Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 24th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

I shall be very careful—I do not want to be thrown out of here. During the referendum campaign, Boris Johnson said that if we did not leave the EU, 70 million or 80 million Turks were poised to enter Britain. That inflamed public opinion and moved it away from sympathy for immigrants, and indeed for refugees, as the public do not always distinguish between the two. It made me realise that public opinion can move about, but it is important. I have said all along when I have talked about refugees that it is important that we explain what is going on in such a way that public opinion is on our side.

On Amendment 4, I believe that the British public on the whole, if it was explained sensibly and objectively, would say, “We understand why we adhere to these international treaties, why they matter and why they are important”. I fear that, when eminent members of the Cabinet talk about “invaders”, they seek to poison public opinion and make it less sympathetic to how we treat asylum seekers and refugees. I think that is very sad indeed. The language we use too often does influence public opinion and I hoped at least some of this debate would have gone the other way. I think those of us who believe in the 1951 Geneva convention and the other international agreements have a responsibility to try and explain the issues in such a way that British people understand what is at stake. I believe there is a great deal at stake here.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, we support the clarifying amendments in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, and my noble friend Lady Ludford has explained at length the reasons for her Amendment 2. I, too, will read the official record in an attempt to understand the points raised by the noble Lords, Lord Sandhurst and Lord Wolfson of Tredegar. Having done that, I may just leave that to the lawyers to argue among themselves.

However, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, has said, if this Bill is not compliant with the European Convention on Human Rights, then the Government should say why or which bits of it are compliant. If there is a precedent for the Government to say that a Bill is not in compliance with the European Convention on Human Rights—the precedent set in the 2002 Act—then surely the precedent set by the 2002 Act is that the Government also say which bits of the Act are not compliant with the European convention.

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[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

I draw the noble Lord’s attention to the fact that he is conflating two different purposes. One is rights of admission—that is for the 1.3 million—the 700,000 have the right to remain. They are quite different, and the 1.3 million do not impose the burden on us in so far as 1.3 million people, but 700,000 people here permanently need to have, as I have said, houses, schools, jobs and all the other stuff which we expect and which they must have if they are fully paid-up citizens of this country.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

I will apologise to the noble Lord if I am wrong, but my understanding is that the 700,000 is net migration. That is the number of people whom the Government have given permission to come and live here—1,370,000—minus the number of people who have left the UK, so not exactly what the noble Lord has said at all. It is an issue. As the most reverend Primate said, this Bill deals with 45,000 compared with the 1,370,000 the Government have given permission to come here.

Similarly, we support Amendment 148 in that none of the Bill’s provisions should come into force until the Secretary of State makes a statement that this Bill is compatible with the European Convention on Human Rights.

To the Minister, I would say that with noble friends like the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, and the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate, the Government clearly have serious questions to answer. In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Horam, and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, whatever the solution to the overall immigration issue is, it cannot involve this country riding roughshod over its international obligations. As a commander said to me when I presented my solution to a very difficult problem in the police, I do not know what the solution is but it is not this.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to wind up for His Majesty’s Opposition. I start by declaring my interest as a trustee of the Human Trafficking Foundation and my work with the University of Nottingham’s Rights Lab. I thank the Minister for arranging for my noble friend Lord Ponsonby and I to visit Western Jet Foil in Dover yesterday and the Manston reception centre to see the work that they do there. I know the Minister will join us in saying to noble Lords that, whatever our debates about policy, the work, commitment, professionalism and dedication of those people who are saving lives at sea and helping people when they come ashore are second to none, and they deserve our praise and tribute.

Having said that, nobody is saying, as we debate the Bill, that there is not an issue about the boats and those coming across the channel in that way. Nobody is disputing that. Nobody is saying that there is no need to control our borders. Nobody is saying there is no need for any of the sorts of policies that we have been debating. What is before us is the way that it is done. What is the policy objective? What is the way of doing it? What is the way of controlling it? From the contributions that have been made, the debate that we have had here is saying that the Government have got it wrong and that not only will it not work—and I will come to the other points in a minute—but that it is not consistent with the principles we hold. That is a perfectly acceptable view to have. It does not mean that you are in favour of as many boats as possible coming across without any reflection on what we might do about it or that we do not care about that; it is saying that it is not the right way of going about it.

Many noble Lords have been Members of the other place, as I have. Nobody is seeking in the slightest sense, as a couple of noble Lords have suggested, to block the will of the House of Commons as it has been expressed. That was defeated by a heavy majority in the vote last week, or whenever it was. That majority included me as I did not think it was right thing to do, but I will not be intimidated by the other place into not saying that this House has the perfect right to stand up, to change the Bill if we think it is wrong, to take out of it things we think are wrong and to say to the other place that it should think again because what it is seeking to do is not right. That is a perfectly reasonable thing to do and is the constitutional position of this House.

My noble friend Lord Dubs is right: sometimes people will pray in aid public opinion one way or another and it changes. I could quote the local election results and some results where one would think that if the “stop the boats” message was working, there would have been different results from those that happened, but I will not make a political point. The point that I am trying to make is that public opinion changes, it moves and sometimes, as my noble friend Lord Dubs reminded us, it is incumbent upon people to say, without being arrogant or out of touch, that in this respect we think this is the right way to go forward, this is the right thing to do.

The other point I want to make is that we are not a direct democracy; we are a representative democracy. That is an important point to make.

Although I signed Amendment 2, which is important, Amendment 4 goes to the heart of this group. The noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, the noble Lords, Lord Paddick and Lord Kirkhope, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, deserve a lot of praise for tabling it because it goes to the heart of the Bill. I think that in many ways—I disagree with noble Lords who say that this is not the case—it is unbelievable that we are having to discuss an amendment to a Bill which says that this Bill, which a Government of this country are bringing forward, has to be consistent with the international conventions that we have signed. I would have thought that was a given.

I know there has been a great legal debate about what law means and whether we are a dualist country. I had never heard the word “dualist” until about a week ago. My simple understanding was, and the noble Lords, Lord Hannay and Lord Patten, and others made this point, that whether we are a dualist country or not, when a country signs an international convention, when it agrees with other countries that these are the rules that it is going to abide by, I think they probably think that means that it is going to abide by it whether you are a dualist country, a monist country or whatever country it is, because they believe that the Government of the country that they have negotiated an agreement with have made a binding commitment in terms of how they will proceed. That is the point. The noble Lord, Lord Patten, knows what happened in Hong Kong with the agreement. That is the whole point. The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, has done more of those negotiations. What are we doing with Russia? We are saying to Russia in Ukraine that we are not going to stand by and watch it drive a coach and horses through international agreements and international conventions. We are not going to stand by and watch that happen. I am proud our country is doing that.

That is why Amendment 4 is so important, but it is, frankly, unbelievable, as I said at the beginning, that it has had to be tabled. Is it really the case that our Government are telling the United Nations commissioner, the Council of Europe commissioner and all the other people who have said that this Bill breaks those conventions and things that we have signed, “You are wrong and we are right”? Is that really what we have come to? Is that really the situation that we are in? Are we not concerned about our reputation? The Government will say that it is not the case. I am sure the Minister will get up and say that we are abiding by these conventions and that the Government do not understand why the commissioner has written and that he or she is wrong in writing to us and saying that we do not abide by this convention or that convention. I am sure that the Minister will say that, but why are they writing to us? They cannot both be right. Either they are right or the Government are right, and yet they are saying to the Government that many of the conventions they have signed are being broken by the Illegal Migration Bill. What is our Government saying? Has it really come down to our Government just dismissing it, just a shrug of the shoulders, it does not matter, who cares, we are not bothered? That is no way for a Government to run their affairs. The consequences of doing that are enormous.

I finish by returning to the point about Amendment 4. I think it does us a favour; there might be one or two other conventions, but the amendment lays it out. These are fundamental ways in which countries have come together to say that, when dealing with some of the most difficult situations that we face, including the mass movement of people across borders, no country can do it alone. There must be co-operation, agreement and understanding—and those agreements and that understanding are based on countries believing that what they are told by another country will be adhered to and promises will be kept.

If that is not the case, all this will fall apart and we will have international anarchy. Our country cannot solve the problem of refugees and migration alone; it needs to work with others. That was the basis of the conventions that we signed and of the agreements that we made; our international reputation stands on it and we should keep it.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 24th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, I wonder whether I could come back to some of the questions the noble Lord failed to answer after the first debate, perhaps understandably in the desire to have a dinner break. Perhaps now he could apply himself to some of those questions.

First, could he please tell me which part of the refugee convention explicitly authorises a country to refuse to even hear the asylum request of a person who arrives on its shore? I would like to hear which bit of the convention says that that is a legitimate thing to do. The answer is not, I am afraid, to go into this rigamarole about returning to the first country they were in.

Secondly, the noble Lord said that nothing in the Bill requires the Government to take action contrary to our international legal obligations, but does he not agree that large parts of the Bill empower the Government, without further recourse to Parliament, to act contrary to our legal obligations? I would be grateful for an answer on that point too.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord German has clearly set out why Clause 1 should not be stand part of the Bill, supported by, among others, the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti.

The Bill is about depriving a particular group of people of their human rights. That is disgraceful. The impact assessments provided by NGOs that my noble friend cited show that the operation of the Bill will be hugely expensive and create a permanent underclass, unable to work and dependent on the state.

I asked the Minister at Second Reading, and I ask him again: when will this Committee receive the Government’s impact assessment? I am not talking about the equality impact assessment; I am talking about the financial impact assessment. Or do the Government consider that an impact assessment is unnecessary because they agree with the impact assessments that we have been provided with by NGOs? The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, and the noble Lord, Lord Hannay of Chiswick, both highlighted the questions that they asked on the previous group, to which the Minister did not provide a satisfactory answer. Perhaps he will take the opportunity to answer those questions now.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I will just add my voice to the requests from various noble Lords across the Chamber for specific answers to these specific questions that have been raised; I think the Committee deserves those answers.

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[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

As I said, I will be writing to the noble and learned Baroness, but the House will recall that the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, set out various examples, including Ullah and Al-Skeini, and there are others. This has been a matter of jurisprudential development since the commencement of the Human Rights Act. It is a well-known evolution in interpretive principle, and it is that which is addressed by the provisions in this Bill.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

Following-up on my question about impact assessment, the Minister says that the Government do not recognise the impact assessments provided by NGOs, but why not? How can they say that they do not recognise the impact assessments provided by NGOs when they do not have their own impact assessment with which to contradict them?

The Minister also talked about the cost of not enacting this legislation, in terms of the current cost of what I think he called the “broken asylum system”—of a Government who have been in power for 13 years. To what extent is the high cost of accommodating asylum seekers in the UK down to the fact that there is a huge backlog of applications that have not been processed by the Home Office, when some 15 years ago there were almost double the number of applications and hardly any backlog?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

The Government do not recognise the figures in the purported impact assessments provided by the bodies that were referred to, such as the Refugee Council, because we do not recognise the assumptions and costs referenced in them. Furthermore, those documents do not acknowledge any assessment of the impact of the effect of not proceeding with the measures in the Bill.

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[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, there are two matters in this group that are in my name, but I shall address just one of them briefly—the other matters having been covered by earlier speakers—and that is the issue about coming directly to the United Kingdom.

The UNHCR, in its legal opinion, says that the vast majority of people in need of international protection will meet those criteria of not being able to come directly to the UK. Almost 90% of people in need of international protection globally come from countries where it is impossible to come directly to the UK—there are no direct flights, nowhere to get a visa, nowhere to make any of the paper arrangements we have set up. We will come to the issue of safe routes later, but the question I have to ask relates to the role of the UNHCR in supporting those who are in need of protection.

Apart from the one relating to Afghanistan, the UNHCR states that there are only two active legal resettlement schemes in the UK. The first is the UKRS, which is the UK resettlement scheme. Since 2020, the UNHCR

“has been requested by the Government not to submit new cases other than in extremely compelling circumstances and on an ad-hoc basis, amounting to a handful per year”.

The second one is the mandate resettlement programme, which provides a pathway for refugees:

“An average of fewer than 25 people a year come to the UK on this route. … they must be identified and referred by UNHCR in accordance with criteria agreed upon with the receiving State”.


So, essentially, the UNHCR has been told that it can have probably about 25 and perhaps five or six more. That is the total—apart from the Afghani stream—from the resettlement schemes that are open. In his reply, perhaps the Minister could tell us how people can get to the UK directly from the places from which they are seeking refuge, and also how these people can be filtered so that only the 30 or so people who can currently come per year will be accommodated.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, this group covers a wide range of amendments concerning the duty to make arrangements for removal. To summarise, it shows that the Government have not thought through the issues that arise from Clause 2. The noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, have spoken compellingly about the unfairness and uncertainty of retrospection. My noble friend Lady Hamwee spoke about the impact on unaccompanied children affected by the retrospection caused by Clause 2. My noble friends Lady Suttie and Lady Ludford spoke about the extreme dangers around the impacts of Clause 2 on the arrangements between the north and south of Ireland. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, spoke about the perhaps unintended consequences of impeding the prosecution of traffickers and perpetrators of modern slavery.

The noble Lord, Lord Cashman, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, spoke about neglecting issues around sexual orientation and gender identity, which could be an extreme risk to people if they were to return to certain countries; they are completely left out of the Bill. My noble friend Lord German raised the important point about what it means when somebody has not come directly to the UK, and what the higher courts in this country have said about that. It was debated endlessly during the passage of the Nationality and Borders Act but goes even further in this Bill, which is why Clause 2 should not stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, much of what I want to say about Clause 2 standing part of the Bill will be reflected in what I say on Amendment 13 in the next group, as otherwise I will end up repeating myself.

