Commonwealth Immigration and Visas

Jeremy Lefroy Excerpts

Tuesday 27th January 2015 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Rosindell]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. When he was a Minister in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, he was a champion of Her Majesty’s realms and territories. I feel that it is shameful that subjects of Her Majesty arriving at Heathrow airport are treated as if they were from any other country in the world. There are no special privileges, nothing whatever, and that is wrong. It is time for us to look at things afresh. He will recall my 2012 United Kingdom Borders Bill, which highlighted this very issue and asked the Government to take action, which, sadly, they have not done so far. I will come back to that.

The truth is that, if we are serious about restoring control of immigration and widening the base of potential future migrants to our country so that our friends from the Commonwealth may again have opportunities to live and work in this country, the EU doctrine of free movement without any control or restriction whatever must end. That would not prevent the UK from agreeing bilateral reciprocal arrangements with other EU nations, or indeed from continuing to accept EU citizens who met the criteria decided by Her Majesty’s Government and who came here, as the vast majority do, to work and contribute to the economy of our nation. Britain would, however, have the opportunity to set the rules in so far as who did and did not come in. Those from Her Majesty’s realms and territories and from the wider Commonwealth would have the greater opportunities that are reserved now only for citizens of the EU.

Surely it makes sense to establish a system with substance and purpose—one that continues to allow the brightest and best from Europe to come to Britain, but no longer alienates or excludes those from places around the world with which Britain has enjoyed much longer and closer historical links. Being a subject from one of Her Majesty’s realms or being from a Commonwealth nation should count for something when looking to visit, work, study or live in the United Kingdom. At the moment, it appears to count for little. That is our fault and we should not be proud of it.

The Commonwealth is an underutilised resource for the United Kingdom. It offers vast opportunities outside the uncertainty, stagnation and turbulence that we have endured over the past decade.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone. Does my hon. Friend also agree that the Commonwealth is increasingly becoming a successful organisation that people want to join? In recent years, Mozambique and Rwanda have joined, and Burundi is very much knocking on the door and would like to enter.

[Andrew Rosindell]

Once again, my hon. Friend is absolutely correct. The Commonwealth is an organisation of the future. For a time, the FCO tended to feel that the Commonwealth was no longer relevant and that we should focus entirely on the EU, but the world has changed. Our historical, traditional links with the Commonwealth of nations can provide a way forward for Britain, so he is completely correct. Thus, not only are former colonies wanting to be part of the Commonwealth, but countries that have never had any link with the British Crown, such as Rwanda, Mozambique and Cameroon, want to join, which shows that the Commonwealth has a great future. We, as the United Kingdom, need to do more to harness the Commonwealth and make it stronger if we are to succeed in making it as relevant to our future as it has been to our past.

For so many years, British foreign policy has failed to grasp that concept, preferring to shun our traditional ties and place most of our eggs in the EU basket. Now that it is clear that trade with the wider world is becoming more important by the day, it is imperative that we change course and grasp the opportunities that the nations of the Commonwealth represent.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) on his powerful speech and on bringing the subject before the House. I shall make a few remarks on visas, starting with visitors visas, but want to preface that by underlining the importance of the Commonwealth, which my hon. Friend and other contributors have rightly emphasised.

The population of the Commonwealth far outweighs that of the EU and one Commonwealth nation alone, India, has a bigger population than the countries of the EU put together. Economic development in Commonwealth countries—not only the fantastic growth in India, but the substantial growth in many countries in sub-Saharan Africa and in Asia—has shown that the Commonwealth is, as my hon. Friend said, the place of the future. That is why countries have been queuing up to join. I am talking about countries that did not have a particular historical connection with the United Kingdom, such as Rwanda and Mozambique, which are already part of it, and Cameroon. Part of that country was under British administration, part under German, and at one time, after the first world war, part was under French administration. Burundi is also seeking to join the Commonwealth, and I believe that other countries have expressed interest.

It is therefore vital that we maintain, and indeed enhance, the links with Commonwealth countries. That is not only about history; it is about business opportunities. For instance, in Tanzania—I refer Members to my business interests in Tanzania, which are in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests—the United Kingdom is the single biggest investor and trading partner. These days, we tend to think that China has taken over everywhere in Africa, but that is not the case at all. In many countries, the United Kingdom is still a major trading partner and investor, and it is, indeed, growing in importance in those countries.

On the issue of visitor visas, a few months ago, a Tanzanian lady, Rhodi Samwell, was invited to the United Kingdom on an extremely important mission. She works for the Anglican diocese of Mara on female genital mutilation, and she is building a safe house in the area for women and girls who do not wish to be subjected to that practice. The House has debated this issue many times in the past year, and I know the Minister is keenly concerned about it.

