Q I would like to bring us back to the issue of 28 days and the time-limited detention. I do not think anyone in this room wants to see unnecessarily long detention. You have all talked about how the system is not robust enough. If a case cannot be determined within 28 days, what rights do you think the applicant should be given?

Steve Valdez-Symonds: It is wrong, firstly, to think of the case being determined within 28 days. I think you have got to think about the whole of the time in which you are talking about an applicant. It is also quite dangerous to think of applicants, too. People who are taken into detention include people who have been through a process and have been applicants and may still be applicants; they also include people who did not even know they had an issue with the immigration services. Think back to the Windrush scandal. People were picked up who were perfectly entitled to be here and had not had any thought that over the last several decades they had had any problem with the immigration system, and they found themselves in detention. There is a whole range of issues to consider in terms of what is going on here.

From our point of view, the straightforward point is that detention is supposed to be for two specific purposes only. The most important one is to effect a lawful removal. At the moment, we have large-scale routine use of a very extreme power. Going back to the first question, we have a system that clearly is not—if you want to use the word—robust enough to exercise the power fairly and sensibly, let alone humanely, for the thousands of people it is imposed on. If we had a system that was properly directed towards using such powers appropriately at the time that it was appropriate to use them, perhaps we would have a robust system. Perhaps many fewer people would end up being detained. Perhaps the smaller number of people who were detained would be those whom the system was lawfully seeking to remove and had some real potential of removing within what should be a very short period of time.

Q How much of the system not being robust enough do you think is due to the fact that there is such a high volume of immigration cases that need to be dealt with?

Steve Valdez-Symonds: I think the aspects go far and wide. You have made the immigration rules so incredibly complex over the last many years; immigration appeals for so many people have been taken away; legal aid is not available to so many people, even to understand what their situation is, including, as it happens, people who are entitled to British citizenship but cannot get legal aid to establish their citizenship rights. All of those things make for a very complex system, which, unfortunately, even the Home Office frequently does not understand. The courts have not only found that this system is so byzantine but have had to rule in cases where the Home Office has not been able to present a consistent understanding of the rules it is trying to operate.

Q I am sorry to stop you, but I sense there is a lot passion.

Steve Valdez-Symonds: There is a lot of passion, yes.

Q But it sounds like you are hectoring me. I would actually like you to take some of the emotion out of your answers and just stick to the facts, please.

Steve Valdez-Symonds: I am sorry to have given that impression. I certainly did not mean to do that. I apologise to the Committee more generally. All I would say is that the system, over a very long period of time—this is not just a matter of this Administration; it is years and decades—has become very complex and safeguards have been taken away from people. If you want to understand how people end up in detention in the situations that I have been concerned about, there are myriad reasons why this system does not work, long before detention even happens.

Bella Sankey: Could I just add to that question? You asked why the system is not robust enough. The main reason for that at the moment is that there is not a proper independent check on it. In other areas where we allow the state to deprive people of liberty, we always ensure that there is an independent check on the decision to do so. Take the criminal justice system, for example. A suspect cannot be held for longer than 96 hours and not without being charged. Within that 96-hour period, a magistrate’s approval is required for incremental extensions to somebody’s detention. At the moment, in our immigration system there is nothing comparable to that. There are bail hearings that have recently been introduced at the four-month stage, but four months is already an extraordinarily long time, particularly for vulnerable people.

To give a quick, illustrative example, earlier this week, the Minister’s Department conceded that it had been unlawfully detaining an incredibly vulnerable Chinese victim of trafficking for six months. This woman was picked up at a brothel after a tip-off from a member of the public that there was a woman there who seemed like she did not want to be there. When she was found, there were all the indicators you might expect for a trafficking victim. She had no passport, she was worried about being in debt to other people, and she had no friends or family in the UK. But instead of being treated as a victim of potential modern-day slavery and trafficking, she was taken to a detention centre and held for six months. She exhibited signs of extreme distress. She had psychotic episodes. She was walking around in her underwear and screaming, and talking about being burned by a man with hot water.

