Global Migration Challenge

Lindsay Hoyle Excerpts

Tuesday 19th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Priti Patel)]

With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement on the United Kingdom’s approach to the global migration challenge.

The United Kingdom has a long and proud history of offering sanctuary to refugees. In recent years alone, we have welcomed more than 185,000 people through safe and legal routes, including from Syria, Hong Kong, Afghanistan and, more recently, Ukraine. In addition, we have welcomed more than 40,000 people in recent years through our refugee family reunion routes. This Government have done more than any other in recent history to support those fleeing persecution, conflict or instability.

But we cannot focus our support on those who need it most or effectively control our borders without tackling illegal migration, which is facilitated by people smugglers—serious organised criminals who profit from human misery, who do not care about people drowning in the channel or suffocating in the back of containers. We must break their lethal and evil business model by removing the demand for their repugnant activities. This type of illegal migration puts unsustainable pressures on our public services and local communities. Every day, the broken asylum system costs the taxpayer almost £5 million in hotel accommodation alone. The cost of the asylum system is the highest in over two decades at over £1.5 billion.

As the Prime Minister said last week:

“We cannot sustain a parallel illegal system. Our compassion may be infinite, but our capacity to help people is not.”

That is why the new plan for immigration and its legislative vehicle—the Nationality and Borders Bill—are so vital. Once again, I urge hon. Members and Members in the other place to follow this elected House in backing the Bill.

At the heart of this Government’s approach is a simple principle: fairness. Access to the UK’s asylum system should be based on need, not on the ability to pay people smugglers. More than 80 million people around the world are displaced. Others are on the move because they want a better life. There is a global migration crisis that demands innovative and international solutions, and this Government are taking firm action.

When we published the new plan for immigration back in March last year, we set out three very clear objectives: to increase the fairness and efficacy of our system so that we can better protect and support those in genuine need of asylum; to deter illegal and dangerous routes of entry to the UK, thereby breaking the business model of criminal smuggling networks and protecting the lives of those they endanger; and to remove more easily from the UK those with no right to be here.

The Ministry of Defence has taken command of small boat operations in the channel. Every small boat incident will be investigated to determine who piloted the boat and could therefore be liable for prosecution. These reforms are a truly cross-government effort, including the Home Office, the Ministry of Defence, the Crown Prosecution Service, Border Force and the Ministry of Justice.

A nationwide dispersal system will be introduced so that asylum pressures are more equally spread across local authorities. Currently, 53% of local authorities in England, Scotland and Wales do not accommodate asylum seekers under the dispersal system. It is simply unfair that a national burden should be felt disproportionately by certain areas of the country.

For the first time, the Government are building asylum reception centres to end the practice of housing asylum seekers in expensive hotels. A new reception centre in Linton-on-Ouse in North Yorkshire will open shortly. Far from being outlandish, as some in the Opposition have commented, asylum reception centres are already operational in safe EU countries such as Greece and they are funded by the EU.

Just last week, I signed a new world-leading migration and economic development partnership with Rwanda. Under this partnership, those who travel to the UK by illegal and dangerous routes, including by small boats across the channel, may be relocated to Rwanda, where they will have their asylum claims considered. Those in need of protection will be given up to five years of support, including education and employment training and help with integration, accommodation and healthcare, so that they can thrive there. The UK is supporting this investment in Rwanda over five years, boosting the Rwandan economy and increasing opportunities for people living there, further cementing the trading and diplomatic relationship between our countries.

This is a bespoke international agreement reached last week with Rwanda; I came to Parliament as soon as was reasonably practicable following the conclusion of that agreement. The agreement is compatible with all our domestic and international legal obligations. Rwanda is a state party to the 1951 United Nations refugee convention and the seven core United Nations human rights conventions, and has a strong system for refugee resettlement. The United Nations has used Rwanda for several years to relocate refugees, and of course it was the European Union that first funded that.

This agreement deals a major blow to the people smugglers and their evil trade in human cargo. Everyone who is considered for relocation will be screened and interviewed—that will include an age assessment—and will have access to legal services. In relation to accounting officer advice, contrary to reports in the newspapers, the permanent secretary did not oppose this agreement; nor did he assert that it is poor value for money. Rather, he stated in his role as accounting officer that the policy is regular, proper and feasible, but that there is not currently sufficient evidence to demonstrate value for money.

It is the job of Ministers to take decisions—more often than not, tough decisions—in the interests of our country. Existing approaches have failed, and there is no single solution to these problems—something that I think Opposition Members may have encountered in the past as well. Change is needed, because people are dying attempting to come to the UK by illegal and dangerous routes. This partnership is the type of international co-operation needed to make the global immigration system fairer, keep people safe and give them opportunities to flourish. This will help to break the people smugglers’ business model and prevent loss of life, while ensuring protection for those who are genuinely vulnerable.

