Lord Lawson of Blaby
Main Page: Lord Lawson of Blaby (Conservative - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Lawson of Blaby's debates with the Home Office
(8 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberThey need to come forward with some answers. The European Commission has today produced some proposals on strengthening the borders. The noble Lord is right to say that this is not something we can walk away from but is something that impacts on us. It is also the reason why we need to tackle the situation at the border, strengthen our EU borders and, given that we know what the cause of this is, take action in Syria with the international community to ensure that this situation is resolved and the cause of this influx is somehow altered.
My Lords, would my noble friend, whom I greatly respect, like to correct his Answer to my noble friend Lord Forsyth—
My Lords, I thought my noble friend had finished asking his question. I suggest that we allow him to finish his question and then go to the noble Lord, Lord Pearson.
Would my noble friend, whom I greatly respect, like to correct his Answer to my noble friend Lord Forsyth? In answering, he said that we had control of our borders. So far as the European Union is concerned, we do not. Even though we are not in Schengen, we do not have control of our borders.
I was making the point that our borders are controlled in the sense that the ability to travel freely across borders in the European Union by the production of an ID card does not apply to us. In Schengen, we retain our full checks on people who are coming into this country and, since April this year, on people leaving this country as well. I believe that that means we have control of our borders.