Despite all of the internal safeguards that are apparently in place, that woman was not released for six months. The Home Office has now conceded unlawful detention. These sorts of cases are happening all the time. I can assure the Committee that there will be people in detention right now in that same situation. That will continue unless there is a statutory end date that will force the Home Office to comply with its own policy and guidance.

Q Professor, as part of the3million, you have had frequent meetings with Government in terms of designing the settled status scheme. Can you tell us how effective you think the Government and the Home Office in particular were in engaging with stakeholders?

Professor Smismans: There has been engagement with stakeholders on the practical implementation, for sure, which has been useful. I think it has been more difficult to have any influence or feedback when civil society has said, “Well, actually, our rights have to be guaranteed; it’s not just an issue of practical implementation.” That has been far more problematic. There has been an involvement, but given the state of the legislation and the rules, clearly civil society has not been as effective as it hoped.

Q I hear what you are saying. In answer to previous questions, you talked about the dissatisfaction with the way the rights have transitioned. However, my understanding is that you were consulted extensively on the design of the settled status scheme.

Professor Smismans: The main flaw of the design is its basic principle: it is a constitutive system. Whatever criteria you put in or however you organise it, the practical consequences can be dire under a constitutive system.

Another key aspect that is highly problematic is that the scheme will, in the end, give you an electronic code, not a physical document. That is highly problematic in practice. People need a physical document. For other immigration statuses, people get physical documents. If people do not have that physical document, private actors will ignore them. Again, the vulnerable will struggle if they only have a code. A private landlord might not make the effort to make use of that code, or might not know how.

There are also huge IT risks. Every IT specialist we have spoken to says it is an incredible risk. Data might get lost. That happens. The data system might be hacked, which will mean that the status of these people will be gone, and they will have to reapply. If that happens, they will not have any document and will be immediately illegal, with all the consequences of the hostile environment hitting them immediately. They need a physical document. That is a key ask, because those with all other immigration statuses get a physical document. Why do these 3 million people not? It is very important.

Q Thank you for that. You talked about the flaws of the system. There were bits that you had an input in designing or were extensively consulted on, so something in there must be good. Do you think there is anything in there that could be useful as the basis of a future immigration system? What do you like about the settled status scheme?

Professor Smismans: I will not express myself on the future immigration system. That is not my task. the3million defends the rights of the EU citizens already here. Whatever system is designed for the future is a political choice that we do not have to make, so we do not make any statements on that.

In the same way, we say that ending freedom of movement for the future is a legitimate choice, and that is fine. We can talk about the interpretation of the referendum, as the Minister did before, which I heard from the back, but we usually leave the interpretation of the referendum up to you. However, let me remind you that, before and after the referendum, all parties said that the rights of EU citizens already in the country would be protected, and that everybody who was already here would be able to remain here with the status they already had.

The Bill wipes out those people’s rights completely and leaves it to secondary legislation to sort them out, and also makes them register with an uncertain outcome. That is not the promise that was made by any political party during or after the referendum.

Q I want to pick up on the point just made by Rosa Crawford about UK citizens not wanting to do undesirable work and the need for migrants to do it. Do you think that sort of rhetoric is appropriate—that certain types of job are not good for UK citizens and we need other people from elsewhere to come in and do them? Do you not think that creates a perception that dirty, tough and difficult jobs are for other people and not for us? I say this as an immigrant myself.

Rosa Crawford: We have always said as a union movement that we stand for workers from all countries. We do not believe any workers should be working in degrading or exploitative conditions. That is why I say it is very important that the law allows workers from all countries, regardless of immigration status, to claim those employment rights.

Unfortunately, we have seen the deregulation of the labour market. In agriculture, the example we have been talking about, there used to be an Agricultural Wages Board that provided a floor level of conditions and pay in that sector. That was abolished under the coalition Government and Unite, the union that represents workers in the agricultural sector, has said since that has been abolished, there has been a proliferation of precarious contracts, illegal forms of contract, people in very exploitative conditions, people not receiving the pay they should, and people often not being paid the minimum wage in certain cases.

That form of labour market regulation, the Agricultural Wages Board, is just one example of how the removal of domestic employment protection results in more exploitation and an increase in the number of migrant workers employed in that sector. We know migrant workers are particularly vulnerable to taking up those forms of employment, or ending up in them, often because they need to secure an income quickly, because they have paid money to come to this country. Unfortunately, precarious jobs are the most likely type of job they are going to get, because those are the sectors of the economy that are expanding.

