Nationality and Borders Bill

Lord Hannay of Chiswick Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 5th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, there can be no doubting the sensitivity in both political and social terms of the policy areas covered in the Bill to which we are giving a Second Reading today.

Immigration is of real concern to many of our fellow citizens. Over the past centuries, it has shaped this country, very often for the better; equally, there can be no doubting that this Bill touches on matters of not only domestic policy concern but Britain’s international obligations. It thus affects, for better or worse, the Government’s objective of developing a positive global role for our country in the 21st century. I will therefore concentrate my remarks on those parts of the Bill that are difficult, if not impossible, to reconcile with our international obligations.

The provisions of the Bill dealing with asylum have been described by the UNHCR, the refugee agency, as

“fundamentally at odds with the Government’s … commitment to upholding the United Kingdom’s international obligations under”

the 1951 refugee convention and its 1967 protocol, and with

“the country’s long-standing role as a global champion for the refugee cause.”

That is strong language from an agency of the UN, which does not lightly criticise a member state which is not only a permanent member of its Security Council but also, over many years, one of its greatest donors. Nor can such criticism be lightly dismissed with subjective legal opinions; after all, why are we now discarding the interpretation of our obligations under the convention which we have applied for 70 years if it is not our intention unilaterally to contravene that interpretation?

However, if there are powerful reasons of principle for seeking to amend the provisions on asylum in the Bill, there are also powerful practical reasons for doing so. Is there any reason to believe that any third country will be ready to accept the offshoring of asylum seekers coming to this country? Certainly, a leak that we might be contemplating trying to negotiate such facilities with Albania provoked an immediate and categorical denial. Moreover, it is surely an incontrovertible fact that no new measures for checking the illegal arrival of asylum seekers will be effective if we cannot secure the full co-operation of our continental neighbours, in particular France.

Does it really make sense in that context to legislate for solutions which have already been dismissed as unacceptable by those countries and contrary to international law? Would it not be wiser to talk first and then legislate? Is it not likely that any such co-operation will in any case require us to open ways in which asylum in the UK could be claimed and processed reasonably expeditiously before asylum seekers quite literally take their lives in their hands by embarking on a perilous Channel crossing?

Quite apart from those complications over asylum, the provisions in Clause 9 for depriving British subjects of their nationality without notice seem to contravene the UK’s obligations under the 1961 UN statelessness convention and would risk depriving their children of their right to a nationality under Article 24(3) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Article 7(1) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child—the latter being particularly poignant to the present speaker as I sat beside Margaret Thatcher in 1990 when she signed it.

The problems caused by our long-standing international legal obligations would thus seem to be a sufficient reason to consider Clauses 9 and 11 of the Bill to be seriously flawed and needing amendment. To ignore these problems or to dismiss them will inflict real damage on one of the pillars of British foreign policy: our support for a rules-based international order. Ministers have stood time and again at the Dispatch Box in this place and in another place proclaiming our national interest in preserving and strengthening that order. For what it is worth, I believe them right to do so. But then measures are brought forward that run contrary to that order—as in the present case—which, if they entered into law, would undermine it. Twice already this House has successfully amended such Bills, in the cases of the internal market Act and the overseas operations Act, to bring them into conformity with our international obligations. I hope that this can be achieved in the present case too. If not, I fear the gap between our rhetoric and our practice could become too wide to bridge with any semblance of credibility.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Lord Hannay of Chiswick Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 8th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 79. I did not speak on this in Committee, but I did raise this concern in a question on 1 July last year. The Minister told me then that the Home Office had recently met with the3million—that was on 21 June—to discuss this in relation to European citizens. As the noble Lord, Lord Oates, has said, that was over eight months ago, so there has been a lot of dragging of feet.

The recent letter from the Home Office to the3million, with its rejection of the use of a QR code, is hugely disappointing. Perhaps even more disappointing is the fact that the response does not start from the premise that physical proof is a necessity—indeed, quite the opposite. It perversely insists on disputing what is a clear necessity for a significant number of citizens, as the3million would have explained carefully to the Home Office in that aforementioned meeting. In Committee too, the noble Lord, Lord Oates, gave many examples of where physical proof is necessary. We have just heard how noble Peers have had their inboxes inundated.

Whatever happens to this amendment, it is important that the dialogue between the Home Office and the3million continues. I know it has written to the Home Office today addressing every single one of the objections that the Home Office has raised concerning the proposal for the use of a QR code. If it would be helpful, is the Minister willing to meet a number of interested Peers, alongside a representative of the3million, to discuss a way forward?

A purely digital approach is not a panacea in this regard, even if the Government wish to believe it is. There needs to be the option of physical proof of status. I will certainly vote for Amendment 79 if it is taken to a Division.

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Oates, ran off an extremely impressive list of people and groups supporting this amendment for physical proof. I add the European Affairs Committee of your Lordships’ House, of which I am a member, along with the noble Earl sitting on the Woolsack. Last year, when we examined the implementation of the settled status system, we unanimously recommended that physical proof be made available. That committee contains members of all parties in your Lordships’ House and none, and we had no hesitation whatever about the recommendation we made. This was after the evidence had come from the Covid barcode system that it could be done at nil cost and would give tremendous relief to people like me who sometimes struggle a little with the digital world in which we now live.

I really hope that the Minister will now go back and accept that providing this physical proof will greatly increase the respect in which this country is held by member states of the European Union, which have unanimously asked for this. It will do nothing but good for the individuals who get the physical proof and for this country, which will have shown that it listens to the views of others. I hope the amendment can be accepted.

[Lord Sandhurst (Con)]

My Lords, I am pleased to follow my noble friend Lady Shackleton’s speech.

We had the Windrush disaster because people got nothing in writing. That was a shameful episode; many people suffered badly and we are now paying large sums of compensation. That does not assist the taxpayer, but no doubt the civil servants 30 years ago did not think about that. It costs us all money now, so if nothing else think about the money for future taxpayers. I see no reason why we should risk a repeat of the Windrush disaster.

If a modest charge is necessary, so be it. People will pay £10 for a piece of paper or for registration costs, but what is that? They will have comfort and security. The Home Office’s reluctance to issue proof in documentary form for European citizens living here, minding their own business, is difficult to understand.

There will be personal disasters in future. They will be disasters in 10, 15 or 20 years for the individuals who, for one reason or another, are unable to prove that they are settled in this country when they come back from time abroad. I ask the Minister to think of herself and her children and grandchildren in that position. Decent people living in this country deserve to be treated decently.