I very much welcome Amendment 6 moved by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, and the points he made on the retrospective nature of some of what is included in the Bill. It was a very powerful contribution that the Committee will need to reflect on. The amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, about the need to reflect sexual orientation and gender identity, is important as well. On Amendment 7 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord German, this issue of what is a safe country, and not being able to transit through a safe country, bedevils the Bill. The Minister cannot answer the question of how somebody gets here without going through a safe country if there is not a safe and legal route without flying. It is not feasible or possible.

I have always found astonishing the argument that nobody can come here if they travel through a safe country. If you take that to its extreme, it will mean that countries such as Italy, Spain and Turkey would have every single asylum seeker there was, because hundreds of thousands come through those countries. Are we saying that they should stay there? It is a shared responsibility. In Africa, some of the poorest countries in the world take millions of refugees. It is just not a feasible or credible statement to say that if somebody comes from a country where they are not threatened, they should stay there and claim asylum. It would essentially mean that no one would ever come here or be able to arrive in this country. It is a nonsense statement.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and my noble friend Lord Hacking for their support for my Amendment 11. I tabled it as a marker because it seeks to provide an exemption from the duty to remove for those people co-operating with the police on people smuggling. For the reasons that the noble and learned Baroness, the right reverend Prelate and others pointed out, that co-operation with the police is essential for us to get the criminals who are involved in people smuggling.

In Clauses 2 and 21 the Government talk about exemptions from the duty to remove for people who co-operate with the police on modern slavery and trafficking. One of the reasons I have tabled my amendment is because I want the Minister to spell out what that actually means, apart from the obvious. People need to know and understand that the Government are saying that, if the police believe that you have been trafficked or identify you as a victim of modern slavery, you will absolutely be exempted—no exceptions—from the duty to remove under Clause 2. It does not include people smuggling, which is why I have put it in my amendment, but it also tests, in Committee, what the Government mean by Clause 21 in particular, about exempting people with respect to modern slavery and trafficking. Does that mean exactly what it says—that those people will be exempt from the duty to remove? I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said, echoed by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, Clause 2 is the centrepiece of the scheme provided for in the Bill. At its heart, the Bill seeks to change the existing legal framework so that those who arrive in the UK illegally can be detained and then promptly removed, either to their home country or to a safe third country.

Clause 2 seeks to achieve this by placing a legal duty on the Secretary of State to remove those who come to the UK illegally. The duty applies where an individual meets the four conditions set out in Clause 2, which I will briefly rehearse.

The first condition is about the lawfulness of the person’s entry into the UK. This underlines the Government’s commitment to take all possible measures to stop people making dangerous journeys to enter the UK illegally, particularly across the English Channel.

The second condition is that the individual must have entered the UK on or after 7 March—the day of the Bill’s introduction in the House of Commons, as my noble friend Lady Lawlor noted. This is a crucial condition that will ensure that we do not create a perverse incentive for migrants to take illegal and dangerous journeys in an attempt to avoid being subject to the Bill’s provisions. I will return to this point in a moment.

The third condition states that the duty will apply to an individual who has not come directly from a country in which their life and liberty were threatened. That means that anyone entering the UK from another country where their life was not in danger will fall within the scope of the duty. This is consistent with our obligations under the refugee convention and upholds the principle that asylum seekers should claim asylum in the first safe country they reach. There is manifestly no need for people to make those dangerous journeys when they are already in a country where they are safe or could, in the case of France, for example, claim asylum. It places themselves and others at risk and puts money into the hands of organised criminals.

The fourth and final condition is that an individual requires leave to remain but does not have it. The duty to make arrangements for removal is subject only to very limited exceptions signposted in Clause 2(11), which we will come on to at a later date when we come to a later clause.

The fundamental point is that, subject to these limited exceptions, the Home Secretary will be under a clear and unambiguous legal duty to make arrangements for the removal of persons from the UK who satisfy those four conditions. She should not be deflected from fulfilling that legal duty. These provisions make it very clear that if you meet these four conditions you will not be able to make a new life in the UK.

A number of the amendments in this group relate to the four conditions I have described. Amendment 6 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, relates to the second condition. In effect, this and other amendments tabled by the noble Lord seek to do away with the backdating of the duty to remove so that it applies only to those who illegally enter the country from the date of commencement rather than from 7 March. Amendment 39 in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, deals with the same point.

The explanatory note to the noble and learned Lord’s Amendment 39 sums up the position well, as was noted by the noble Lord, Lord Kerr. It says:

“This amendment seeks to give effect to the principle that, unless for good reason, legislation should operate prospectively and not retrospectively”.


I was challenged by the noble and learned Lord to explain what that good reason was. The Government entirely agree with the explanatory note from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope. The Committee will know that it is not uncommon in exceptional circumstances for legislation to have retrospective effect, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, noted. But as the noble and learned Lord has acknowledged, there must be good reason for such exceptions. I suggest to the Committee that there is good reason in this instance for retrospection.

I would say that the retrospective nature of these provisions is critical. Without it, we risk organised criminals and people smugglers seeking to exploit this with an increase in the number of illegal arrivals ahead of commencement of the provisions in the Bill. This would likely lead to an increase in these unnecessary and dangerous small boat crossings and could even place more pressure on not only our asylum system, but our health, housing, educational and welfare services, not to mention our services for saving lives at sea.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

Can the Minister explain why in that case the Nationality and Borders Act does not have a retrospective clause? What evidence does the Minister have, having announced the retrospective elements and that the provisions apply from when the Bill was first introduced into the House of Commons? What deterrent effect have we seen in terms of reducing the number of boat crossings?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

Certainly. The structure of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 was very different. It was not a Bill like this one, which focuses on a duty to remove and is targeted at creating a disincentive effect on people crossing the channel. This is a very differently structured piece of legislation and therefore the retrospective element is a vital and logical part of the scheme in the Bill.

As to the evidence of the deterrent effect taking effect from the date of introduction, this is seen potentially in the fact that—and one can only draw inferences from the figures—it would appear that the numbers are down on this time last year. I accept that the weather has facilitated a good measure of that, but it is certainly right to say that had there not been a retrospectivity measure in the Bill I would conjecture that the numbers crossing the channel would have been far higher. It would have been easy for people smugglers to advertise their services—and I will come to this in a moment—as something of a fire sale, saying, “Get across the channel now. Here’s your opportunity before these measures in the Government’s new scheme take effect”.

The provision in the Bill does not mean that all those who enter the country illegally on or after 7 March will be subject to the duty to remove in Clause 2(1). We have expressly provided in Clause 4(7) that asylum and human rights-based claims made on or after 7 March may be decided by the Secretary of State prior to the commencement of Clause 4. Where a person is then granted leave to remain, they will not be removed.

The noble Lord, Lord Carlile, noted that retrospectivity is problematic because it impinges on legal certainty. The key here is that we have been clear in the Bill and in the public messaging—for example, in the statement given by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister and the other messaging—that this is the date when the scheme will commence. That means that there can be no uncertainty about the Government’s intention. While I accept that this is unusual in our legal system, it is not unheard of. The Revenue sometimes announces intended changes to tax law which are then later introduced by Finance Bills but backdated to the date of the announcement. In those cases, it is usually to prevent a closing-down sale of improper tax structures. There, retrospectivity is designed to protect tax revenue. Here, it is to prevent a closing-down sale of dangerous, sometimes fatal, channel crossings in the lead-up to some prospective date. We do not take this step lightly but feel it is necessary to reduce this perverse incentive.

I say “reduce” advisedly. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, has pointed out that migrants on the other side of the channel may not be as well advised as some taxpayers, but it is clear they are alive to changes in policy in the UK. For example, it is clear that announcements of a change in the approach to Albanian illegal migrants has led to a very significant dropping off of that cohort in the small boats, even before removals have begun at scale. This shows that the criminal gangs and migrants are aware of policy announcements in the UK, as my noble friend Lady Lawlor has pointed out. Similarly, the original announcement of the Rwanda scheme was known in the camps in Calais, with some suggesting in reporting that asylum seekers sought to go to the Republic of Ireland instead to avoid being sent to Rwanda. Indeed, the then Taoiseach Michael Martin noted a surge in applications and partly blamed the Rwanda announcement.

While clearly announcing the start date of the new scheme may not have had a decisive impact, it is important to do everything we can to discourage those dangerous journeys. Announcements such as this can have an impact on behaviour, and we hope they will reduce the incentive for a surge in dangerous crossings, perhaps at a time when the weather makes crossing very dangerous. To answer the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, these are the compelling and exceptional circumstances that justify this decision.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 5th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, it is an absolute privilege to follow such a distinguished former Permanent Secretary to the Foreign department. To return to my noble friend’s amendment, it may seem a little counterintuitive or surprising for me to welcome a probing amendment about removal and about a duty to negotiate removal agreements, but I do. The reason is that there is actually a greater and stronger link between the principles that we have been discussing and the practice that my noble friend is considering here, because in this neck of the woods, in particular, the two go together.

I say, with respect to the Committee, that it would have been wise for the Government to have thought about a duty to negotiate removal agreements before they proposed to legislate for a duty to remove. The sin is to have duties to remove with nowhere to remove people to, and duties to detain with no ability to remove, because that leads to indefinite detention.

There were all the arguments that we had on the last illegal Bill, and the arguments that we will have again about whether refugees and asylum seekers should be allowed to work after a period of time. People argued about pull factors, and some of us said that there were push factors, not pull factors. But if people’s claims were being considered quickly, including of those who did not qualify for asylum—who were genuinely illegal migrants and never qualified for asylum—some of us would have no problem with the principle or practice of having a short period of arrest and detention for the purposes of facilitating a lawful removal.

My noble friend Lord Coaker has really hit the nail on the head. What is the practice here? If there is no practical agreement to remove people to whichever country they are from, and people are in practice irremovable, that is where the cruelty comes in. That is a cruelty towards people who are detained for lengthy periods, quite possibly at great public expense, in inappropriate accommodation; this could include accompanied or unaccompanied children not being housed or detained appropriately, not being educated, and so on. That is the sin—the terrible maladministration and lack of good practice, which is then translated into this culture war via more draconian legislation for a general election that will no doubt be sloganed, “Stop the boats”. We do not stop the boats, but we do not welcome the vulnerable people either, so we perpetrate this great swindle on the British people. We toxify a debate that needs to be handled much more temperately, and we do not achieve anything very much at all.

The final link between principle and practice in this area is that, in this amendment, we are talking about a duty on the Secretary of State to negotiate these practical removal agreements for those people who do not meet the tests and do not qualify in the end as refugees. In this probing amendment we are talking about that duty and asking whether it does not need to be a duty because the Secretary of State genuinely wants to negotiate. To go back to what the noble Lord, Lord Patten, said before the break, whether that is the case or not, who will negotiate with us? We have heard some flummery from the Benches opposite about how international law is not real law—“We have a dualist system and let me not give you a law lecture, but it’s not real law, it’s only international law”. If our word is not our bond, who will negotiate with us?

There is currently a contradiction at the heart of government between those who want to be leaders on the world stage, with all the challenges that have to be met internationally at the moment, and those who want a culture war. My understanding is that the Prime Minister is now saying not only that we are going to be part of the Council of Europe and honour our international commitments but that we are going to be the architects of new ones. London is apparently going to be at the heart of regulating artificial intelligence—this is where it is all going to happen. But why should anyone allow us that moral leadership on the world stage, if we will not honour international law?

I look forward to the answers to my noble friend’s questions about the moment when principle really does need to meet practice.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, perhaps the Minister can help us here. Is not it the case that, without removal agreements, the Bill is likely to make the current situation worse in terms of costs to the Exchequer? As the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, has said, if people are not able to work, and they are not allowed the right to remain but cannot be removed, they will have to be looked after by the state. The difficulty that the Minister has is that, without an impact assessment, there are all sorts of organisations that are filling that vacuum. The vacuum was filled at the weekend—and the estimated additional costs of this Bill were £3 billion to £6 billion in additional accommodation needed to detain those people who could not be removed.

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[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I am afraid that I have nothing to add other than that it will be published in due course.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

I am sure that the Minister did not mean to ignore the questions that I put to him. Perhaps he has not had the chance to read today’s Times. Can he write to me on the veracity of the reports in today’s Times and, while doing so, respond to the article in the Telegraph saying that the Home Office has failed to identify sufficient detention spaces as required by the Treasury?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

As the noble Lord well knows, it is not government policy to comment on leaks. That is a fairly long-standing convention. I do not propose to do so now.

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[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, having listened to the debate, I have three questions for the Minister.

First, if I understand the Government’s position correctly, the use of punitive measures against unaccompanied children in this Bill is for a deterrent effect. That is what the Minister said at Second Reading, and it has been a consistent line. For the Government to come to that view, they must have information about the numbers of unaccompanied children that the Bill will affect—otherwise it would have been impossible for them to have determined that this policy will be a deterrent. What is the Home Office’s core estimate of how many unaccompanied children it will require facilities for under this Bill? I know that the Minister has that information in his pack. He must tell the Committee what it is.

My second question is on the Government’s assertion that this measure complies with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Government say that they will act in the interests of the child. At the moment, the UN checklist is the mechanism used to determine the best interests of the child. Will the Minister commit to the Committee that the UN checklist for the determination of the best interests of the child will be used under the terms of this Bill? If the Government’s plan is for it not to be used, like the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, and others I fear that they will not be acting in the interest of the child according to the UN convention. This is particularly relevant given that the policy shift is moving away from determining what will be the safety of a child and towards what is considered to be a safe country. That is a very radical change. For example, there are a number of countries on the Government’s safe list that they are today advising against all travel to. Therefore, a British official, or any British charity, may seek to accompany an unaccompanied child back to a country that is considered to be safe while the Foreign Office advises against all travel to that area. How can that be consistent? Last year, I visited the Rwanda reception centre in Kigali. There were no children’s facilities. Can the Minister confirm that there are now?