At my invitation, Rhodi Samwell was coming to this country, and indeed to the House, to talk to the all-party group on Tanzania about her work, but she could not get a visa. Her application, which was processed in Pretoria, was refused. Only after a large number of Members of the House and the other place wrote to those involved and pressed her case was she finally able to come here on a visa.

This lady was in full-time, secure employment with the Anglican diocese of Mara. She had the backing of the Tanzania Development Trust, the Britain-Tanzania Society and many other reputable organisations, which bore witness to the fact that she would be supported while she was here and that she was planning to return. Indeed, the very reason she was coming here was to help to enable her to return home to fulfil her dream of setting up a safe house for women and girls. However, the United Kingdom was unable to issue her with a visa without pressure from Members of Parliament and without volunteers across the country putting in a great deal of time and effort. That does the United Kingdom’s reputation no good.

I am glad to say that, ultimately, Rhodi Samwell was able to come here, and she gave an excellent talk in the House of Commons, alongside my right hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Lynne Featherstone), who was then an International Development Minister. We were delighted to see her. She gave talks all across the country. As a result of her visit, the remaining money needed to build the safe house was collected— indeed, school children in my constituency also contributed. The safe house is now in operation, and more than 100 girls and women have found help there.

That is just one instance, but I have heard of many others from right hon. and hon. Members in both Houses. People are doing fantastic work for non-governmental organisations or charities, and we want to hear from them first hand. They are invited here, and they will be fully provided for, but the only obstacle is a visa. Most of the time, these are people from Commonwealth countries.

The second issue I want to bring up is business visas. It is vital that visas are made available quickly and easily for those with whom we wish to do business. Before coming to this place, I travelled to Tanzania and other countries fairly frequently on business. As a British citizen, I could send my passport, together with the necessary documents, to the Tanzanian high commission in London, and sometimes I would receive my business visa back within three days. However, Tanzanian business people, who are often running businesses that are far bigger and of far more significance to the United Kingdom economy than that which I ran, sometimes find it incredibly difficult to get visas. That cannot help our trade with Tanzania or, indeed, with other countries.

Finally, there is the issue of family. The Commonwealth of nations is a family of nations, but it also contains family members of people in pretty much every constituency in the House. Surely it is important that we facilitate family visits that are done in the proper way—where it is clearly shown that these are not visits to seek long-term admission to the country, but family visits to see nephews, nieces, grandparents or grandchildren. That is all about humanity.

In those three areas—visits from charities and non-governmental organisations, visits for businesses and visits for family—it is surely possible to organise things in such a way that the cost is reasonable and that applications are dealt with in a matter of days or weeks, rather than the months we sometimes hear about.

I want to give a final example from my own experience to show what things can be like. My son was born in Nairobi about 25 years ago this month. We took the birth certificate and one or two other documents to the British high commission there, and we were issued with a British passport pretty much over the counter. A constituent, whose grandchild was born in Kenya last year, went through the same process, albeit with one or two complications. However, those complications should not have resulted in it taking several months for that child to be issued with a passport. Surely, things should have gone forwards after 25 years, not backwards, particularly with the access we now have to technology, but it seems that things were a lot easier 25 years ago.

--- Later in debate ---

[Karen Bradley]

I understand my hon. Friend’s point, and he will forgive me if I indicated that I understood it differently. The Government have taken significant steps to address that matter, and if we form the next Government, as I fully intend—I apologise to the right hon. Member for Delyn, but I fully intend to be sitting in this seat in 12 weeks’ time—the excellent measures that the Prime Minister set out in his speech close to my constituency in Staffordshire just before Christmas will enable us to take even further steps to ensure that free movement within the EU comes with responsibilities and that we do not have free movement of criminals, which I particularly care about, or for welfare benefits. There is agreement on both sides of the House that access to welfare payments for non-UK nationals should not come without the responsibility of having contributed to the system.

The immigration system plays a strong part in supporting growth and meeting the needs of UK businesses. Migrant workers can fill skills gaps in our labour market and help to boost our economy. However, as the economic recovery continues, we are clear that employers should look first to recruit people who are already in the UK and are already UK nationals.

The Government are aware of the Commonwealth Exchange report “How to Solve a Problem like a Visa”—I commend the Commonwealth Exchange for its engaging title—and we are working with other Commonwealth countries to consider options to improve migration opportunities within the Commonwealth. Although the UK is happy to work with and consider ideas proposed by Commonwealth partners, the UK maintains that immigration and visa controls are a matter for the UK Government. It is important to remind the House—I know this has been mentioned already—that citizens of the majority of Commonwealth countries, 31 out of 53, do not require a visit visa to come to the UK.