On average, if you arrive in this country needing a job quickly, you are probably going to end up on a zero hours or temporary contract or in a job with an illegal contract. Unfortunately, migrant workers are particularly likely to work in that sector. We have said that is absolutely unacceptable. We want good conditions in those sectors, for the migrant workers who come and the UK workers who are here already. If you improve conditions and pay, restore things such as wages councils, not just in the agriculture sector, but across the private sector, in hotels where—

Q I am going to stop you because you are not answering the question that I asked. I hear you on the discussion on labour market regulation, but that is something completely different. It was about the rhetoric which you just used, and perhaps you did not hear yourself when you said it. I am going to assume that you did not quite mean what you said, that undesirable jobs are for people outside this country.

Rosa Crawford: I absolutely want to correct that if it was ever the perception. We would say undesirable jobs are undesirable for all workers. No worker should suffer them. All workers deserve to work in dignity.

Q How much of your research is focused exclusively on agricultural workers as opposed to workers in other sectors? Do you have any information or data on other areas in terms of the percentage of people using these visa schemes who would be working outside agriculture?

Caroline Robinson: The visa scheme announced in that amount of detail—and for which we have pilot operators—is the seasonal workers pilot. That is in the agricultural sector. The short-term—as they have been termed—visas in the immigration White Paper, the temporary short-term workers schemes, are for all sectors as far as we can see.

We looked particularly at high-risk sectors in the UK. The most recent in-depth piece of research we did looked at the construction sector. We are also conducting work looking at the hospitality industry, particularly at hotels. Generally we look at sectors that we believe are at risk of exploitation. We are particularly interested in the functioning of the seasonal workers pilot because that is up and running, in so far as we are engaging with the pilot operators. We are talking to the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority about how they will oversee that pilot.

Q So that is why the focus is there. Have you looked at any other historical or previous temporary visa schemes that have occurred in the UK to see what sort of issues came out of them? Do you have any research on that?

Meri Åhlberg: Specifically in the UK?

In the UK. There have been other temporary visa schemes, but I am not aware of high levels of exploitation around them. If there are lots of cases I would like to hear about them.

Meri Åhlberg: We have done research on the previous seasonal agricultural workers scheme, which ended in 2013, and we have also done research on the sector-based scheme, which brought workers into hospitality and food processing. That ended in 2013, but had been slowly being phased out.

In the sector-based scheme it was found that workers were paying up to £10,000 in recruitment fees to come to the UK. They were heavily in debt when they arrived in the UK, and were therefore unable to leave abusive or exploitative situations because they were afraid of not being able to pay back that debt.

In the seasonal agricultural workers scheme, there were a lot of issues around people being unable to change their employer. They had to have permission from the scheme operator to do so, but sometimes the scheme operator and the employer were the same person. In practice it was very difficult to change employers, meaning that if you were in an exploitative or abusive situation you had to either choose to leave the country and leave your source of income, or put up with it. There are a lot of cases of people not being paid the minimum wage, and of people not having guaranteed hours and so not earning enough. There was an over- supply of workers, meaning that employers did not have to provide enough work for people to earn money. There will be a similar problem in this scheme; there are not any guaranteed hours in the seasonal workers programme pilot.

Q If I were to look at this from the perspective of my constituents, I do not think that a lot of the suggestions around just not having the visas would fly. I think people would want to know what sort of things the Government could do on the employer side, to improve the situation. For example, do you think that instead of a 12 month on, 12 month off regime, being able to renew after the end of a 12-month visa would be helpful in providing some type of certainty?

Meri Åhlberg: That would definitely be better than having to bring in people who had no networks here or no idea about their labour rights. If you have people who can stay for longer periods, over time they learn about their rights, and have a better chance of unionising and, essentially, of gaining employment rights, or enforcing their employment rights.

Q Do you think that providing information about those rights on arrival, rather than by osmosis while they are here, would be a better way of ensuring that people were aware of what they could access and what their rights were?

