member for Fareham (Suella Braverman), so admired. If the Government do send people, there will not even be the facilities to put them in, unless they intend to stack them high as they often do in hotels in this country, treating people as human cargo that they can so easily dispose of. It is absolutely despicable.

So far, the Government have sent Home Secretaries and civil servants. Even the Joint Committee on Human Rights has gone to Rwanda, along with some hand-picked journalists, but no asylum seekers—nor is there much prospect of them going. While all this has been going on, dozens of Rwandans have submitted asylum claims here in the UK, and there is still concern about Rwanda’s sponsoring of the M23 rebels, who are engaged in conflict with their neighbours, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, last month wounding UN peacekeepers in the DRC; the group controls roads and mining sites in that country, and has displaced 1.7 million people. In The Guardian last week, Vava Tampa questioned international support for the Kagame regime, saying:

“The UN, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty are clear that without Rwanda’s backing, the M23 couldn’t have killed, raped, tortured and displaced as many as it has.”

I ask the Government why they want to pursue deals with such a regime—it is quite worrying.

I turn to the Lords amendments, which I will go through in turn. Lords amendment 1 asks that the Government have due regard for “domestic and international law”—that should be a basic element of any legislation that this House wishes to pass. The amendment slightly waters down the Lords’ previous amendment about

“maintaining full compliance with domestic and international law”,

but clearly, even having due regard for domestic and international law is too much for this Government. That includes obligations like the European convention on human rights, which is tied up with the Good Friday agreement and the devolution settlements in this country, and international laws such as the refugee convention, the UN convention against torture and the UN covenant on civil and political rights. Why would the Government not want to abide by those international agreements?

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I am a member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and I am not aware that I am a foreigner, but it has many difficulties and we are missing the essential point. For what it is worth, I support this Bill, but I am concerned that, in the absence of these people who land here being detained, if they are threatened with being deported to Rwanda at some stage in the future, they are simply going to bugger off into the community.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman means that they might disappear into the community. That phrase would be preferable.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I was using rather colourful phraseology just to make my point, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I take my ticking off.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I will forgive the right hon. Gentleman on this occasion: they will disappear into the community. I call Mr Simmonds.

[David Simmonds]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for highlighting that in a way that I am sure many of our constituents would choose to highlight it as well.

To finish the point around the convention itself and amendment 1B, as the Minister said at the Dispatch Box, when we cannot be certain of a future potential legal challenge it is appropriate that the statement is made as it has been made in respect of this. However, it remains my view, and I think the view of many others, that we have many channels of influence, both diplomatic and political, and that this is a living convention. We know that it is embedded in many different parts of our constitution—not just the Good Friday agreement, but our withdrawal agreement from the European Union—and therefore our adherence to it remains incredibly important. But because it is a living document it is able to flex and evolve, to recognise that the world we see today—the world of asylum and the international context—is different from the world when the treaty of London was first very strongly championed by Winston Churchill in the 1950s. Therefore, I am very much persuaded that the Minister is correct in the way he seeks to reject these amendments while also acknowledging the spirit and tone behind them.

I would like to address some of the issues that arise in amendment 7B. I am again persuaded by what the Minister has said about this, but there is a long-standing issue with the way unaccompanied children are treated. The Children Act 1989, which set up the legal framework, sets out in some detail that a child who is not accompanied by a person who has parental responsibility for them by operation of law becomes the responsibility of a local authority. Whether or not that local authority goes through any process at all to bring that child into the care system formally, for example by seeking a care order, it remains the responsibility of the local authority where that child arises to take care of them. If they return later on in early adulthood and are able to make a case that they had been present in that local authority area as a child, they are also entitled to care-leaving responsibilities from that local authority under the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000.

--- Later in debate ---

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. It will be obvious to the House that we have just over an hour left for the remainder of this debate. I hope that we do not have to have a time limit, but if speeches are about seven minutes or so, everyone will have an opportunity to make their points. Speeches so far have not been too long—they have been perfectly reasonable—but I would like to keep to around seven minutes each, please.

[Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

We are now on the final stages of the legislative journey of the Rwanda scheme announced two years ago, as my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) said from the Front Bench. What we do know is that £370 million is already committed to the Rwanda scheme, no individuals have yet been sent to Rwanda, and the Rwandan Government reportedly want to pause the scheme after the first tranche of removals. The question of how this policy will meet the Government’s objective of deterring small boat crossings remains pertinent, especially because, as we have heard, a record number of individuals have made the dangerous channel crossing in the first three months of this year.

I will turn to each of the Lords amendments, but I also say to the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), who is not in his place, that when I went along to the other place to hear the debate on the Bill, I was impressed by the debate and the points being raised. To say that the House of Lords needs to calm down a bit and that these are ridiculous amendments is doing a huge disservice to what the revising Chamber can provide for this part of Parliament. When the House of Lords thinks we have made mistakes and that things need to be looked at again, it gives us the opportunity to do that.

Lords amendment 1B is a modified version of the original Lords amendment 1. The original would have added a requirement to maintain full compliance with domestic and international law. Lords amendment 1B, which the other place has proposed in lieu, sets out a requirement to have

“due regard for domestic and international law.”

In moving Lords amendment 1B on 20 March, Lord Coaker said:

“We have put this forward because the Bill that your Lordships are discussing now explicitly disapplies aspects of domestic law and disapplies aspects of international law.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 20 March 2024; Vol. 837, c. 213.]

As I made plain in the previous debate on Lords amendments, if the Government are so confident that the Rwanda scheme will be fully compliant with domestic and international law, they should have no objection to this amendment.