My hon. Friend the Member for Romford made the point that visas are an effective tool for the UK in reducing illegal immigration, tackling organised crime and protecting national security. The visit visa regime is an important tool in reducing the national security threat to the UK, allowing us to intervene in a number of ways before someone arrives in the country. We can prevent someone from coming to the UK by refusing a visa or, where appropriate, we can allow travel while setting up an operational response when someone in whom we are interested arrives in the UK. The information provided in the application process also allows us to identify links about which we would not otherwise have known. The backflow of data can be vital to new investigations, and the security and intelligence agencies require a biometric visa regime for all visa nationals.

Visas have a role to play in reducing crime. We can use the application to check whether someone is known to international partners, and we can check a range of databases to see whether someone has a criminal background here in the UK.

Finally, the process helps to tackle illegal immigration. The visa process enables us to check whether the applicant has a genuine reason for coming to the UK and enough money to support themselves. The use of biometrics enables us to lock an individual securely to their identity so that we know who we are dealing with.

As the Minister with responsibility for serious and organised crime, I know it is incredibly important that we keep in mind the security of British nationals with regard to foreign offenders. Commonwealth countries feature in the top 10 nationalities of foreign national offenders and, sadly, the top two nationalities are Commonwealth countries: Jamaica and Nigeria. We are working closely with those countries to ensure that we have upstream work to deal with foreign national offending so that it does not hit our streets, but I want to ensure that people in Romford, Stafford, Staffordshire Moorlands, Delyn, Tamworth and Wellingborough can walk the streets knowing that foreign national offenders are not coming to the UK without our knowledge. We should all recognise that that is incredibly important.

Economic factors are a big part of the decision on whether to impose a visa on a country, as they can be a big pull factor on illegal migration. Nevertheless, because of the traditional ties that we have with the Commonwealth, the UK is arguably more generous in that regard. Eighteen of the 31 Commonwealth countries with visa-free access to the UK, which is more than half, are classed as developing nations by the World Bank, which shows that there is occasionally a different approach to Commonwealth countries. The EU economies, in contrast, are more on the same economic level as the UK, with the majority being in the world’s 50 richest countries based on gross national income per capita per year. Economic criteria are one area of assessment for countries that want EU membership under the accession criteria.

I always think of immigration as being like the movement of air: it moves from high pressure to low. Wind is created when high pressure moves to fill a low-pressure gap. If we consider that high pressure for immigration is poverty, lack of opportunity and lack of education and that countries such as the UK represent low-pressure areas where there are opportunities, jobs and the potential to achieve wealth, it is understandable why people want to move from one to the other. Our job is to ensure that, when we look at the movement of people, we do not get to the point where, continuing the analogy, the low pressure in the UK becomes the high pressure that means we are overburdened—that is a strange analogy, but I hope it makes sense. I like to perceive immigration as being like the movement of air around the world.

Even within the EU, as the Prime Minister has made clear, disparities in income per head, as well as disparities in labour markets and work opportunities, create incentives for migration—let us remember that in the past four and a half years the UK has created more jobs than the rest of the EU put together. That is why the Government have started a debate within Europe on future accessions, such as linking freedom of movement to relative wealth and, of course, limiting the access of EU nationals to welfare and other services.

Visa regimes for some Commonwealth countries are an effective tool for the UK in reducing illegal immigration, tackling organised crime and protecting national security. The visa process enables us to check whether an applicant has a genuine reason for coming to the UK and enough money to support themselves. We take our duty to protect the public extremely seriously and, where foreign national offenders commit serious crimes in the UK, it is right that they are brought to justice and removed from the UK at the earliest opportunity. Since April 2010, we have removed more than 22,000 foreign national offenders. Where a Commonwealth national commits an offence in the UK, we will pursue deportation, unless they were resident in the UK before the commencement of the Immigration Act 1971. Visa regimes are an important part of the UK’s immigration system, which is fair to British citizens and legitimate migrants, and tough on those who flout the rules.

The UK has a flexible policy for visitors that enables people to come for a range of purposes. Work is under way to streamline the policy further and consolidate the routes that will make the system even more accessible and provide greater flexibility. I acknowledge, however, that obtaining a visit visa for the UK is an inconvenience for some, which is why the UK has invested heavily in ensuring that applying for a UK visa is as easy as possible.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford spoke about a specific visa case, although I cannot comment on the individual circumstances of that case. It is important that Members of Parliament always raise such cases because, no matter how good the system, there will always be the odd occasion when something does not quite work as it should. I am glad that the lady in question was able to visit the UK, and that my hon. Friend could help her in that regard.