Meri Åhlberg: Definitely. Pre-departure training and on-arrival training about people’s rights is really important. Having a multilingual complaints hotline or a 24-hour hotline, on which workers can make complaints is also important, but the most important thing would be to have proactive well-resourced labour market enforcement, to ensure that people were not depending on migrant workers and vulnerable workers coming forward and enforcement being based on reaction to a worker making a complaint. There is a lot of evidence to show that vulnerable workers do not come forward, so what needs to be in place is really proactive enforcement.

Contrary to what the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) says, as a first-generation immigrant, I know that it is wholly inconsistent to say that immigrants have not changed this country or communities in any way whatsoever. Sometimes there is positive change, and sometimes there is negative change—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman shakes his head in disagreement, but I am merely repeating his words. Does my right hon. Friend agree there are both positive and negative changes, and that we want more of the positive and less of the negative?

I mentioned earlier in this debate that I was speaking as a first-generation immigrant. Immigration is an issue that is very close to my heart. My personal experience, especially through my immediate family and relatives, has been not from an EU perspective, but from a non-EU perspective. One good thing about the Bill is that we are no longer focusing on nationality, but, really importantly, on skills and ending this form of discrimination. I know that, in the future, most of the red meat will be coming with the immigration rules, so I shall speak on the substantive points in the Bill.

One of the primary reasons that I supported the withdrawal agreement was because of the reciprocal guarantees on citizens’ rights. As leaving the EU is such a huge fundamental change to this country, it is only right that we have clear rules and that we think very carefully about what the new regime will be like. Quite clearly, this is a country that welcomes migrants; the numbers speak for themselves. For every British citizen who is in the EU, there are four EU citizens in this country, so we know that this is a country that welcomes immigration—that is just EU migration, let alone migration from the rest of the world. One huge challenge has been the language that we use to discuss immigration and, in particular, freedom of movement. I thank the Home Secretary, who is no longer in his place, for taking a lot of the emotion out of this debate, allowing us to focus on the logic, the reason and the substantive issues.

One Opposition Member—I cannot remember their name—talked about negative media rhetoric and about the language that is used to talk about migrants. I think that a lot of that starts from this House. It comes not, as Opposition Members may think, from the language that is used on the Government Benches, but from the whipping up by the Opposition of things that are not necessarily to do with immigration, so that they can get good headlines. I say to Members to look, for example, at how the shadow Home Secretary conflated illegal and legal migration in her opening statement when she was talking about those “Go home” vans. This is not in any way an endorsement of that sort of technique, but it was quite clear that those things were used to talk about illegal migration. This constant conflation of legal and illegal migration is one of the things that whips up the rhetoric. It starts from here and ends up going out there.

The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), who is not in his place, intervened on his colleague to say that Tories do not want to see anyone coming to this country at all. That is completely ridiculous.

No, I will not give way. I want to make this point.

The same people who say that we on these Benches do not want anyone to come to this country will also complain that we are letting in more non-EU migrants such as me and my family.

I will take the intervention.

In that case, nor will I take any lectures from Scottish National party Members. We can see from their sparkling racial diversity just how much they care about immigration. As someone who came to this country as a first-generation immigrant, I have seen at first hand both the positives and the negatives of immigration. There are not enough people who are willing to speak the truth on the subject.

No, I am not interested in joining any nationalist party, but I thank the hon. Gentleman whose constituency I forget for inviting me to join. The fact is that if we are to have a calm debate about immigration, what we need are facts and figures, not smug self-righteousness, which is all that we get from those on the Opposition Benches.

I will continue on the topic of free movement, which is what this Bill is about. We all have different constituency experiences, which will have an impact on this discussion. I have had many positive discussions with Conservative Members. For instance, my hon. Friend the Member for Gordon (Colin Clark) talked about positive impacts in relation to immigration in his constituency. I listened to my hon. Friend the Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) talk about some of the difficulties that his constituency has had. We have both positive and negative experiences.