My third question is this. The Government’s fact sheet on children states that:

“For any unaccompanied child who is removed when under 18, we will ensure that adequate reception arrangements are in place where the child is to be removed to”.


That is not true. What in this Bill provides for the assurance and the duty that there will be reception arrangements in place for any unaccompanied child? There is no mention of that in the Bill. The fact sheet cannot be correct if the Bill does not state that this will be the case. If the Minister can tell me where in the Bill there is a duty to ensure that there are reception facilities and reception arrangements in place for a child to be removed to, I would be very grateful.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville added her name to Amendments 14 and 22 but is having to deal with matters in Grand Committee this afternoon, and means no disrespect to this Committee. My noble friend Lord German comprehensively set out the problems with this clause and why it should not stand part of the Bill. Having said that, we also support all the amendments in this group.

On 8 May 1995, Nelson Mandela said:

“There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children”.


If the Government are serious about implementing the provisions of this Bill in relation to children, what would Mandela have said about our society’s soul? An infant, or even a child yet to be born, brought into the UK by a parent and by what the Home Office calls an irregular route, or an unaccompanied child not thinking of all the consequences—because children, some as young as 10 years-old, do not think about all the consequences of their actions—will never be able to acquire the right to remain in this country and will never be able to work. They will potentially be detained until they are 18 years-old and then deported. Many of them will have had no say in determining the circumstances that they find themselves in or will not have thought about the consequences of their actions. How can the proposals in the Bill be the actions of a society that describes itself as civilised?

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I support the amendments tabled by the noble Baronesses, Lady Meacher and Lady Hamwee, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and my noble friend Lord Dubs. They go to the heart of what many of us are concerned about: what this says about our country and our conformity to various conventions and international treaties that we have signed up to and agreed to be part of. I want to reiterate the importance of that. I will not go on at great length about it because I have spoken at this Dispatch Box, and will again, about there being a huge issue around compatibility with various conventions in this aspect—children—and with some of the workability and practicality of what the Government are setting out to do.

I join the noble Lords, Lord Purvis and Lord Scriven, in particular, in saying that it is quite extraordinary to read in the Explanatory Memorandum that the department’s view is that the Bill should have a deterrent effect, which can result in fewer unaccompanied children arriving in the UK by dangerous and unlawful means. Nobody wants anybody to come by dangerous means to a particular country, in this case ours, but it is just an assertion. It is the departmental view. No evidence, as the noble Lords, Lord Scriven and Lord Purvis, mentioned, is provided. Of course—without going back to the debate that we had—we have no impact assessment to make any judgments about any of that. I ask the Minister to clarify what that sentence means, what the evidence is for that, and how the Government have come to this view that the Bill should have a deterrent effect. It does all read, to a certain extent, as though the Government are justifying these actions by using unaccompanied children as a deterrent, which I think cannot be the Government’s intention. But that is certainly how it reads, and I think the Minister should put on the record that that is not the case, even though that is certainly what some of the refugee children’s charities have said.

I will ask the Minister a couple of specific questions. How old are the unaccompanied children we are talking about here? I think it was my noble friend Lady Lister who mentioned a child of eight. Some 5,200 unaccompanied children arrived last year. What has happened to them? What is the age range of those children? I think that knowing what has happened in the past would help us make some judgments and assessments about the future.

As my noble friend Lord Touhig mentioned, I think it is appropriate for us to ask what progress the Government have made in finding the 200 children who have been lost to the system. As I have said before, the Home Office is not a corporate parent. My own view is that if it was, it would be prosecuted for losing children. If a human parent lost children, we would be incandescent about it. But the Government have lost 200, and in their equality impact assessment, they warn that they are worried and concerned about children absconding from their care.

Will the Minister take up the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Dubs? Supposing an unaccompanied child is 12, are the Government expecting them to be deported when they are 18, or is there an age limit for that? Have they got to be under 16? It is Committee, so these are the sorts of detailed questions we ask, because otherwise we will not understand how the Government are arriving at their policies. The Government say that if they do not have a right to be here, they will be deported when they reach their 18th birthday. When does that start from? That is why I am asking about age—you can be here for seven years, go to school, and at 18 you will be deported. That was the point the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, was making; those are the practicalities of it. Does the Minister expect that if a child aged 17 was in that situation they would wait until they were 18 for the Government to come and find them and deport them? These are detailed questions, which, although we are in the main Chamber, are the point of Committee, to try to understand the practicalities and workability of the situation.

The Government made the amendment to say that there will be exceptions; there will be no requirement on the Secretary of State to deport or to remove—which is the Government’s preferred term—unaccompanied children, but there will be exceptional circumstances, which will be made by regulation. The Government said this would be for reasons of family reunion, and also if a safe country was identified. It would be helpful if the Minister said a little bit more about how that all works in practice, how that information would be found out, and what other circumstances there are, because those are just two examples. They are not the only exceptions; the Government say there are those two, but there may be other exceptional circumstances. What other exceptional circumstances does the Minister think that would mean?

Can the Minister clarify for us the Government’s policy with respect to the use of force with unaccompanied children and how they will be, if you like, kept in care and looked after? What are the Government’s provisions with respect to that?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, I think, to some extent, that that is the point of the amendment. I am scared of dentists, so I have no desire to rush into a debate about dentistry, but I was waiting because at least from the Conservative Benches we heard a speech. I was counting how many. Every one had voted for this Bill, but it is amazing how many are coy when it comes to defending what is going to be the reality: that if a young woman is trafficked from a war zone, is raped on the way and arrives in the UK having been lied to, the response is no longer what had been the case; namely, that a first responder in assessing her needs would refer her to protection—the British way. Now, the first responder will say, “You have no rights under modern slavery or trafficking legislation in the UK at all. Not only that but you will be detained and you will be deported”. So, please, can we have some defence of this from the Conservative Benches? If they are not going to defend it, please do not vote for it. Only vote for something that you are willing to defend. It might just be that if the whole purpose of the Bill, as the noble Lord, Lord Horam, said, is deterrence, why stop here? If it is going to be deterrence for an emergency, why stop at this measure? If the Government act in an emergency on a situation of great importance and it is to deter, should it not be on the basis of evidence?

We heard earlier from the Minister saying that one person’s evidence is another person’s assertion. He did not say exactly that; I am putting words into his mouth so that I can disagree with them, but he basically said, “Well, it’s our view that this is the case”.

It was in 2019 that the Government promoted with fanfare a £10 million policy centre. The government press release said:

“Efforts to uncover the true scale of modern slavery, expose more trafficking networks and better inform our action to stamp out these crimes have been boosted today following the government’s investment of £10 million to create a cutting-edge Policy and Evidence Centre for Modern Slavery and Human Rights”.


That was universally welcomed. The Government said that our response to this crisis would be evidence-led and that we would then act on it. There was universal support for that.

That centre—the Modern Slavery and Human Rights Policy and Evidence Centre—which is still receiving Home Office funds in 2023-24 to do this job and inform the Government, says of the Bill:

“Thousands of potential victims of modern slavery may be denied protections by the modern slavery provisions in the Bill. This will include people for whom their entry to the UK is an integral element of the criminal offence of trafficking committed against them”.


It goes on to say:

“The need for these provisions is predicated on the UK Government’s assumption that people are ‘abusing’ the modern slavery system, and that the system is an incentive for illegal migration to the UK. The available evidence questions both of these assumptions”.


Finally, it says:

“The modern slavery measures in the Bill are incompatible with the UK’s obligations”.


I would rather drive a coach and horses through proposals from the Government that are not based on evidence and put in their place evidence-based policies that are likely to work. I declare an interest: I have supported schemes in the Horn of Africa through to the Gulf which are trying to support victims of human trafficking and forced labour.

The Bill will not only not work; it will undermine our reputation around the world. That is shameful. It is not only shameful for our global reputation—I hope we can rebuild that—but it is even more shameful for that young woman who was lied to, trafficked to the UK and would now effectively be a double victim.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, we support all the amendments in this group. As many noble Lords have said, victims of slavery or human trafficking should not be further victimised by the provisions of the Bill. As many briefings with which noble Lords have been provided—for which I personally am very grateful—have pointed out, these provisions play into the hands of traffickers and perpetrators of modern slavery. Victims will face the dilemma of further exploitation or deportation, and the criminals will use the provisions in the Bill to enforce their hold on their victims, as the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, said. Speaking as a former police officer, I say that it is difficult enough to get victims to give evidence in court, let alone victims of modern slavery or trafficking who have been deported to another country.

As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, said, referrals to the national referral mechanism are made by officials, making abuse of the system unlikely. That is reinforced by the fact that a very high proportion of the claims are actually supported.

For the reasons the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich, gave, we agree with the conclusions of the Constitution Committee that the cumulative impact of the ouster and partial ouster provisions in the Bill give rise to very considerable and, I argue, dangerous constitutional implications. As the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, has said, this could have potentially fatal consequences for individuals.

The effects on physical and mental health of the Home Office’s policies of placing people in limbo are well documented. We support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, to limit the damage by placing a six-month limit on refusal to consider a protection claim or human rights claim. In doing so, we agree very strongly with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Kerr of Kinlochard. For the reasons my noble friend Lord German has explained, we believe that this clause should also not be part of the Bill.

So far as emergencies are concerned, is it not the case that the only emergency is the huge backlog of undecided asylum claims—and that it is an emergency which is entirely the responsibility of the Home Office?

[The Lord Bishop of Coventry]

My Lords, I apologise for not being able to speak previously on the Bill, but I support Amendment 23 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, on behalf of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, who has added his name to this little band, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, referred to them. I have been holding back in the hope that he would land, but his aircraft has been delayed.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 5th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

I wish to ask a question of the Minister in regard to Amendment 43, spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, regarding Ghana. It relates to the points made my noble friend Lord Scriven.

The Home Office currently proposes that we move away from looking at countries on a case-by-case basis to determine which are safe. However, under the current Immigration Rules, the Government use the country policy and information note as the basis that officers will be able to use when they are considering a case.

The country policy and information note on Ghana regarding sexual orientation, gender, identity and expression, published in May 2022, states that of course each case will be considered on its own merits. That is obvious because that is what we are moving to. However, paragraph 2.4.13 states:

“In general, L, G and B persons are likely to be subject to treatment from the state that by its nature and frequency amounts to persecution”.


So, the Minister’s department for Ghana is saying that the state persecutes L, G and B people in general terms—but for men it is a safe country. So someone fleeing Uganda because of persecution because of their sexual orientation and arriving by an illegal route can now be deported to Ghana, where that very same person is now going to be vulnerable to, as the Government say, treatment from the state that by its nature and frequency amounts to persecution. I just want to ask the Minister why.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, we support all the amendments in this group, including the probing amendments tabled by my noble friend Lady Hamwee. It is quite clear from all sides of the Committee that just listing countries as being safe is not sufficient. The Government have already acknowledged that some countries are not safe to remove women to, for example. Therefore the principle is established that a country may be considered sort of generally safe, but not safe for particular individuals, whether because of their gender or sexual diversity. The noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, introduced amendments aimed at that. The amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, would ensure that victims of trafficking and modern slavery are not removed to a country where they would not be safe. As both my noble friends said, when you contrast the list of countries in Schedule 1 with the Government’s advice to travellers, for example, there is clear inconsistency between the two, or at least a case for the Government to answer in terms of using the countries in Schedule 1 as a blanket list rather than looking into the specific problems or dangers faced by people who belong to different social groups.

The other concern I have is, if people who arrive by means of what the Home Office calls irregular routes are not to have their asylum claims considered at all, how will the Government know whether the individual concerned is, for example, gay or a lesbian and therefore will be put in danger if they are removed to a country that clearly persecutes people from those groups? If there is going to be no consideration of the merits of an individual’s claim, how can the Government be certain that the person is going to be safe if they are removed to one of these countries?

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, this is another important group of amendments and we support all of them. I remind noble Lords of the importance of this. Since the Bill assumes that everybody arriving irregularly will be detained and automatically removed, where they are going to be removed to becomes important to us all, and for us to have some consideration about the criteria which the Government will use is of particular importance. Can the Minister confirm that deterrence does not trump human rights with respect to removals? That was the implication of what his noble friend Lord Murray said earlier—that deterrence is everything and something that has to be achieved irrespective of any other consequence.

Since the Government always say that they are on the side of the British people, let me be controversial for a moment. With regard to the issues that we have been discussing in this group of amendments, I do not believe that the British people believe that deterrence should trump human rights. Let us make this real. I have looked at this, as other Members have done, in relation to various LGBTQ rights in countries that the Government say will be safe to send failed asylum seekers to through the Bill. Let us take the case of Nigeria; as my noble friend Lord Cashman has said, you can be flogged for being gay there. In Malawi, it is up to 14 years’ imprisonment with or without corporal punishment. In Liberia, it is a maximum of three years in prison.