Lords amendments 3B and 3C, which relate to treaty implementation and monitoring committees, are modified versions of the original Lords amendments 2 and 3 respectively. Lords amendment 3B, like the original Lords amendment 2, states that Rwanda

“will be a safe country when, and so long as, the arrangements provided for in the Rwanda Treaty have been fully implemented and for so long as they continue to be so.”

The wording has changed slightly. There is no longer a reference to the arrangements in the treaty being “adhered to in practice”, but the effect is the same. Lords amendment 3C, like the original Lords amendment 3, sets out what full implementation should look like and would give the independent monitoring committee a significant role. Unlike the original Lords amendment, there is no requirement on the Secretary of State to consult the monitoring committee every three months. Instead, Lords amendment 3C states that the treaty

“will cease to be treated as fully implemented if Parliament decides, on the advice of the Monitoring Committee, that the provisions of the treaty are no longer being adhered to in practice.”

In moving Lords amendment 3C, Lord Hope of Craighead said that it was an attempt to respond to a point made by the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) in the Commons debate on 18 March. He said that

“my Amendment 3C in lieu does my best to make it clear that the authority lies with Parliament and not with the committee.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 20 March 2024; Vol. 837, c. 227.]

The Home Affairs Committee has argued that the House of Commons should be given an opportunity to debate the treaty prior to ratification, in the light of how critical its implementation is to the Rwanda policy. Given that this opportunity to scrutinise the treaty was denied, Lords amendment 3B would at least provide some reassurance to Members that its provisions will be implemented and applicable to anyone relocated to Rwanda. Lords amendment 3C would enable Parliament to review the treaty’s implementation and respond to facts on the ground if they change.

These Lords amendments speak to the practicalities of implementing the Rwanda policy and how, sadly, too often the Government have sought to skate over them. Take the airline issue. In order for this policy to function, the Government must be able to transport people to Rwanda, yet Ministers have still not confirmed that they have secured an airline, with Rwanda’s state-owned airline reportedly declining a request to use its planes. Then there is the issue of where migrants will live if they are sent to Rwanda. Recent reports suggest that the majority of homes on a new Rwandan housing estate initially earmarked for migrants relocated from the UK have been sold to local buyers. Those are not moot points; they are the kinds of practical details that will determine whether the scheme works, and works safely. In the absence of prior scrutiny of the treaty, the House of Commons must be allowed to assess its implementation and act on the findings.

Lords amendment 6B relates to legal challenge. It is a modified version of the original Lords amendment 6 and, like the original, it would delete clause 4 of the Bill, allowing much wider grounds for legal challenge. Like the original amendment, it states that a court or tribunal may prevent or delay the removal of a person to Rwanda, but unlike the original, it adds

“providing such prevention or delay is for no longer than strictly necessary for the fair and expeditious determination of the case.”

The Home Affairs Committee has always recognised that the opportunity for appropriate legal challenge is a necessary part of an effective and fair asylum system. That is why the amendment has significant merit.

Lords amendment 7B is a modified version of the original Lords amendment 7. The original amendment would have disapplied section 57 of the Illegal Migration Act 2023 in its entirety, meaning that people claiming to be children could appeal against a decision that they are over 18. Lords amendment 7B instead would insert a new subsection into section 57 of the Illegal Migration Act. In moving Lords amendment 7B, Baroness Lister explained:

“This amendment in lieu is much more modest and in effect meets the Commons’ formal objection to the original amendment. It would permit an age-disputed child to be removed to Rwanda with a pending challenge on a limited basis, but only if a proper age assessment has first been carried out by a local authority.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 20 March 2024; Vol. 837, c. 252.]

During its channel crossings inquiry, the Home Affairs Committee heard examples of safeguarding processes failing across various parts of the asylum system, including cases of children being mistaken for adults. That is why I believe the Government must look again at this amendment.

Lords amendment 9 on modern slavery would add a new clause to the Bill to create an exception relating to the removal of victims of modern slavery and human trafficking. The new clause states:

“A person with a positive reasonable grounds decision from the National Referral Mechanism…must not be removed from the United Kingdom on the basis of the Rwanda Treaty until a conclusive grounds decision has been made.”

It also states:

“A person with a positive conclusive grounds decision…must not be removed…without a decision-maker considering whether such removal would negatively affect the physical health, mental health or safety of that person”.

The Government have proposed amendment (a) in lieu of Lords amendment 9. It requires the Secretary of State to publish an annual report about the operation of the Act

“as it relates to the modern slavery and human trafficking provisions in Article 13 of the Rwanda Treaty”.

The Home Affairs Committee’s recent report on human trafficking expresses our concern that the Government are prioritising irregular migration issues at the expense of tackling human trafficking. Human trafficking is not an immigration offence; it is an exploitation offence, and the two must not be conflated. Lords amendment 9 would provide a vital safeguard for victims of human trafficking, and I hope the Government will look at that.

Finally, Lords amendment 10B is a modified version of Lords amendment 10. Like the original amendment, it would provide an exemption for people who supported our armed forces overseas or who have otherwise been agents or allies of the UK overseas. Lords amendment 10B includes a new subsection, which states:

“A person seeking to rely upon the exemption…must give the Secretary of State notice as soon as reasonably practicable to allow prompt verification of available records”.

In moving Lords amendment 10B, Lord Browne of Ladyton said:

“we are told that men who braved death, courted injury and are forced into exile as a result of assisting our Armed Forces in fighting the Taliban are to be punished for arriving here by irregular routes—even where, owing to wrongful refusals on our part or possible malfeasance on the part of the Special Forces, they have been compelled to take these routes in the first place.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 20 March 2024; Vol. 837, c. 254.]

We know that families from Afghanistan who helped our armed forces and subsequently fled to Pakistan are at imminent risk of deportation back to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. That is despite ministerial reassurances that a route for eligible separated Afghan families to come to the UK would be established.