Draft Immigration (Persons Designated under Sanctions Regulations) (EU Exit) (Amendment) Regulations 2022

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2022 General Committees

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is, as always, a pleasure to serve under you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone. I do not think we will be detaining the Committee quite that long.

I thank the Minister for her comprehensive explanation of the regulations’ purpose, which is to correct what might best be described as a glitch in the operation of immigration sanctions or travel bans in respect of individuals based within the UK. The Home Office has identified that discrepancy, which has led to the entirely perverse situation in which people subject to a travel ban have more rights than those who are awaiting a decision on a human rights or protection claim and are not subject to sanctions.

The roots of the issue date back to the passage of the 2018 Act and regulations under that Act that were made in 2020, so it took the Government quite some time to become aware of the problem, which begs the question how and why the discrepancy first came to Ministers’ attention. The Government point out that in most cases, people subject to travel bans are not in the UK and do not have any significant connection to the UK. The number of people likely to be affected by these regulations is therefore small. The intention of the regulations is to rectify the error, and the hope is that in doing so, they will also help to strengthen the operation of UK sanctions regimes in the future. I am sure we can all support that. On that basis, the Opposition support this statutory instrument.