This Government are delivering the first comprehensive overhaul of the asylum system and of this type of illegal migration in decades. At the heart of this approach is fairness. Access to the UK’s asylum system must be based on need, not on the ability to pay people smugglers. The demands on the current system, the cost to British taxpayers and the scandalous abuses are increasing. The British public have rightly had enough. Our new plan for immigration will improve support for those directly fleeing oppression, persecution and tyranny through safe and legal routes. It will deter illegal and dangerous routes of entry to the UK, make it easier to remove those with no right to be in the UK and provide a common-sense approach to controlling immigration, both legal and illegal. I commend this statement to the House.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Home Secretary.

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[Priti Patel]

I am happy to meet my right hon. Friend to discuss this further, and to give her further information —[Interruption.] Calm down and listen. First and foremost, the policy is legal and a memorandum of understanding has been published that states very clearly—[Interruption.] Members are not even listening, so there is no point. The MOU states clearly in terms of the legal—[Interruption.] If Members are interested in listening to the responses, please do. The MOU that has been published spells out in full detail the legalities and the nature of the agreement. I think my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) would respect the fact that I am not going to speak about the eligibility criteria on the Floor of the House. [Hon. Members: “Why not?”] Because, as my right hon. Friend will know very well, those types of criteria are used by the smuggling gangs to exploit various loopholes in our laws to do with, for example, legal action to prevent removals. Opposition Members write to me frequently asking me not to remove some of the failed asylum seekers and foreign national offenders who have no legal basis for remaining in our country. I will be happy to meet my right hon. Friend to discuss this further.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Scottish National party spokesman, Stuart C. McDonald.

[Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)]

This is a cruel and catastrophic policy. It will not hurt smugglers, but it will further seriously harm people who have fled persecution. It will do untold damage to the international system of refugee protection, and to what little remains of the UK’s reputation for upholding international law. This is worse than temporary offshoring; it is offloading responsibility altogether. As the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has said, people fleeing persecution should not be “traded like commodities”, and in words of the Refugee Council, this is nothing short of cash for deportations. We know that 85% of refugees are in the developing or least developed countries, yet here is the wealthy UK offering them cash to take some more. So much for global Britain.

The only thing that is transparent about this policy is its dodgy timing and grubby political motivation. In the interests of proper transparency, will the Home Secretary finally publish a detailed estimate of how many billions this policy will cost? She was chuntering that she had the deal sorted out, so she should now announce it to Members of the House. And for what are we paying this money? Can she say what percentage of asylum seekers coming to the UK will be subjected to this abysmal treatment? Reports from Rwanda suggest capacity for probably around1%, but certainly less than 5%. Is that correct? We are told people will be screened before transfer, but how can a pathetic screening interview possibly pick out trafficking survivors, torture victims or LGBT people? Quite simply, it cannot, so is she happy to see those people subjected to this treatment?

Why are women and children within the scope of this policy? Will people going through the screening process be able to access legal advice? Why are we not allowed to see the criteria for deciding who will be sent? Where is the transparency in that? How will she monitor their treatment? Her Government have completely failed to stop abuses in UK detention centres, never mind in centres that are 5,000 miles away. In short, this disastrous policy has nothing to do with the global migration crisis and everything to do with distracting from the Prime Minister’s political crises. It is absolutely sickening, for all that.

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[Priti Patel]

There are a number of things—[Interruption.] If the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) were less hysterical and actually listened, she might learn something about the new plan for immigration.

It is important to reflect on a number of points. The answer to my hon. Friend’s question is yes, because we do not want people to be in hotel accommodation. It is a cheap point for Opposition Members to make, but we had to use hotel accommodation to protect people during the pandemic, and Public Health England guidance spoke to that.

On decision making—[Interruption.] If the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury chooses to listen, the new plan for immigration is about speeding up asylum decisions and processing through legislation and the digitalisation of the system. I have to add that, because every single Opposition Member voted against this policy, they clearly want open borders. They just want to have uncontrolled migration, and they have done nothing to come up with an alternative plan on this issue.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, Dame Diana Johnson.

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

The announcement made last week, when Parliament was not sitting, has caused a great deal of confusion about what this policy actually entails. Unfortunately, the Home Secretary turned her head away from the microphone when she responded to the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), so I wonder whether she will answer the question of who will actually be eligible to be sent to Rwanda. Will it be single young men, or will it be women and children? What percentage of asylum seekers does she think will be sent to Rwanda?

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. That concludes this statement. I am sorry that some Members did not get in, but I am sure that we have a list of names so that we may look to them in future.