G20 and the Paris Attacks

Lord Grocott Excerpts

Tuesday 17th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

My noble friend is right in saying that there is widespread support for the measures that we have already committed to taking, and I am very grateful for that. The Prime Minister said very clearly today that he knows that he and the Government have a responsibility to come forward and make their case for the additional steps that we believe are right, and that is what he is going to do. He hopes very much that by doing that in a very clear way, he will attract strong support for the additional action that is necessary to keep this country and its people safe.

[Lord Grocott (Lab)]

Is it not perhaps an unpalatable truth that the progressive removal of border controls—and, indeed, the virtual elimination of boundaries between many countries of Europe—while very good news for law-abiding people, can have pretty serious consequences so far as the movement of terrorists across Europe is concerned? Has the Leader of the House seen reports that it is now a deliberate strategy of the terrorists to make plans for terrorist attacks in one country and implement them in another? Given the dangers facing Europe at the moment, is not the progressive removal of border controls—not, of course, applicable to the UK—an aspect that heads of Governments need to look at?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

As the noble Lord has just acknowledged, we are not part of the Schengen agreement. We remain very committed to retaining our borders and to policing them strongly. As we have announced in the past few days, we are taking even more steps towards, and investing further in, protecting those borders. We also play a big part in protecting the outside borders of Schengen agreement countries. However, I agree with the noble Lord that this raises very serious issues that have to be considered by countries that are part of Schengen.