What creates the problem is when Members on the Opposition Benches, and perhaps some on these Benches, feel that only they have the best intentions and that anyone else who speaks with concerns is speaking from xenophobia and racism. That is absolutely wrong. We cannot think the very best of ourselves and the worst of anyone else who is not in our party, or who is not sitting on our side of the House. I am very, very willing, even as an immigrant, to hear arguments against immigration, because I know that immigration is a global issue. It is not a UK issue. Every single country in the world is talking about it. It is completely crazy for us to have this discussion as if it were a UK-only issue, or even an EU-only issue, and believe that no one else has the experience to be able to speak on it.

From the perspective of my constituency, immigration has, perhaps, an indirect effect. The north of my constituency has a huge biotech and pharmaceutical industry, and many of the arguments that people make there are very, very similar to those that have been made by SNP Members and by my hon. Friend the Member for Gordon and others, about the need to ensure that we continue to have a strong relationship with the EU—that is something that I support. Speaking as someone who was a former London Assembly member, I have also seen how immigration has an indirect effect on those of us outside London. My Essex constituency has seen a huge rise in house prices and house building, which is having an effect on its population in a very significant and profound way. It is not because loads of immigrants are coming to take on our jobs, but because lots of people who migrate to London raise prices and take up housing there, causing a push-out effect on other parts of the country, which we do not get the resources to deal with. As was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Luke Graham), who is no longer in his place, we should be looking at trying to reduce the impact of negative consequences on places such as Saffron Walden and Uttlesford District Council.

I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention. We need to look at what is actually happening and to think of an immigration system that will work for the very north of our country as well as for the very south. There will not be a one-size-fits-all approach. I am very willing to listen to arguments from Opposition Members about how much they need it, but they also need to extend the same courtesy and not pretend that everyone on this side of the House, including people like me who grew up in Nigeria, are racist. That is completely mad.

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his point, and I can see why he is making it. I am not someone who supports devolution, and I do not think that that would necessarily solve the problem. [Interruption.] I am talking about the devolution of this issue. We have a national border, so devolving national border issues to specific places will not solve the problem, but I take his point.

Social security co-ordination is another reason why I support the Bill. Those of us with long memories will remember that this very matter was one reason why former Prime Minister David Cameron went to the EU to seek a negotiated change to some of these things. Perhaps if we had been able to resolve this issue, we would not be having this debate now.

We can do better. We should be asking ourselves more questions around migration. On free movement, is it fair, for instance, for us to absorb all the youth and young people from southern Mediterranean countries and not to give back? We do not talk enough about brain drain, for example. We do not talk enough about villages in eastern Europe that are losing all their young people. Migration is not going two ways. Not enough people from this country are going to eastern Europe. We talk about going to France and to the Netherlands—

I will give way to my hon. Friend.

My hon. Friend is right. There is no one-size-fits-all picture. There are lots of different things happening in lots of different places, and piecing together the pieces of this complex picture will give us the solution.

I am afraid that I cannot take any more interventions because I am running out of time.

We can and should do better. We need a moral migration policy that is right for everyone—not just the migrants coming in, but those going out. We should also be looking at the polling numbers. It is not a coincidence that attitudes towards migration are more positive than they have been for a very long time, and that is because we are tackling people’s concerns not about immigration, but about uncontrolled, open-borders immigration. It is difficult to control free movement, but people want to see more control. It is not a coincidence that now that we are tackling the issue, we are seeing concerns about migration fall. That is why I am very happy to support this Bill.

Perhaps I was a bit too loose with my words. I am not saying that there is not control whatever, but that people want more control and do not feel that free movement is enough control.

It is an honour to speak after the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick), who has been on a journey similar to mine, but from a different direction and a much longer one. If there is anything I can say to convince him to cross over the line and completely support the agreement, I hope I can say it in this debate.

I rise to speak in support of the withdrawal agreement, and it has been a journey for me. I was not here when the House voted for the referendum, I was not here when it voted to trigger article 50 and I did not campaign for either side during the referendum, but I did vote leave, and I knew what I was doing. Contrary to what Opposition Members have said, I was not misled or confused, and I disagree with some of those on my side who feel that this deal is not what the 17.4 million voted for. I am one of the 17.4 million. I agree with the Prime Minister that no deal is better than a bad deal, but this is not a bad deal.