We have upgraded our entire network of visa application centres to increase capacity. We have made our processes less bureaucratic, and we ensure fast turn-around times and offer appointments out of working hours. We have extended our three-to-five-day priority service, which is now available in more than 100 countries, and we have introduced a passport pass-back service in a number of countries so that customers can retain their passport while their UK visa application is being processed. A new super-priority 24-hour visa service, building on the popularity of the three-to-five-day service, has been introduced in India and China and will be extended to New York, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Manila, Istanbul, Bangkok and Pretoria by April 2015.

My hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Mr Bellingham) mentioned the hub-and-spoke model for visa applications. We have more than 300 visa application points around the world, connected to a network of decision-making hubs. They are in similar places to the ones I just mentioned: Beijing, Manila, Abu Dhabi, Shanghai, New Delhi, Riyadh, New York, Istanbul, Chennai, Bangkok, Mumbai and Pretoria.

The next generation of the outsourced visa project has delivered the next set of outsourcing contracts for the visa application process, including biometric enrolment, courier services and interviewing facilitation. The new contracts have allowed us to increase the number of application points globally, offer improved customer services including increased access to premium priority services and deliver efficiencies in the visa application process. To increase access to our visa services overseas, we have considered how best to support our operation and our customers, including by extending opening hours in some locations and trialling new “user pays” services in developing markets.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

As for all such important new projects, will the Minister undertake to get a bit of customer feedback, particularly from Members of Parliament, to whom constituents often come as a matter of last resort when, for instance, a business partner, relative or non-governmental organisation worker whom they are supporting has spent weeks or even months trying unsuccessfully to get a visa? Will she consider collecting information from colleagues and seeing how the system can be improved? Clearly, if this is a new system, we will want to ensure that it works as efficiently as possible.

[Karen Bradley]

I assure my hon. Friend that we in the Home Office take seriously all comments and feedback from fellow Members of Parliament on all aspects of our work. He makes an important point about ensuring that we take seriously our colleagues’ feedback when their constituents experience new systems, because that feedback gives us on-the-ground evidence about what is happening and how it is working. I welcome comments from all Members about how the system affects their constituents and those constituents’ families. I have said that all the changes are working, and I hope that we have proved that they are. They provide greater flexibility and choice, and we know that they have been welcomed by many travellers and tour operators.

On longer stays, the UK views the Commonwealth as an important partner in helping the UK to grow. A number of routes are open to Commonwealth citizens who want to work in the UK. There are further provisions specifically for Commonwealth citizens, such as the UK ancestry route. My hon. Friend said that the Commonwealth was a family, and he is right. When I visited Pakistan last year, it was extraordinary how familiar it looked, given how Pakistani culture has become so commonplace within UK culture. The furnishings, the look and the things that we talked about—cricket, for instance—are common across the Commonwealth. In fact, during my visit to Islamabad, I do not think I met anybody who did not have family in Britain.

The UK ancestry route is for Commonwealth citizens with a UK-born grandparent who intend to work in the UK. Applicants do not need to come for a specific job and are not restricted to graduate-level occupations. They may be accompanied by dependants and can apply for indefinite leave to remain after five years’ residence. In 2013, a total of 4,100 UK ancestry visas were issued, including 1,600 to Australians, 500 to Canadians, 1,000 to New Zealanders and 870 to South Africans.

My hon. Friend the Member for Romford mentioned the UK’s youth mobility scheme which, as he rightly said, operates in eight countries, three of which are Commonwealth countries: Australia, Canada and New Zealand. It enables young people to come to the UK for up to two years to experience UK culture. The UK is happy to engage in discussions with any country meeting the YMS eligibility criteria, which include presenting a low immigration risk to the UK, having satisfactory returns arrangements and offering a reciprocal arrangement for young UK nationals. My message to those countries is, “Please come forward and talk to us.” We are open to talking to countries that want to be part of the arrangement to see whether the eligibility requirements and reciprocal arrangements can be put in place to enable young people from the UK and Commonwealth countries to enjoy each other’s culture by living in each other’s countries.

The right hon. Member for Delyn wanted to remove students from the immigration target. That might seem like a quick fix for reducing immigration levels, but it is important that we understand how many students are here in Britain and ensure that they are leaving, as we will be able to do much more effectively when exit checks are introduced this spring, because we know that the student visa route was being exploited. This Government have clamped down on nearly 800 bogus colleges, slashed 45,000 visas from the further education route and cut family visas by nearly one third since we came to power. Our reforms have reduced net migration from outside the EU and, importantly, ensured that our higher and further education systems are not being abused. I caution the right hon. Gentleman against removing student numbers from the net migration figures. Although that might give a short-term boost to the figures, it would not enable the Government to manage the situation, thus leaving the potential for that important route to be abused, as has been the case in the past.