Can the Minister tell us, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, whether a failed asylum seeker who is gay would be removed to those countries? In the end, that goes to the essence of what we are talking about. I want to know, and the British public and this Chamber want to know: will such an individual—or anyone in circumstances detailed in the helpful amendments tabled by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, my noble friend Lord Cashman and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett—be deported, or not? I do not think they should be deported in those circumstances. I do not see how those countries can be included in Schedule 1; I do not understand that at all. I do not believe that the Minister would want anyone —a female asylum seeker, for example, who has failed according to the terms of the Bill—to be returned to a country where they would be persecuted. Would such a country be included in Schedule 1? Rather than these general terms, let us see the specifics of what would happen.

Some noble Lords who have been Members of the other place will know that people will often say in general terms, “It’s an outrage”, or that “It’s about time those people were sent back” or “dealt with”. Then, the individual case—the individual family, the individual asylum seeker, the individual gay person—comes up and that very same community launches a campaign to stop them being deported. You can see it happening up and down the country because people are genuinely decent. When the human consequences of a piece of legislation are made clear, that general enthusiasm and support dissipates because they understand its consequences.

When the Minister answers the various questions of noble Lords, I want him to answer the specifics about an individual gay person who has failed as an asylum seeker under the terms of the Bill. Will they be returned to the sorts of countries and the sorts of persecution that other noble Lords and I have outlined?

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 7th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, many very cogent points have been made in this debate, and I will not repeat them, but I will mention one or two relating to the international dimension. I, too, believe that the use of “in general” is one of the slipperiest pieces of drafting that I have seen in a long time. I suppose that the Home Office may have been ashamed to put “in principle”, the words more often used to get out of commitments in international law than any others, but it means much the same thing. It has no place in this legislation.

Secondly, it seems an enormous hostage to fortune to put a list of countries described as “safe” into legislation tabled in March this year and which will not become statute until much later this year at the earliest. By that time, I suspect that quite a lot of things will have happened in some of the countries listed that will make them completely unsafe. I do not want to refer to individual countries, although people will be aware of what happened last week in Uganda. It is a moving agenda, and it is not wise to fix it in that way.

My third and last point is that there has been much talk of the Government concluding agreements with countries to enable us to send asylum seekers—without considering their asylum applications—to them. I imagine —and perhaps the Minister could reply on this point; it would be quite helpful if he could listen to what I am saying—that it would be useful to know whether those agreements would come before Parliament in the form that the International Agreements Committee of your Lordships’ House takes them. I take it that the answer will almost certainly be “No, they won’t, because they will be based on a memorandum of understanding”. This House has already debated this and established beyond peradventure that the use of a memorandum of understanding in the case of Rwanda was entirely designed to avoid any parliamentary scrutiny. Will the Minister say whether an agreement that will be reached for return will be subject to the international agreements procedure—CRaG—or not?

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend Lord Purvis of Tweed for his devastating critique of the government reasoning behind the measures in this Bill. As he said, the measures could have serious consequences for women and girls who have been trafficked, and he provided some examples of the sorts of numbers that might be involved. The facts presented by my noble friend appeared to show clearly that the system of referrals to the national referral mechanism is not being abused. As he said, much of the increase resulted from claims from those who were already legally in the United Kingdom.

I am very grateful—going back to Monday—to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Bellamy, for indicating something of the thinking behind this Bill as far as the Government are concerned. He said:

“All I am saying is that one should have this power; I am not necessarily saying the circumstances in which one should exercise it”.—[Official Report, 5/6/23; col. 1229.]


I am beginning to wonder whether this is a sort of remake of “The Wizard of Oz”, with these very scary things being put up front with very little behind them. In reply to what my noble friend said about the vulnerable women and girls who could be detained and then deported from this country, the Minister said it might not happen because, as he said, all the Government are saying is that the Government should have the power to do that, but they are not necessarily going to use it.

In relation to Schedule 1—the safe countries—many noble Lords have given graphic examples of why countries do not belong on a safe list. I have to say: what is the point of the list? As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Bellamy, said on Monday, in response to the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, who gave a particular example of a gay man being sent back to a hostile country:

“Secondly, and in practice, this is all predicated on the country being willing to accept them. At the moment, the only agreement we have is with Rwanda. There may well be others. I hesitate to give any commitment but it seems, if I may say so, most unlikely that the fears of the noble Lord are well founded. It is most unlikely that these postulated circumstances will arise in practice”.—[Official Report, 5/6/23; col. 1234.]


Well, if the Government are saying that each individual case will be considered on its merits, and if a country that is on the list is found to be not safe for that individual, what is the point of the list? What is the point if there is only one country—or potentially two countries—on the list to which the Government can return people? Is this just to try to scare the horses, with no substance behind it? That is increasingly what this Bill looks like.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I start, as other noble Lords have done, by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, for his introduction, the quality of his speech and the comments that he made, which deserve a full answer, and I thank all noble Lords for the detailed and important contributions that they have made.

In that light, I ask the Minister whether he will take back to Downing Street the fact that we do not need to read on the front page of the Daily Telegraph that the PM is set to overrule the Lords on boats Bills. The quality of the contributions that have been made in today’s debate show the importance of the consideration in detail of the legislation. Indeed, the Minister will know, as has been reiterated through the usual channels, that it is not the view held by every single noble Lord that the Bill should be blocked; indeed, we on the Front Bench of His Majesty’s Opposition have said categorically that we will not block the Bill. However, we will not be intimidated by having people, even the Prime Minister, attempting to intimidate us into not properly scrutinising, in a detailed and forensic way, the operation of the Bill.

We can see from the way in which noble Lords have put forward various points and considerations today that there are real questions to answer. I do not believe that the Government Front Bench here or the usual channels did that; to be frank, I think they were probably taken by surprise by it as well. But it is important that we in this House recognise that we have a role to play, which is to revise and improve legislation. The Government are then perfectly entitled to turn around and say, “We totally disagree and we’re not going to take any notice”, but we do not need to be lectured on how we should not attempt to revise it in Committee or on Report. That is an important point to make.

The other point to make as we consider this is for us all to wish the noble Lord, Lord Murray, well in his attempt to get the impact assessment out of the Home Office well before Report. It is too soon for me to ask him in a nasty way whether he has yet had any success, but even if I do not return to this throughout the Committee, I am sure a number of other Members will ask him how it is going—so I will start the process by asking the noble Lord how it is going with regard to getting the impact assessment out.

I will say, without repeating many of the points that have been made, that my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti summed up a point that has been reinforced by many noble Lords. At their heart, Clauses 5 and 6 and Schedule 1 give effect to Clause 2. In other words, the Government require a blanket ban on asylum claims and therefore require, in a blanket way, people to be removed from the country. I have said time and again that that removal, as we have heard from many noble Lords, is without any real understanding of where to or what the consequences will be. I ask again: is it a fact that the Government believe that the threat of deterrence overcomes or supersedes individual human rights? That goes to the heart of what we are debating, and is a point that the noble Lords, Lord Carlile, Lord Kerr and Lord Hannay, have made on numerous occasions. Is it the case that the Government are prepared to accept that, under Clauses 5 and 6 and Schedule 1, individuals may well be at risk of persecution or may have a well-founded asylum claim but, because they have arrived irregularly, that does not matter and they are going to be sent to wherever? Is that the case or not? We could do with knowing the answer to that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, broadly speaking, I support this Bill, but there are many things in it which give me cause for concern and we have now hit one of them. The noble Lord, Lord Davies, mentioned it—the extent to which the state can co-opt unwilling people to implement its legislation. Regarding those who happen to be the driver of a train or pilot of an aircraft that has on board what we are now going to determine is an illegal immigrant, how can we force such people to act as agents of the state in detaining them?

The noble Lord, Lord Davies, mentioned that this will come up in the next group but it is an important, fundamental point. I am not talking about the refugees but the many trade unionists who will be horrified at the thought of being co-opted as almost part of the police. This is not on. Before the Bill moves to the next stage, I hope the Government can come forward with some proposals which will exempt ordinary workers from becoming its policemen.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, the amendments in this group all seek clarification of various issues. My noble friend Lady Hamwee rightly asked what priority is to be given to removals under the Bill, bearing in mind that the uncertainty is very corrosive of people’s mental health. She asked how P will give notice to the Home Secretary and spoke about the dangers inherent in oral notice being given. She said that that could easily be regarded as giving notice that they do not intend to make a suspensive claim, and she spoke about the danger of language difficulties, misinterpretation and so forth.

My noble friend Lord German and other noble Lords raised the question of requiring private individuals to carry out enforced removals. Most, if not all, will not have been trained in or compensated for undertaking the risks associated with forcibly removing people from this country. He also asked a very important question about consultation. Who has been consulted: trade unions, to which the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, referred, or the commercial organisations that are going to be required to undertake this work? There are other uncertainties, as my noble friend Lord German set out. It would be most helpful if the Minister provided answers to these questions.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, has a habit of saying what many of us are thinking, but we may not be prepared to stand up and use her exact words. What I would say about Clause 7 is that it smacks of desperation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)]

My Lords, my point, which I hope is a helpful one, follows on from what the noble Baroness has said but also from what the Minister said about the need for interpreters; he was talking about Clause 55, but I can see the same thing happening here.

A few months ago in your Lordships’ House we discussed the whole nature of the qualification of interpreters. We came to a conclusion that, sadly, this was often wanting. Justice and democracy are served only if people who have to make a case for themselves are understood, and if they are talking to someone who can put their case cogently. My question to the Minister is: when he talks about interpreters, is he talking about people who will be adequately qualified?

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, as other noble Lords have said, there is an overlap between the last group of amendments and this one. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, for setting out specifically what the issues are here, particularly the additional complications of the potential incompatibility of the Bill with the European Convention on Human Rights, and therefore workers being asked to act in contravention of people’s human rights. There have been instances where whole aeroplanes were chartered and immigration officers have accompanied people who were being removed, but here we are talking potentially about removals in numbers that we have never seen before—if the Government are to be believed.

The Government seem to be asking transport workers, who have not been trained in self-defence, to safely detain people or safely restrain them if they resist. They are not paid to do that sort of work or cope with those sorts of risks. What about employer liability insurance? What happens if a fight develops between a transport worker and one of the people being deported, and the person being deported ends up suing the transport worker? What about indemnity? What indemnity are the Government going to provide to these transport workers, who are effectively being used as agents of the state?

Again, what consultation has taken place with trade unions and transport operators around the feasibility of the proposals contained in the Bill? As the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, pointed out, and as my noble friend Lord German pointed out in the last group, there was the potential for seafarers to be prosecuted under the Nationality and Borders Bill if they attempted to rescue people from drowning in the English Channel, if they believed that they were illegal migrants. Now we are talking about potentially prosecuting transport workers who fail to act as agents of the state in detaining people for removal. How can that possibly be part of what a transport worker signs up for when they take on their role?

As my noble friend Lord German said in the last group, the UK Chamber of Shipping has written to noble Lords. The overall problem with this measure can be summed up when it says:

“We are greatly concerned about these clauses becoming law which could require the ship’s master and crew to detain passengers, something which they are not trained to do, at the direction of the Government”.


As I said on the last group, this whole clause seems to be an act of desperation and something that the Government really need to think about again.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, with apologies to the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, I will intervene briefly. I very much want to hear what is said by my noble friend Lord Coaker, who will be speaking next. I have only one very simple observation to make. Although I have attended most of the debates on this Bill I have not been able to get into the detail of this, and I certainly did not get into the detail of this problem until my noble friends Lord Davies of Brixton and Lady Chakrabarti, and the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, spoke. It is a very simple proposition: these provisions are just unworkable.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 12th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg (Con)]

My Lords, I support Amendments 86 and 90. No one wants to see abuse of modern slavery legislation or false claims from those arriving on small boats, but I regret that in the Bill currently, all protection for genuine victims of modern slavery has been removed. These amendments are focused just on those who have been unlawfully exploited here in the UK; they do not allow people arriving to claim it. Any abuse of the national referral mechanism should be addressed but, as we have heard, no data currently exists on this, so I would be grateful if my noble friend the Minister could share any information on the scale of this issue. These amendments provide the additional protection for victims of modern slavery that the Immigration Minister is looking at, and I hope my noble friend will carefully consider them.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, as was pointed out by the noble Lord, Lord Kerr of Kinlochard, not one speaker has supported the Government’s position on these clauses. The only person who is going to speak in favour of the Government is the Minister. Surely the Government must realise what the Committee’s view is of these provisions.

In the debate on the Nationality and Borders Bill, we discussed the importance of a period of recovery and reflection for victims of modern slavery. For example, those traumatised often do not have a clear recollection of what has happened to them until after they recover. They cannot co-operate with the police until they have had a period of recovery; it is counterproductive to remove that provision.

In the remarks made by my noble friend Lord Purvis of Tweed on a previous group, we heard a clinical dismantling of the government case that the protections afforded by the Modern Slavery Act are being abused. It does not stand up to scrutiny. In previous groups, we also discussed how unlikely it was that victims would support a prosecution if they were removed from the UK. As the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, said, what will the impact of these measures be on tackling modern slavery?

We all want to see the prosecution of criminals involved in the exploitation of vulnerable people, whether they are children or vulnerable people trafficked into this country, but what assessment have the Government made of the impact on the likelihood of such prosecutions? How can all victims of modern slavery who arrive in the UK through what the Bill calls irregular routes be considered a threat to public order? We know how children can be groomed and coerced into committing offences—as so many children with British citizenship have been in connection with county lines drug dealing, for example—yet the Government want to disqualify from protection non-British children who could be in a similar position.

As the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, said, Clauses 21 to 28 remove all protections from victims of modern slavery who arrive irregularly, making it more difficult to prosecute the criminals exploiting vulnerable migrants, including children. If the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, with all of his experience as a former Director of Public Prosecutions, is telling us that this will have a devastating impact on the police’s ability to tackle these issues, the Government should surely be paying attention. The noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, outlining the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool, talked about witnesses of modern slavery not feeling safe in giving evidence against offenders.