In my maiden speech, I said that democracy was messy. Of course it is. I never expected a perfect deal, and I also knew there would be concessions. Had this deal been on the ballot paper in the 2016 referendum, I would have voted for it as better than remaining. I have received thousands of wholly irreconcilable opinions from my constituents asking me to do things that are mutually exclusive. I have looked at what the best option is to satisfy as many as possible, and I believe this deal respects the referendum while looking after those who have concerns about the significant change we are making in our relationship with the EU. So I am supporting this deal, not because it is perfect or it is exactly what I wanted, and not just because I think it is good for the 52%, but because it is also good for the 48%.

Why do I think that? Why do I think this is a good deal? There are several reasons for that. I like the fact that it avoids a cliff edge, because of the transition period. I like the fact that it gives us full control on services, which are 80% of our economy. I am a free marketeer and, much as I feel we can do well on our own, I like the compromises on state aid and monopoly law—those are good restrictions to prevent our descending into a wholly socialist state. I like the fact that we are leaving the ECJ’s jurisdiction and that we are ending free movement. Even the backstop, which does give concerns, has great advantages, not least that we will not be paying any money to the EU despite having access, via Northern Ireland and in other areas, to the EU market. I represent a farming constituency, and the tariff-free and quota-free access negotiated in this agreement are most welcome. More importantly—this is the reason I chose to speak today—this deal gives guarantees on citizens’ rights, not just to EU citizens in the UK, but to UK citizens in the EU. There are those who want to vote against this deal and speak about the loss of citizens’ rights, but I ask how they can do that, knowing full well that no deal would mean that those people, especially British citizens living abroad, who had no chance to vote in the referendum, would suddenly lose their rights.

People have talked about other options, such as revoking article 50. That is a terrible idea, one that comes from people who think they can wipe away the referendum and pretend it was all a bad dream. That cannot happen and they should think carefully about the consequences. What would we be saying if we, the UK, the fifth largest economy—it certainly was in 2016—with the same population as 15 members of the EU, cannot leave? If we cannot leave, who can? If we do not leave, why would the EU ever reform? Many Opposition Members talk about wanting to reform the EU, but if we cannot leave, why would it reform, knowing that no one else will leave? We need to leave in order to show that it is not a prison but a co-operative organisation and that if it no longer works for people, they can escape it.

The hon. Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck), who is not in her place, talked about extending article 50, but I disagree with her on that, as to do that would be to kick the can down the road and just keep us in this limbo even longer. What happens if the EU says no? What happens if it demands concessions? The EU has said that negotiations are over and it is either this deal or no deal or no Brexit. I am not against no deal, although it is not my preferred option, but I am against no Brexit, as are the vast majority of my constituents. I doubt I am going to be able to change the minds of many of my friends on the Conservative Benches. I am thinking of my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois), and my hon. Friends the Members for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan), for Hornchurch and Upminster (Julia Lopez) and for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson). I wish we were in the same place, but we are not. However, I am happy that at least the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse might be coming across. I will take that as a win and hope that many people will think about changing their minds on this.

As a first-generation immigrant, I welcome the Home Secretary’s statement. I feel that the White Paper represents a move from the 20th century to a much better future immigration system. I especially thank the Home Secretary for removing the annual limits on work visas and on international students: I lobbied for both on behalf of the Wellcome Sanger Institute and Anglia Ruskin university, which serve my constituency. Will he elaborate on how removing the work visa cap in particular will give businesses certainty?

rose—

Does my hon. Friend agree that many of our constituents have requested the ability to pay more specifically for local policing? Constituents have written to me to say that if the Treasury could not fund it, they would happily pay extra.

Saffron Walden is the largest and most rural constituency in Essex, with almost 400 square miles of beautiful countryside. However, its size means that my constituents face challenges in accessing public services, and in that regard the vast majority of the correspondence that I receive relates to tackling rural crime. Rural crime needs special attention, because it is markedly different from other offences. In some respects our area needs more, not less, policing than other areas. That is because crimes are often committed by certain groups in isolated areas where police response times are inevitably slower.

The Conservatives are the party of law and order, and the Government have done some very positive things, which I acknowledge. In April the Minister for Housing, my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Dominic Raab), announced a review of the powers to deal with unauthorised caravan sites. Similarly, after lobbying efforts by me and a number of colleagues—including my hon. Friend the Member for Clacton (Giles Watling), who is present—the Essex police precept was increased. The increase will deliver 150 more officers.