We have an excellent offer for students to stay in the UK after their studies. In April 2012 we closed the old tier 1 post-study work route, which gave two years’ unconditional access to the UK labour market, allowing many students to stay on in low-skilled work. We have replaced it with a more selective system. Graduates who get a graduate job that pays a graduate-level salary can stay in the UK, and there is no limit on their numbers. Also, we have created a scheme for graduate entrepreneurs and doubled the number of places on it to 2,000, as well as creating a new visa for graduates wishing to undertake a corporate internship or professional training related to their degree.

We are continuing to ensure that the scheme for the exceptionally talented attracts those who are already internationally recognised at the highest level as world leaders in their particular field, or who have already demonstrated exceptional promise. We wish to encourage more take-up of that route, and we are working with the endorsing bodies to do so, but the number of places available—1,000—is a limit, not a target. We wish to attract exceptional talent, wherever it comes from.

On 1 December 2014, the UK introduced new “transit without a visa” provisions that make it easier and clearer to transit through the UK. Commonwealth citizens who hold valid exemption documents, including visas for Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the US, which is a close partner, although it is not in the Commonwealth, can transit through the UK without a visa, regardless of where they are travelling. The UK has also reduced the cost of the direct airside transit visa to £30, making it cheaper than the Schengen alternative for the citizens of the 21 Commonwealth countries who need to apply for one.

Also, after a successful pilot, on 17 November last year we launched our new registered traveller scheme. The scheme permits approved members who undergo advanced security checks access to our e-passport gates at Heathrow and Gatwick, or the option to use the EEA queue at Heathrow or a special RT lane at Gatwick, expediting their clearance through the border. The scheme is open only to a select number of countries but, crucially, travellers from Canada, Australia and New Zealand who are aged 18 or over, meet the criteria for the scheme and travel to the UK at least four times a year are eligible to apply. Applicants pay an average membership fee of £50, and since the scheme’s formal launch in November, more than 5,000 regular travellers, almost a quarter of whom come from Canada, Australia and New Zealand, have been approved to join it. Keeping the UK’s borders secure is our priority but, at the same time, we want to welcome legitimate visitors and trade that contribute to the UK economy and to show that we value our links with other countries. Using the latest technology helps us to do both, and the scheme is proving popular with regular travellers.

My hon. Friends the Members for North West Norfolk and for Romford talked about separate entry as a possibility for Commonwealth citizens, or for citizens of those Commonwealth realm countries for which Her Majesty the Queen is Head of State. Any policy or operational decision to create an additional line for Commonwealth nationals at ports must be taken with due regard to the wider operational impact—the likelihood of placing an additional burden on port operators—and the impact on other passengers. That is key to ensuring that any benefits to a limited number of individuals are not outweighed by a negative impact on border security operations more generally by constraining UK Border Force’s flexibility to respond dynamically to fluctuations in passenger flow.

Having visited UK Border Force and seen its work, I can say that there is very careful management of the lines at the borders. We have a registered traveller scheme that enables people who have gone through pre-clearance to go through e-gates, which is the quickest and easiest way to access the UK, and such people include those from Australia, Canada and New Zealand. However, having a separate route for those travellers from Commonwealth countries who do not have registered traveller status would, in many cases, hamper UK Border Force’s ability to deal with fluctuations in arrival flows.

Let me give an example of that. If a flight arrives from Jamaica, it would be highly likely that many of its passengers will be UK nationals who have visited Jamaica, but many other passengers would be Jamaican nationals. Due to the prevalence of foreign national offenders from Jamaica, we need to check those people and ensure that they go through the proper immigration and border gates, as would be the case for people coming from places such as Albania, or perhaps south-east Asia. We want to ensure that those travellers have the right security checks at the border. It would create a problem if we had a separate Commonwealth gate when all the passengers being dealt with had arrived from Commonwealth countries, meaning that there was only a limited number of gates through which those passengers could pass although there were many other gates available for passengers whose flights had not yet arrived.

To give UK Border Force the flexibility it needs, if it felt that it would be appropriate to have specific gates in operation to help its staff, that would be entirely down to the Border Force itself. However, we should not try to restrict it, given how its staff have to manage flows of arriving passengers. It does not want to keep people waiting for longer than the 40-minute target that we have set.