The other important question raised by these amendments is when a new Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner will be appointed. Will it be at the same time as the Government respond to the Joint Committee on Human Rights’ report on the Bill? They say that will be in August, when the danger of the Bill being criticised by such an independent commissioner will have gone.

What assessment has been made of how safe the countries in Schedule 1 are for victims of modern slavery? As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham said, there is a bigger problem with modern slavery in Rwanda than in this country, yet this Government are proposing to send victims of modern slavery to that country.

My noble friend Lady Hamwee drew attention to the excellent report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, published on the weekend. It entirely supports the position taken by these Benches in opposing all clauses in the Bill, including those in this group. Clauses 21, 25, 26 and 28 undermine the Modern Slavery Act without justification and should not stand part of the Bill for the reasons powerfully explained by noble Lords on all sides of this Committee, including in the very powerful contributions of the noble Lords, Lord Randall of Uxbridge and Lord Cormack. I pay tribute to the long and continued dedication of the noble Lord, Lord McColl of Dulwich, in this area.

The amendments in this group, while commendable, would not remove the dangers to the victims of modern slavery proposed by this Bill. That is why these clauses should not stand part.

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[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I am afraid I do not accept that, because of the advances in technology that I have already described. That is the position in respect of Amendment 89.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

Does the Minister not understand that for a victim of crime who is in effect persecuted by the Government by being sent to another country, that is going to have an impact on their likelihood of co-operating with the Government in order to prosecute traffickers?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

One would hope that a victim of trafficking would want to facilitate the prosecution of their traffickers. It is clear, for the reasons I have already set out, that we cannot afford to create any loopholes or exclusions from the scheme.

Amendment 92 seeks to limit the countries to which a person can be safely removed. There is no one international standard to assess a country’s ability to provide support for victims, so we should not be tied to removing potential victims of modern slavery only to signatory countries of the ECHR or ECAT. In addition, this amendment would have the perverse effect of preventing the return of potential victims to their home country where it was safe to do so; I am sure the noble Lord would not want such a block to apply. As I have indicated, our partnership with Rwanda has in place provisions for supporting survivor recovery needs.

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[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

My Lords, Clause 54 provides that, under the Bill, recipients of removal notices will have access to certain civil legal services. As your Lordships have rightly pointed out, this would bring them within the scope of legal aid and allow access to legal services in relation to removal notices without the application of the merits criteria and within the timeframe of the Bill.

Despite my respect for the expertise and knowledge of the noble Lords who have brought forward these amendments, I cannot support them. I am concerned that, in extending further the provision of legal aid available under the Bill or the duties under it, Amendments 92A and 120—and Amendment 120A, in its own way—would add more cost and compliance burdens to a system that has already become far less overarching than was envisaged when it was set up.

In my view, legal aid needs to be looked at in its entire context. As matters stand, legal aid is not given in many sorts of cases. Schedule 2 to the Access to Justice Act 1999 excluded categories that had hitherto been included. The LASPO Act 2012 went far further, in that there was a significant removal of cases; indeed, all cases other than those mentioned in its Schedule 1 were removed. This means that cases historically funded by legal aid in this country have been removed.

This affects many people who have lived and worked here—and, indeed, those who have fought wars for this country. Their cases are no longer eligible for consideration for legal aid, which might strike them as unfair and disproportionate. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, that the system must be seen to be proportionate and fair as well as efficient. However, many cases where a UK citizen may have a just claim or wishes to defend a right are now excluded. For example, in cases of medical negligence, claims are no longer permitted other than those relating to a child who suffers a severe brain injury during pregnancy, childbirth or shortly afterwards.

Legal aid has historically played an important part in poor persons—I am using the words used until 1950—being able to pursue their legal rights without being charged fees, albeit with charges and restrictions made from time to time until 1949, when the system as we know it today began. That change extended eligibility to people of small or modest means, with free aid up to a limit and a merits test for civil cases. As we have heard and as we know, that system has all but disappeared. Means testing is more severe. Some categories have been removed while others have been added. The upshot is that access to legal aid has been reduced significantly. I agree with much of what the noble Lord, Lord Bach, said about how the system has changed dramatically.

Clause 54 will add another category to the overstretched system. There are reasons for that but, for the reasons I have given, I am not in favour of extending this beyond what is proposed in the Bill.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, as my noble friend Lady Ludford said, proper scrutiny of the Bill rests with this House, as the Commons was not given sufficient time to scrutinise it, so that is what we are determined to do.

Bearing in mind the draconian measures in the Bill, proper legal aid must be provided, including for those referred to the national referral mechanism, particularly in light of the changes introduced by the Nationality and Borders Act that adjusted the reasonable grounds threshold and the standard of proof required—and not just to those served with a removal notice. We also support Amendment 120A to ensure that legal aid is provided, rather than just allowed.

In response to the noble Baroness, Lady Lawlor, it seems an extraordinary argument to say that, because British people are denied justice and cannot access legal aid, people seeking asylum should also be deprived of justice. Surely, the answer is to provide justice to everyone who needs it.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, this group of amendments looks at legal aid in the context of the Bill. Prior to a removal notice, the Bill does not provide legal aid to a person in detention in England and Wales. There is no provision for a person awaiting a decision on removal in Northern Ireland and Scotland, so I wonder whether the Minister can say something about the position in Northern Ireland and Scotland.

The Bill provides an extremely short timeframe of eight days for an individual to seek legal advice and representation and provide sufficient instructions for a representative to lodge a suspensive claim with compelling evidence against removal to a third country. The non-government amendments in this group would expand legal aid provisions to persons potentially facing removal. The government figures suggest that around half of asylum seekers already do not have access to legal aid advice, with advice being much harder to obtain outside of London. My noble friend Lord Bach amplified that point very powerfully, when he gave the figure of the gap of 25,000 between the numbers of asylum applicants and legal aid provisions in 2022, showing that about 50% of asylum applicants have no legal advice.

My noble friend also gave a powerful exposition on the background of legal aid following the cuts we saw with the LASPO Act. The noble Baroness, Lady Lawlor, also acknowledged those cuts, which have been extended from when the LASPO Act originally came into force. As my noble friend Lord Bach summed up very effectively, the overwhelming danger of Clause 54 is that it becomes a sham and a fig-leaf; the rights may be there on paper, but they will never be provided in practice. The amendments in this group are seeking to ameliorate that fear.

The noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, also summed up this group of amendments very effectively, when she talked about the importance of legal aid for making fair decisions. I agree with her that this will reduce appeals, will let applicants properly understand the process of what is happening to them, and, perhaps above all, will uphold the UK’s reputation as a country which is ruled by law, as people need to understand the laws being applied to them.

This has been a relatively short group, but it goes to the heart of the Bill, because it concerns what is available in practice to people coming over and applying for asylum. They need to understand the situation they are in and that they will be treated fairly. Reflecting on my own time sitting in courts, I say that people may not like the decisions being made, but it is a much better position when they understand them. It will resonate beyond the courtroom itself, if people understanding the decisions being made about them.

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[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, said when he introduced this group of amendments, it is quite extraordinary to deny assistance and support to the victims of modern slavery, as provided by Section 50(1)(a) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham said, it is cruel to do this.

Modern slavery is a devolved matter in relation to the support provided to victims, yet the Bill appears to undermine devolution in overruling the provision of support provided in Northern Ireland and Scotland. It was very interesting to hear the noble Lord, Lord Weir of Ballyholme, quite rightly highlighting the issues facing Northern Ireland, with its border with the European Union and the common travel area. It was even more interesting to hear from the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, about how this Bill potentially conflicts with EU directives that Northern Ireland is still subject to. It will be very interesting to hear the Minister’s answers on the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, in particular.

In asking the Minister to justify these provisions, both in terms of denying support and in terms of devolution, I am very struck by what the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws, and the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, said about the impact that meeting victims of modern slavery had on them. I wonder whether the Minister, who I think previously suggested that he had not met a victim of modern slavery, or anybody involved in the drafting of these provisions, has met a victim of modern slavery—bearing in mind the impact it has had on the noble Baroness and the noble Lord.

As my noble friend Lady Hamwee has said, we do not believe that Clauses 22, 23, 24 and 27 should stand part of this Bill.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

My Lords, as we have heard, this group of amendments relates to the provision of support to potential victims of modern slavery. We have, of course, recently had an extensive debate about the application of the public order disqualification to those who meet the conditions in Clause 2 of the Bill. I will not go over the same ground again, save to say that it is a necessary consequence of the provisions in Clause 4 that the duty on the Home Secretary to make arrangements for removal of persons who meet Clause 2 conditions should apply regardless of whether the person claims to be a victim of modern slavery.

It follows that, for the provisions of this Bill to work as intended, individuals who arrive illegally in the UK and receive a positive reasonable grounds decision must be disqualified from the protections of the national referral mechanism. Clause 22 gives effect to this principle for England and Wales by disapplying the duties on the Secretary of State, under Section 50A of the Modern Slavery Act 2015, to provide necessary assistance and support to potential victims during the recovery period. Clauses 23 and 24 have the same effect in relation to corresponding legislation in Scotland and Northern Ireland respectively. Clause 27 then makes the necessary consequential changes to the relevant legislation that applies in each part of the United Kingdom.

If an individual arrives in the UK illegally and a first responder suspects that they may be a victim of modern slavery, they will still refer that individual into the NRM and that person will receive a reasonable grounds decision. That process will not change under the Bill. However, as I set out before in relation to Clause 21, Article 13 of ECAT envisages that the obligation on signatory states to provide assistance and support to potential victims may be withheld on grounds of public order. This is precisely what Clauses 22 to 24 give effect to as a result of the public order threat arising from the current scale of illegal entry into the United Kingdom by people undertaking dangerous and unnecessary channel crossings in small boats. That means that they will not benefit from the protections otherwise afforded to potential victims of modern slavery, subject to the exception set out in Clause 21, which we have debated at some length.

It is right that the Government take meaningful steps to ensure that these illegal and dangerous channel crossings are stopped and that any incentives to enter the UK by such means are closed off. That is what these clauses seek to do. Clauses 22 to 24 operate subject to the same exception as Clause 21 in relation to those potential victims who are co-operating with a public authority in connection with an investigation or criminal proceedings in relation to their alleged exploitation, and it is necessary for them to remain in the UK to provide such co-operation.

The effect of Amendments 93, 94, 95 and 96 is no different in practice from proposition by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, to strike out these clauses as a whole. The amendments effectively gut Clauses 22 to 24, such that the existing requirements relating to the provision of support would continue to apply. It will therefore come as no surprise to noble Lords that I cannot commend these amendments to the Committee.

In response to the devolution points raised by the noble Lords, Lord Weir and Lord Morrow, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bryan, I remind the Committee that immigration and nationality are reserved matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and therefore matters for the UK Government. It is also our view that the modern slavery clauses also deal specifically with the reserved matter of immigration, and they are for a reserved purpose. As for the Bill as a whole, they would not therefore engage the legislative consent process.

I assure the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham that anyone who has arrived illegally in the UK on or after 7 March and before commencement would in this period receive support as now.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 12th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Janke (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 95EA in the name of my noble friend Lady Ludford. The amendment seeks to ensure that all UK obligations under EU law are considered when persons are considered for ineligibility in terms of the rights to entry or citizenship.

As my noble friend said, the consideration of rights under the ECHR raises a number of concerns, such as in relation to Articles 2, 3 and 8. This includes, for example, the right to family reunion, the right for individual circumstances to be considered, and even the rights of safety and not to be tortured. The need to consider the best interests of children is a priority under the ECHR as well as the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Indeed, the Government have acknowledged that children affected by the Bill will rarely qualify for citizenship, so it is difficult to see how provisions in the Bill are in the best interests of children, as required by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

The right to citizenship is the means by which an individual is able to construct a life, settle, earn a living and feel at home in their circumstances. However, individuals fulfilling Clause 2 conditions will be denied those things. They will most likely be kept in a form of limbo, waiting to be moved elsewhere. Ineligibility for citizenship is particularly important for children, who, in effect, will be denied a future by this Bill through no fault of their own.

The Bill does not comply with many of the UK’s international obligations and penalises the most vulnerable and threatened people. The safeguards of ministerial discretion to protect people from breaches of international law are inadequate, as the report of the JCHR makes clear in its recommendations. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s response to those recommendations.

We have heard from noble Lords some of the punitive measures in the Bill, so how could any of us support what the Government propose in terms of treatment of children? How can it be right to punish children for the activities of their parents? That is unjust and insupportable. To flout international law is deplorable, as it condemns many who have already suffered to more injustice. The Joint Committee has exposed the inadequacy of the Bill, and I hope that the Minister will consider its recommendations.

As others have said, the systematic wrecking of long-supported safeguards for the protection of refugees and asylum seekers is totally unacceptable. The potential for the contravention of international obligations has been clearly established by the JCHR, and is the basis for Amendment 98EA and many other amendments in this part of the Bill, which deserve our support. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Ludford has fully explained our reasons why Clauses 29 to 36 should not stand part of the Bill. The lifelong prohibition on status is disproportionate; extending the prohibition to children, who may not have had any choice in their irregular arrival in the UK, is both unfair and unlawful.

As my noble friends Lady Ludford and Lady Janke have said, these provisions will produce a permanent underclass who are unable to work and reliant on the state. We believe that these provisions are incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Children Act 1989.

We also support the amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, and my noble friend Lady Brinton, on the narrow issues affecting citizenship by registration and British national overseas citizens, particularly the children of those settling here from Hong Kong and their inability to acquire travel documents.