I supported that measure wholeheartedly, but it was a short-term solution, and local people cannot always be asked to pay more. Taxpayers are already burdened with the cost of clearing up rural crime—for instance, in the village of Great Canfield, where my constituent Allison Ward wrote to me about fly-tipping, explaining that it had blocked roads and that it could take two or three days for the rubbish to be removed. I have regularly been in contact with farmers who have been threatened, businesses that have been stolen from, shop owners in the market towns who have been burgled, and the many constituents whose lives are blighted by illegal Traveller sites. My constituents Kate Mitchell and Jenny Askew wrote to let me know that, even as we speak, an illegal site is disrupting pupils in the middle of their important exams at Helena Romanes School.

I am speaking today on behalf of all those people, and asking the Government for a fresh look at rural crime with more innovative solutions. For instance, Uttlesford community safety partnership has brilliant outreach schemes. By building networks among farmers, it has enabled them to message one another when an incident requires a rapid response. The partnership is currently lobbying for automatic number plate recognition cameras along an Ml1 link road, the B1383, which would help to trigger alerts when suspected hare coursers enter the area. We would be pleased if that received Government support.

I spent my Easter recess gaining work experience with local police. It was an opportunity for me to engage with what they are seeing on the frontline. I was able to look more closely at how cases are handled on the Athena system and how the police work with Uttlesford Council, and to take part in local and community policing ride-alongs. One day we even had an urgent 999 call—about a naked man running around Saffron Walden. I am only half glad that we did not catch him, as he would have had to sit in the back of the patrol car with me!

What I learned from being with the police is that they feel they spend too much time driving across the area and not enough time policing. They also have concerns that population does not account for as wide an area as Braintree and Uttlesford, so we need more officers because the per capita statistics are not reflective when need is assessed. That is why constituents such as David Kerr wrote to me, quite rightly, to say that police presence is lacking and that is why some criminals feel they can act with impunity.

When I was out on a patrol with PCSO James Graham, whom I pay tribute to for his tireless community engagement, we met farmers who had been affected by hare coursing. Their families had previously been threatened by the coursers. As law-abiding citizens, they have liberty to lose, but those who challenge them on their own land do not. My constituent Tony Rea has often written to me about ways in which the Irish model, where trespass is a criminal and not a civil offence, can be used to stop Travellers trespassing on private land.

What was striking is that due to the major roads and airport infrastructure in the constituency, we suffer from high rates of transient crime, as hare coursers come from outside the county. I have also been told of the bizarre instance of criminals from as far away as Chile coming in via Stansted airport and fleeing before their crimes could be properly investigated.

On my last day with the police, I took part in a multi-agency operation on the Felsted Traveller site to find some wanted individuals. I helped the police patrol the perimeter to ensure that suspects did not successfully flee, and joined the dog unit to microchip the Travellers’ dogs. Shockingly, we uncovered a cannabis factory. This illegal activity on a sanctioned site only fuels drug use in the area and Travellers’ own gambling habits for hare coursing. Despite this, I also heard stories of remarkable bravery, notably where Sergeant Geoff Edwards—only just returning to full duty—challenged seven hare coursers on his own.

I pay tribute to Essex Police and in particular Chief Constable Stephen Kavanagh, who recently announced his retirement. The police need more support from us in this House. We can help them by looking again at a strategic view of how best to fight rural crime and introducing innovations as they protect our constituents. I would be most grateful if the Minister shared with the House in this debate, or in the near future, any new proposals or innovations the Government have in this area.

I welcome the Secretary of State to his new role. Like him, I have an immigrant background. I am not a second generation, but a first generation, immigrant. The fact that we are both sitting on these Benches is a testament to how open and welcoming our country and, in fact, our party is to new immigrants. In the Secretary of State’s previous role, he would have been overseeing plans this year to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Empire Windrush arriving in the UK, so he knows that this is not just an immigration issue, but a communities issue. Will he tell us of any opportunities that he may see for cross-departmental working to ensure that this situation does not happen again?