We believe that Clauses 29 to 36 should not stand part of the Bill, and we also support my noble friend Lady Ludford’s Amendment 98EA, to ensure that the Home Secretary has to comply with all international agreements and not just the European Convention on Human Rights.

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[Lord Carlile of Berriew (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak in support of both my noble and learned friends, who sit to my right in the Chamber. I am particularly grateful, as I think the whole Committee is, to my noble and learned friend Lord Etherton for the very clear exposition he gave of the law and of the consequences of these provisions which change the law.

I will put my very short analysis of this into “faults” and “conclusions”. Clause 38 is word soup, full of tautology and contradictions—the sort of thing that makes fortunes for lawyers if they can get in front of judges, like my noble and learned friends in the very senior courts, and make esoteric arguments based on an analysis of the text. The word soup is most certainly not a consommé clarified by the use of egg whites, so that you can see through it to the bottom of the bowl. It is more like a sort of mad minestrone, into which the draftsman has thrown every word vegetable that he or she could find.

Let us look at Clause 38(3), where the “serious harm condition” is in inverted commas. I was taught at school never to use inverted commas, if you could avoid it, because they show a weakness in your argument, unless it is a quotation that someone said. It says:

“The ‘serious harm condition’ is that P would, before the end of the relevant period, face a real, imminent and foreseeable risk”.


Supposing we missed out the words “real, imminent and”, what difference would it make if it simply read,

“before the end of the relevant period, face a … foreseeable risk of serious and irreversible harm”?

If one missed out the words “and irreversible”, would it mean less if it read:

“The ‘serious harm condition’ is that P would, before the end of the relevant period, face a … foreseeable risk of serious … harm if removed from the United Kingdom”?


What are they trying to gain by the word soup—the possibility of making bizarre submissions in front of the senior courts in which my noble and learned friends sat?

After those comments, if you were asked, “What does all this mean?” by a lay man who might be up at 10.10 pm looking at parliamentary TV or parliamentlive.tv and fascinated by every word in this debate, you would say to him, “Just go and have a look at Clause 38(5)(c)”, which refers to

“where the standard of healthcare available to P in the relevant country or territory is lower than is available to P in the United Kingdom”.

They—or at least those who were well informed enough to be sitting up at 10.10 pm, watching parliamentary TV—would immediately say, “This is deliberate discrimination against gay men”. What else is this for?

We should be ashamed of ourselves if, at least when it comes to Report, we allow this kind of provision to remain in the Bill and do not help my noble and learned friends to pass their amendments. But I hope that we do not have to reach that stage, because this word soup should seem as ridiculous to our noble friends the Ministers as it does to some of us.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, this has been an interesting, if not bewildering, debate—at least to us non-lawyers. My lay interpretation of the provisions we debated in this group is that they highlight the danger of asylum seekers being removed to countries where they could come to harm by making the level of proof required to suspend removal so high, and by making the evidence required to prevent their removal so compelling—within impossibly short timescales—as to make the likelihood of a successful claim diminishingly small. If it turns out that it is not diminishingly small enough, the provisions allow the Secretary of State to redefine what “serious and irreversible harm” means to make sure that the tap is turned off almost completely.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, questioned whether such an approach is compatible with existing law. It is quite clear what the Government are trying to do here: make it impossible for anyone to resist removal from this country under the provisions of the Bill. That is why we do not believe that Clauses 37 to 42 should stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, this was an interesting debate. I thought I was with lawyers, but then, listening to the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, I realised that I was also struggling to be a chef.

The serious point was well summed up by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and it was interesting—it answers the point of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, about people who may be watching parliamentary TV, and certainly members of the public who read our deliberations. The legal dissection of the clause done by the noble and learned Lords, Lord Etherton and Lord Hope, the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and others is of immense benefit. But the real point for members of the public reading our proceedings will be what the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said: there can be no other interpretation of how these clauses are laid out and, essentially, the Government are trying to make it as hard as possible for an individual to stop their removal from the country when they are subject to the provisions in Clause 2. There can be no other interpretation—this is designed to make it almost impossible. The key question for the Minister is: why is that wrong? Why is it not the case that the Government are seeking to make it as difficult as possible for people to leave?

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All in all, there are issues of serious concern about appeals, the appointment of judges and lack of higher judicial scrutiny on all these matters where, again, the Government seem to be revolutionary in their approach, to no obvious good effect. These clauses are no worthy part of the Bill.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Ludford has clearly explained why Clauses 43 to 51 should not stand part of the Bill. The Government just seem to dismiss all the safeguards around access to justice and making sure that the court process has integrity, to speed up any sort of appeal process against decisions under this Bill, to the extent that they are destroying the whole principle of justice. That is why we do not believe these clauses should stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, for explaining this really quite complex area. The only thing I was going to ask the Minister was whether he could explain the timeframes within which the appeal must be lodged: seven days for the Upper Tribunal and then 23 days for a further appeal to the Court of Appeal or the Court of Session. Are those timeframes standard in these types of cases? How have they arrived at them?

The noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, expressed the case very fully and I thought the way the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, summarised it was a fair comment about the accessibility of these processes to people taking part in them.

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[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

In which case, I will give one final statement before I finish. On this we all agree—the answer to this issue, I suggest, lies ultimately in Reykjavik. The answer lies in the engagement between this Government and other Governments with the Strasbourg court to improve the jurisprudence, to set the jurisdiction on a proper footing and to improve the procedures. In that way, for those of us—and I include myself—who want this country to remain part of the convention and play a part in its jurisprudence, that is surely the way forward.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

If I understand the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, correctly, he is saying that the solution is not Clause 53 but to engage with the court to ensure that proper processes are followed when it comes to Rule 39 rulings.

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My point is that I am supporting Clause 53. It is not inconsistent to say that we will have Clause 53 and will engage with the court.

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[Lord Paddick (LD)]

What I am hearing from the noble Lords opposite is that if the Government ignored Rule 39 it would not be a breach of international law. But the Government accept that Rule 39 is binding on them; otherwise, there would be flights to Rwanda, surely.

The other thing to say about the two clauses is the stunning silence about Clause 52—absolutely no comment at all. For the noble Lords opposite to say this is not about the rule of law when they have said nothing at all to defend Clause 52 is quite extraordinary.

I think enough has been said—and there has been a very interesting sideshow for 20 or 25 minutes from the noble Lords opposite—but it takes us no further forward as far as the arguments here are concerned. Even if one was to accept the arguments of Policy Exchange, there has been no argument about the fact that Clause 52 is contrary to the rule of law, and that is why we believe that neither Clause 52 nor Clause 53 should stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I think everybody is really waiting to hear what the Minister has to say about this. It has been a fascinating debate and, as the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, said, it appears that Government, whatever the rights and wrongs, accept Rule 39—the Minister made that very clear in what he read out—and yet we have had the silence about Clause 52. I do not think I can add anything of substance to the debate at this stage and I look forward to what the Minister has to say.

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[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

Of course we consider the advice provided by the Age Estimation Science Advisory Committee and the Home Office’s chief scientific adviser, and we will continue to do so. It is because we are in the process of awaiting such advice that the age assessment process is not fully operational. That demonstrates that we take and appreciate the advice that we are given.

As to the information questions, I will look at the statistics that the noble Baroness raises. I do not recognise them immediately, which is not to say that they are not properly reflective. There are a lot of statistics published on the Home Office website, so I appreciate that there may be some conclusions to draw. I will certainly look at that.

Government Amendment 123C is a clarificatory amendment that simply ensures that Clause 55 applies to any decisions following the regulations made under Clause 56, which automatically assumes someone to be an adult as a result of their refusal to consent to a scientific age assessment. It includes a decision as to whether an individual has reasonable grounds to refuse consent to a scientific age assessment.

We cannot escape the fact that almost half of asylum seekers claiming to be children were found to be adults. Those seeking to game the system in this way create clear safeguarding risks to genuine children and delay their removal. Clauses 55 and 56 are a necessary part of the framework of the Bill to ensure that we can swiftly remove those subject to the duty in Clause 2. I therefore invite the right reverend Prelate to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

The Minister did not allow me to intervene earlier, so will he allow me to intervene now? In what world can he say that a child freely consents to a scientific assessment on the basis that, if that child does not consent, they will be treated as an adult and removed from the United Kingdom?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

We have already canvassed these topics, but there are many ways for a decision-maker to take a refusal to consent into account. It need not be an automatic presumption that somebody is of age; it can be treated in a variety of potential ways, which will be described in the regulations. They will be subject to debate at that time. I am afraid that that is the answer to the noble Lord’s question.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 14th June 2023 Lords Chamber

Finally, I will reflect on the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington. I note to the noble Lord that there are now more bedrooms per person in the UK than there have ever been before. We have a housing crisis because of decades of failed housing policies. Refugees did not create those policies; refugees are not the problem—indeed, they could build some of the houses that we need. Let us focus on the problem of housing policy rather than bringing it into a debate on refugees.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, we support all the amendments in this group. The issue of the millions displaced by war and persecution requires international co-operation, including the UK taking its fair share of genuine refugees. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham said, there are no safe, or deliverable, and legal routes for many, or most, genuine refugees. The Bill seeks to imprison and remove any genuine refugee who arrives in the UK other than by safe and legal routes that do not exist. We need humanitarian visas, as my noble friend Lord Purvis of Tweed has said.

Placing a cap on the numbers arriving by safe and legal routes at the whim of the Secretary of State is not acceptable, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, has said. Any cap needs to be debated and set by Parliament. Rather than the Secretary of State being exempt from the need to consult if the number needs to be changed as a matter of urgency, it is exactly in times of emergency that we need debate and consultation.

In support of the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Hannay of Chiswick, I say that if the UK secured a reputation for taking its fair share of genuine refugees, and had a widely publicised humanitarian visa scheme and a strong strategy for tackling people smugglers, an international agreement to address the global problem of those seeking sanctuary would be more likely to be negotiated. I ask the Minister to answer clearly in his response the questions raised by my noble friend Lord Purvis of Tweed and the noble Lord, Lord Hannay of Chiswick, about the situation facing young women fleeing Iran.

There was only one dissenting voice in the debate on this group, and that was from the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, on the Cross Benches. The noble Lord knows that I have some sympathy for the views he expresses about the pressure on housing and other services caused by immigration but, as I have said previously, we are talking about desperate people fleeing war and persecution. The noble Lord talked about 606,000 being the net migration figure last year. The Government actually issued 1,370,000 visas to people to come and stay in the UK, and that is an issue that needs to be addressed. The people coming across the channel in boats, which is what the Bill is supposedly all about, are a tiny fraction of the numbers that this Government are allowing into this country.

Most of the time, it causes me real distress to hear about these sorts of policies and the direction the Conservative Government are taking this country in. Yet it is heartening to know that compassionate conservativism is not completely dead. To hear the support for these amendments from Back-Benchers on the Government side is truly heartening, and I am very grateful for their support.

On family reunion, surely children looked after by their parents will be less of a burden on the state than looked-after children, let alone the other benefits to the children involved and society generally. Hard-working refugees are more than capable of looking after dependent parents, similar to UK citizens in that situation. I support Amendment 129 particularly, as well as the other amendments in this group.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been another very important debate on the Bill, on safe and legal routes. We support much of what has been said and the majority of the amendments in this group, particularly the one moved by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham. I also mention Amendment 128C, which I thought was important, from the noble Baronesses, Lady Stroud, Lady Helic and Lady Mobarik, and the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope.

I want to pick up what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, was saying. I thought that it was really important. I think his point was that there is a lot of intent but that it is important to see the obligations laid out, hence the importance of knowing when the Government will do certain things. The noble Baroness, Lady Sugg, also made that point. Can the Minister confirm when he expects this to be operating? If it is 2024—again, I am not being sarcastic—is the expectation that it will be towards the end of that year? Can the Minister give any indication of when we can expect the safe and legal routes to operate, however they and the cap are arrived at?

The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, also made the point that this is part of the Government’s solution to the chaos in the system at the moment. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, made the point well: it is broader than just small boats. It is about the asylum and refugee system that we think should operate.

During the debate, I was particularly struck when I reread the first part of Amendment 128C, on the duty to establish safe and legal routes. This is why I was referring to what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay said. It says:

“The Secretary of State must, on or before 31 January 2024, make regulations specifying additional safe and legal routes”,


to try to put some sort of timescale on what is taking place. The Government say in Clause 58 that they will make regulations after consulting and so on, but, unless my reading is wrong, there is no timescale. The addition of a timescale would help significantly, for the operation of the system and for all of us to understand what is going on.

Can I also, in the spirit of early afternoon on a Wednesday, make a suggestion? The Government can reflect on it or ignore it. Obviously, they are making regulations on something really significant and important. If I have read the Bill correctly, it will be done by the affirmative process, so the regulations will be put and debated. I wonder whether the Minister could confirm that it is affirmative—my reading is that it is.

One thing that sometimes happens and which Governments have done in the past—and given the importance of this legislation, and all the various reflections that will change the primary legislation, or not, as we finish this process—when something is of significant importance or contentious, as this may well prove to be, is to publish the regulations. Because the regulations cannot be amended, to at least ameliorate the impact of that, Governments sometimes publish them for comment well before they put them for approval. They put them in a draft form and make sure that everyone is aware of it, then ask people for comments well before they put them for approval. The Government would take a view as to whether or not they would like to change them, but that is one helpful way for them to take this forward. Will the Government consider that?

Will the Minister also confirm what the regulations under Clause 58(1) actually involve? Will it just be a figure, or will they say how that figure has been arrived at, mention all the countries that may be involved, and so on? It would be interesting for us to know exactly what those regulations would involve and include. On the regulations, which are everything with respect to much primary legislation, will the Minister comment on my suggestion about having draft regulations well in advance, before they are put for approval? Will he say whether they are affirmative, and a little bit more about what they would actually involve? There is also the point about timescale and the very good point made in proposed new subsection (1) in Amendment 128C.

To move on to general points, in the Government’s safe and legal routes scheme as proposed, do they intend to have any sort of prioritisation, or will it be just on an individual case basis? I am interested whether the Government are going to talk about family reunion and high-grant countries and what their view is of any of that. How will the Government deal with the emergencies that may arise? I have read the clause, but could the Minister spell that out a little bit more? It has got slightly lost, so I also emphasise one of the points that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham made—the issue of children in all this, whether they are unaccompanied or not. We would be interested to hear what the Government have to say on that issue.

I have nothing much more to add to the many excellent points made by many noble Lords during this very important debate. I am really interested in the process with respect to the regulations, because in that will be everything. I am concerned that we do not just have a repeat of what has happened before, whereby the regulations are just put and there is no ability to debate or amend them. Any regulations being published well in advance so that we can at least debate and discuss them and try to change the Government’s mind would be extremely helpful.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 14th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

No, it does not surprise me that the noble Lord asked the Question. I had not noticed it, but the Answer does not surprise me. The serious point is that the Government are clearly working to figures—they have to be—but they are not sharing them with the Chamber. It cannot be that they are just making it up as they go along. Hence the probing amendment: let us know something about the consequences of the measures and how many detention places the Government are planning for. Presumably, it will be as many as they need because of the number coming across—whatever that will be. The whole thing is predicated on the Government saying, “It will deter people from coming; therefore, we won’t need many”. So what is the figure and the deterrence effect assumption that the Government are working towards?

Amendment 138 is just to understand what police co-operation is taking place to deter the criminal smuggling gangs and tackle the people smugglers. Again, we would like to know. According to the figures I have—it will be interesting to know the figures from the Minister—there have been just three to four convictions per month for people smuggling across the channel, including a halving in total convictions for smuggling since 2018 to just 135 a year. Can the Minister confirm those figures? Can he confirm that over the past 12 months, criminal smuggling gangs have made, according to estimates, £180 million? Can he also confirm what co-operation is taking place between all the EU member states and beyond to tackle the criminal smuggling gangs and deal with the people we would all wish to be prosecuted and jailed for their horrific actions? An update on that would be helpful. Presumably, that would also be in an impact assessment, so we could understand it.

Finally, my Amendment 139FD would insert a new clause requiring the Government to report on the number of those removed due to the passing of the Act. How many people are the Government assuming that they will remove? As I said, the whole Bill is predicated on detention and removal—that is the whole raison d’être—so what assumption do the Government have? As we asked on earlier clauses, where are these people going to be removed to? I know we have had the debates about proper conformity to treaties, human rights and all those sorts of things, but again, we need some statistics and facts about what the Government intend to do—where they intend to remove people to, but also the number they are seeking to remove.

We are moving beyond the stage of platitudes and rhetoric. We want some hard statistical evidence to back up what the Government are saying alongside their proposals. We cannot act; we do not know the statistics and the impact assessment is being denied to us. I say again: the frank reality is that the Government have figures within the Home Office that they are working to. The only people who are not having those figures shared with them are the people legislating on the Bill, and that, frankly, is simply and utterly unacceptable.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, the main problem with the broken asylum system, which appeared to be working satisfactorily in 2010, is how it has come to create a disproportionately large backlog of those awaiting asylum decisions, set against a similar or smaller number of applications for asylum and a disproportionate number of failed asylum seekers awaiting removal. Amendment 132 seeks to address this. We will discuss with our Labour colleagues whether we should move to Report on the Bill in the absence of an impact assessment.

The Cabinet Office’s Guide to Making Legislation, last updated on 15 August 2022, says:

“The final impact assessment must be made available alongside bills published in draft for pre-legislative scrutiny or introduced to Parliament, with 80 copies sent to the Vote Office (30 of which should be marked for the attention of the Public Bill Office) and 10 to the Lords Printed Paper Office on introduction, and will need to be updated during parliamentary passage to reflect any changes made to the bill”.


Can the Minister say why the Government have not complied with the Cabinet Office’s Guide to Making Legislation in relation to this Bill?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I want to speak briefly to the two amendments in the name of my noble friend Lord Coaker. The new clause proposed in Amendment 139FA

“requires the Home Secretary to establish a process to fast-track asylum claims from safe countries”,

while the proposed new clause in Amendment 139FC

“seeks to require regular reports from the Secretary of State on progress toward eliminating the current backlog of asylum cases”.

As of March, there were 172,758 asylum seekers in the UK waiting an initial decision on their case, with 128,812—that is 75%—waiting longer than six months. The backlog is so extreme that the Government have tried to quietly drop a key measure of the Nationality and Borders Act to speed up 55,000 people who have arrived over the past year.

The purpose of these two amendments is first to re-establish, if you like, the fast-tracking so that the people who are very likely to succeed in their appeals are dealt with as quickly as possible and, secondly, to monitor the situation to see how it is progressing. In the press I read that Robert Jenrick, the Immigration Minister, said he believes that reducing the backlog would increase the pull factor for those seeking to apply for asylum. Can the Minister confirm whether the Government’s view is that by decreasing the backlog you are increasing the pull factor? People taking part in today’s debate would be very sceptical of that, but I wonder whether the Minister can confirm that that is indeed the Government’s view.

We have had a wide-ranging debate, and I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, that the debate has gone far wider than the Bill and has been focusing on right to work and issues such as that, but what I seek to do in this brief contribution is to talk specifically to the amendments in my noble friend’s name, and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, we support all the amendments in this group. On Amendment 133 in the name of my noble friend Lady Ludford, it makes complete sense to ensure that asylum seekers are not a burden on taxpayers as soon as practicable. If the Government do not agree, perhaps they should ensure that claims are decided within the three or six months suggested in the amendment.

As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham says, a lot of asylum seekers who are granted permission to work send money back home, as it were. Surely that helps to ensure that people stay in the country where they are and do not add to the problem of asylum seekers.

On Amendment 150, there is no point in creating an even greater backlog until the Government have addressed the existing one.

On the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, fast-tracking claims from countries with high rates of success makes complete sense and any ongoing impact assessment should include the impact of the Act on the backlog.

The noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, made a significant contribution and I hope she does not mind me responding to it. I think she is absolutely right that we have to bear in mind how all this is viewed by members of the British public, but we have already heard one noble Lord— I cannot remember who it was—saying that 77% of the public support allowing asylum seekers to work.

On the issue that the noble Baroness raised around job vacancies versus UK citizens who are jobless, the adult social care system cannot attract British workers, to the extent that the Government allow special provision for foreign workers to come in and fill those vacancies. The agriculture sector cannot attract British workers—for example, seasonal workers to pick crops—and the Government make special provision to allow foreign workers to come into the country. I do not know whether the figure that the noble Baroness quotes of 5 million is right, but the Government allow foreign workers to come in and do those jobs. Why can asylum seekers not do those jobs while they wait for their application to be decided by the Government?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

I will let my noble friend the Minister respond on behalf of the Government to the noble Lord’s point but, as he was responding to what I had argued, I have to say that what he has just described makes my point, if I may be so bold.

I argue that, yes, there may be schemes that are authorised for the recruitment of people from outside the UK for specific jobs, but that does not justify that we make those who arrive outside those schemes eligible for work. That would make crossing the channel a route that is seen as attractive for those who might not want to come and do those jobs in particular but certainly want to come here for economic reasons.

As far as the specific working environments that the noble Lord talks about, if the problem in those industries is that wages are insufficient, whether it is in the care sector or the food industry, then I argue very much that the employers need to address the wage issues to encourage more people to apply, if that is part of the barrier to people going to work in them in the first place.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness. I am not sure whether she heard the evidence provided by my noble friend Lady Ludford from the Home Office report, which said that providing work was not a pull factor in the way that the noble Baroness has suggested.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

My Lords, the amendments in this group all relate in one way or another to the operation of the asylum system. They variously seek to enable asylum seekers to work after three months and to reduce the backlog of asylum claims, an objective which we all share. Let me address each of these issues in turn.

Amendment 133, moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, would enable asylum seekers to seek employment after three months. Asylum seekers are allowed to work in the UK if their claim has been outstanding for 12 months or more, through no fault of their own. Those permitted to work are restricted to jobs on the shortage occupation list which, in turn, is based on expert advice from the independent Migration Advisory Committee, about which we heard during the debate. The list comprises skilled jobs where there is an identified shortage which it is sensible to fill, at least in part, through immigration.

It is important that our policy approach distinguishes between those who need protection and those seeking to work here, who can apply for a work visa under the Immigration Rules. Asylum seekers do not need to make perilous journeys to seek employment in the United Kingdom. There are various safe and legal routes for those seeking to work in the UK under the points-based system. Amendment 133 would fundamentally undermine our immigration framework. Instead of people applying to work in the UK through the proper channels, this amendment would simply encourage them to come to the UK illegally or overstay on a visitor’s or student visa, and then claim asylum in the knowledge that they would be able to work after three months.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Meacher (CB)]

My Lords, I rise to speak briefly, but I hope strongly, to support Amendment 139FB tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker. This amendment is incredibly simple and yet, it seems, immensely powerful. It gives the National Crime Agency a legal responsibility to tackle organised immigration crime across the channel and to maintain the specific unit to undertake work related to that responsibility.

It is surely extraordinary that the Home Secretary has produced a Bill of 67 clauses devoted entirely, as I understand it, to an attack on the victims of persecution, modern slavery and trafficking and incorporating every conceivable manoeuvre to prevent those victims achieving asylum in the UK. I think I am right in saying—and I know the Minister will correct me if I am wrong—that not one of the 67 clauses sets out a plan to prosecute the criminals who demand large sums from vulnerable individuals to bring them to the UK in small boats across the channel at great risk to their lives—we know many of them die.

The noble Lord, Lord Coaker, is doing the country a great favour, in my view, in offering, in Amendment 139FB, a way in which the Prime Minister could actually fulfil what he claims to be one of his top policy priorities—to stop the boats. I presume the Government will give tremendously strong support to this amendment, but whether they do or not, the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, is to be applauded for his amendment.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I apologise for any confusion. Normally, the Labour Front-Bencher would be the last speaker but, when they have amendments to speak to, it is only right that we respond to what they have said.

Like the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, we believe that the Government are wrongly focused on prosecuting the victims of people traffickers rather than the people traffickers themselves. Amendment 136 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, and Amendment 139FB in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, seek to refocus the Government on the real criminals in all this—the people traffickers.

Amendment 139E seems to make complete sense. I slightly disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, saying that the Government have the statistics that Amendment 139E wants them to produce. I am not sure that they do have those numbers. For example, the Government increased the number of countries whose citizens can use e-passport gates at airports, so in addition to EU and EEA citizens, citizens of Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea and the USA can use e-passport gates. Once those people have passed through the e-passport gates, the Government have no idea where they have gone in the UK or whether they have left after the six months they are allowed under visa-free entry. There is no way to track where the people have gone, what they are doing or whether they are illegally employed. So I am not sure that the Government have those statistics. I absolutely agree that the Government—all of us—are entitled to know who those people are and how many are here.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

Just to show how it can be done: may I just say that the noble Lord might have a point?

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

High praise indeed from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker.

We also support Amendment 139F and Amendment 137, to which my noble friend Lady Ludford has just spoken comprehensively—so I do not need to.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 14th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, we on these Benches support all the amendments in this group, for the reasons my noble friends have explained.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

The noble Lord has caught me out as I gather my notes.

Amendment 139A, which the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, spoke to, is about encouraging victims or witnesses to report offences. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham also spoke to this. I absolutely understand and support the sentiments behind that amendment. I thought I would reflect a little on my experience as a magistrate in Westminster Magistrates’ Court, where I remember that, about 10 years ago, we had officials from the Home Office sitting in our courts. They were basically there to try to pick up business to do with illegal migrants and asylum seekers, whether they be offenders, witnesses or people who just appeared in court.

It just so happened that one of my magistrate colleagues was a Home Office official—particularly, part of the Border Force organisation but within the Home Office. She explained to me that it was a pilot that had worked for three months, I think from memory, but which was stopped after that period because they just did not pick up enough business. It was not worth the officials sitting in court for that period. I thought that was an interesting reflection on the points which the noble Baroness made. I absolutely understand the point which she and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham made about people being reluctant to come forward, because of their distrust of the criminal justice system as a whole, However, my practical experience of that, as just described—and Westminster Magistrates’ Court deals with perhaps the most diverse group of people to pass through the doors of any magistrates’ court in the country—was that not a lot of business was picked up. That is my first reflection.

My second reflection is on Amendment 139B, regarding the implementation of the report by the Chief Inspector of Prisons on immigrants in detention centres. This also goes to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord German, about the Brook House inquiry. Again, a few years ago I was a lay inspector and in that role I went to Littlehey Prison with the then chief inspector. It was an unannounced visit and extremely illuminating to see the prison itself, which was a sex offenders’ prison, but also to talk to the inspectors about how they conduct their activities and how important it is to have unannounced inspections. The way they explained it to me was that the inspections need to be, on the one hand, unannounced, but perhaps even more importantly, regular, and there need to be follow-up inspections. The prison officers and governors whom I met were very sure that they would be continually inspected over a period of time. It would be a working relationship with the inspectorate to try to ensure that standards were kept up.

I am sympathetic to Amendment 139B, as it is a process; it is not a one-off. I very much hope that the Government have confidence in their inspectorate to put in place, over time, an inspection regime which is in-depth and can do its best to maintain standards, while identifying any shortcomings it may see on its inspections. Nevertheless, I look forward to the Minister’s response.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I am pleased to offer our support from these Benches. The most reverend Primate has delivered what I would call a swerve ball: he has gone around the side of what is being proposed by the Bill and tried to find a route for what will follow it. He raised the issue of the Modern Slavery Act at the beginning, which we have debated in Committee as being something this Parliament has been very proud of indeed. All of that has been put to one side in order for the Government to make these short-term decisions.

It is interesting that, on many occasions, Ministers on the Government Front Bench have referred to the Bill as dealing with an emergency, whereas they have not yet recognised the context that what is happening is a global problem. The interesting figures at the beginning of the Joint Committee on Human Rights report on the Bill enlighten us:

“In mid-2022, the UN Refugee Agency … estimated that there were 103 million forcibly displaced people worldwide. Of those, 32.5 million are refugees and 4.9 million are seeking asylum — the highest number since the UNHCR was created in 1950. This number is likely to increase given the deadly conflict that has erupted in Sudan”.


Over the page, it says that we will not solve this on our own. Treating this as an emergency will never satisfy the issue that the Government are trying to address of trying to deal with the problem at source.

The Government say that they will stop criminal gangs with the Bill, but many in the Committee believe that this simply will not happen. Many of your Lordships believe that the Bill, as it stands, is as a gift to traffickers, who know that their victims will be too frightened of the threat of removal to approach authorities.

The logic behind the most reverend Primate’s amendment is quite clear to us, in relation to trafficking. It focuses on efforts to tackle the traffickers rather than penalise the victims. What most of us find most abhorrent about the Bill is that it tackles the victims to try to deal with a problem that is well beyond its reach. I absolutely support the view of the noble Lord, Lord Deben, on the supply chain process: it is just silly—not sensible—to think that it will work.

That is why we need a global and collaborative approach with international partners. That is what is needed when traffickers operate across national boundaries and borders. This amendment therefore addresses the question: what next? It puts co-operation front and centre of its approach and it seeks a role for the UK in which it is a leader, rather than a follower and a country trying to pull up a drawbridge. Trafficking is an abhorrent crime and we need to play our part in tackling the crime at source. It needs a global perspective and collaboration, rather than headlines with an election in mind.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, as other noble Lords have said, a 10-year strategy, implementation plan and associated measures are needed to tackle human trafficking, particularly, as the most reverend Primate’s amendment suggests, through international collaboration to deal with issues upstream and downstream—as the former oilman said. His experience of supply chains is similar to that of the noble Lord, Lord Deben.

However, the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, raised a justified concern about the reluctance of other partners, who would be central to the success of such a strategy, if they believed that the United Kingdom were breaking its international commitments, whether regarding the European Convention on Human Rights or the European convention on trafficking. The most reverend Primate highlights the worrying slowdown in prosecutions for human trafficking, which must be reversed.

I have one concern about the most reverend Primate’s plan. I understand the need to establish a long-term strategy, but an incoming Home Secretary could thwart a 10-year strategy by asking Parliament to repeal any law that contains the provisions in this amendment. Sadly, enshrining a 10-year strategy in law does not guarantee its longevity, but it would make it more difficult to dislodge. That is why we support these amendments.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a great privilege to address the Chamber briefly in support of the amendment before us from the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury. My points will build on the excellent speeches and comments that have been made.

As others have said, this amendment presents the Government with a phenomenal opportunity. All our debate has been very contentious and will remain so when the Bill is on Report, but here is an opportunity, in one amendment, for the Government to take a different approach in line with the 10-year strategy that has been laid before us.

Let me say this as well: the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, is right that this discussion deserves a wider audience. We ought to think about how we could generate that in the context of the Bill and perhaps in other ways to ensure that this issue gets the audience that it deserves. Why do I say that? I do so not only because I agree with it. Yesterday, we debated the purpose of this Chamber in a different context. We had a debate among ourselves and disagreement on the constitutional role of the Lords and what it should be with regard to legislation. As a relatively new Member here, I think that that is a really important role for this House to play.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

For the reasons I have already given; shouting “why” from a sedentary position does not assist.

I am very grateful to the most reverend Primate for raising this issue. It is very important that the Committee has had a chance to step back and discuss these strategic issues in the way that it has. I am very grateful to him for affording us this opportunity to debate this issue but, having done so, I hope he will be content to withdraw his amendment. Of course, we will shortly consider the wider context of the refugee question.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

Just before the most reverend Primate responds, what I heard the Minister say from the Dispatch Box was that the Government do not believe in strategy, not that the Government oppose strategy being in primary legislation. Perhaps I misheard him.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

No, I certainly did not say that the Government do not believe in strategy.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I will not repeat the comments I made on the last group, some of which equally apply here, but, as this is the end of Committee, I feel at liberty to repeat one of the remarks I made at Second Reading. I studied moral philosophy at university—Oxford, I am afraid—and one of the acid tests for whether something was morally right was: what would happen if everyone did the same thing? As the most reverend Primate said, if everyone followed the path that the Government propose to take with the Bill, the whole established global system for dealing with refugees would collapse. International collaboration to tackle refugee crises is essential, as are these amendments, which we support.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to make a short contribution on an amendment that we very much support. Before I make general remarks, I ask the Minister to reflect again on the importance of a strategy and why strategies can move between Governments, as I know from having seen Governments change. That does not mean that they stay exactly the same, and a strategic framework may not bind another Government, but that does not stop Governments producing strategies for themselves. I ask the Minister to reflect on that—I am sure that others who have had experience in government would bear that out.

I was reflecting more generally about the references to the 1951 refugee convention. I mention that because the world faced a global crisis in 1951, and what did it do? Visionary people came together to sort the problem out as best they could and to deal with the challenges that they faced. As the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, said, it was more than regional; it was global, affecting the global institutions and world powers, which had major conflicting differences—poverty and goodness only knows what else was going on, with countless millions of people displaced.

I am not saying that the world is currently in a post-World War II situation, but I agree with the most reverend Primate that we face a global crisis that cannot be solved by one country on its own—it just cannot. The world will be driven by a common interest, in some ways, to sort this out. Whatever we think of other countries, their own self-interest will drive them to sort it out. Countries will try to sort it out on their own, but they will not be able to.

Without being a prophet of doom about this, I say that things are going to get more difficult. I do not mean that we are at the edge of the end of the world, or anything like that, but you can see the impacts of regional and ethnic conflict as well as overpopulation, failing crops, the changing climate, water and energy competition and the food crisis, as well as millions of people moving—in fact, countless millions. I know that figures have been arrived at. Many noble Lords have been to parts of the world where it is unbelievable to see some of the poorest countries in the world dealing with millions of people. If those people came into some of the richest countries, I am not sure how they would deal with it. I went to Angola 20 years ago, after the civil war, and you just could not believe it. I went to one refugee camp and there were 1 million people in it—and that was internationally supported, so it was fantastic. I went to Jordan and the number of people who had flooded across the border from Syria into temporary camps there was unbelievable. There were huge numbers of people—and you can replicate that. I do not think that it is going to stop any time soon, and we need to understand how we are going to deal with that and cope with it. The noble Lord, Lord Deben, was quite right to point out the various impacts.

The most reverend Primate is not trying to say that therefore that means that the UK should just allow in anybody who wants to come—that is just trivialising the argument. Of course you have to have control and manage the situation. The point that the amendment seeks to make is that, if this is going to be sorted out—over and above the problem of the boats, which we accept needs to be dealt with—the UK is still a significant power. It is challenged at the moment through some of its attitudes to international conferences, conventions and treaties, but we are still a member of the United Nations Security Council, NATO and the Commonwealth, which we have not mentioned. When you travel, you recognise, understand and see the influence that the UK still has.

In backing the amendment proposed by the most reverend Primate, though the initiatives that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham has mentioned—with the Clewer Initiative and the Anglican community across the world—I say that in the end people are going to have to come together to sort this out. Somewhere along the line, it will need big, visionary people to stand up and say, “We’re going to do that”.

I am going to make this point—and I am going to take a minute on this issue. The argument in this country, which those of us who stood for election know is difficult, and the conflation between immigration, migration, refugees and asylum makes things actually really difficult, because it is all lumped together as one problem. Somewhere along the line, part of what a strategy does is to get people to step back and reflect. The British public, along with all the publics in the world, can do that. If people are presented even with difficult choices that they may not wish to confront, they are not stupid—they know that sometimes things have to be dealt with.

This is a really important point: people are decent. I know that sometimes they will rant and rave about how this is happening and they cannot believe that everybody is coming here, but I have seen myself, and I am sure that everyone has seen it in their own communities, that if you try to deport one family that has lived in community for a considerable period of time, there will be a campaign in that community to stop them being removed. That is because people are decent. If you look at it as individual children and grandparents, individual men and women, we all know from our own personal experiences that people look at it in a different way. All that the amendment proposed by the most reverend Primate is doing is to say that we should harness that and bring it together into a way of addressing a problem that we have as a country but which we have globally as well. If we do not try to sort it out globally, we will have a problem, because the problem will not go away—but it is a challenge that we can meet. This gives us an opportunity to develop a strategy that has at its heart using the privileged position that our country has as a world leader to be an agent for change in a way that would bring about a better world and offer hope to millions of the poorest people in the world.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 28th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Horam (Con)]

My Lords, some extreme language was used throughout Second Reading and Committee and there was very strong emotion. I understand that, because the Bill evokes strong feelings, but I suspect that, beneath all that, there may be more agreement than has been visible in our debate today and in previous debates. The spokesman for the Opposition has not added his name to this amendment and they did not oppose Second Reading, I suspect because there is an understanding that this is a difficult problem that any Government have to deal with. Any Government of whatever stripe have to take protecting the country’s borders extremely seriously.

A great deal of agreement underlies all this. For example, we all agree that there should be better-organised legal routes for genuine asylum seekers than there are at the moment. The main difference between the two sides in this debate is over the role of deterrence. The Government argue that we will not succeed in handling this problem unless there is an element of deterrence.

To bring it up to date—I will respond to the Chief Whip’s desire to be quick—we now all have the impact assessment, which we did not have until the day before yesterday, which points out the Australian example. Australia brought in a law very similar to this, which gave its Government the power to detain people and turn them around, in their case to Nauru and the Solomon Islands—in our case it is to Rwanda—within 48 hours. I asked the Government, reasonably, why we are not doing this. They pointed out that the Australians do not have to pay any regard to the European Convention on Human Rights, whereas we do. In their view, to comply with that, we could not reasonably turn detainees around within 48 hours; we would have to take at least 28 days, as is in the Bill at the moment.

I do not know whether the Government have ticked every box and crossed every T in relation to the ECHR, but it is quite clear that they have made a big attempt to do so. They have clearly taken on board the spirit of what we have agreed, even if not the letter of the law. The Government are in discussions with the European court about the convention. I am interested to know what the Minister can say about the state of those discussions. It is not only the UK but other countries—Italy, Spain and France—that are in discussion, because this is a new problem which is not covered by the original convention. We have to take that into account and realise that there is a real problem here, which is not a lot to do with immigration but is about border control more than anything else, which any Government will have deal with.

In relation to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, the Bill in its unamended form, as it is now, passed the Commons with a majority of 59. There is huge public support for what the Government are attempting to do. The latest YouGov poll showed 60% as saying that illegal migrants should not be allowed to claim asylum in this country; only 20% said the reverse, and 20% were undecided. We have to take that into account. As Matthew Parris, who is no one’s idea of a right-wing nutcase, said recently in an article:

“If you oppose the government’s plans to send away those who land, then whether or not you know it you are advocating an indefinite continuation of migrant deaths. And that is cruel”.


It is indeed cruel to allow that continue.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, the refugee crisis in a global one and any sustainable solution needs to be international. If we do not comply with our international obligations, as set out by the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, we are unlikely to achieve the international co-operation necessary to deal with the crisis. I am afraid I do not agree with the argument put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Lilley, that because other countries do not abide by their obligations, we should not abide by ours either.

The noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, talked about the cost. The Government’s own impact assessment says that implementing the measures in the Bill will cost the country more than the status quo. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Horam, the impact assessment says there is an “academic consensus” that there is no evidence that the measures in the Bill will have a deterrent effect. Opinion polls may say that illegal migrants should not be allowed to settle in the UK but we are talking about genuine refugees; we are not talking about illegal migrants.

We support all the amendments in this group and Amendment 5 in particular, which we will support if the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, chooses to divide the House.

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, I have the misfortune to differ from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton. I know that he will not think that this is any personal discourtesy. Let me take a few minutes to explain to the House why I respectfully disagree.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, I support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs. He quoted a letter that the Minister very kindly sent to me two days ago about the reaction of the Committee on the Rights of the Child of the United Nations. That communication demonstrated that the committee found that if we did not amend the Bill—and the amendment we are looking at now is obviously required—we would be in breach of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. That convention was signed by the late Baroness Thatcher. I do not believe we should be in the business of ignoring the view that we will breach that international obligation we undertook in 1990.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, for the avoidance of doubt, my noble friend Lord Scriven has signed the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs. All of us on these Benches wholeheartedly support that amendment, in addition to Amendment 15 in the name of my noble friend Lord German.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, in the spirit of reciprocity, we wholeheartedly support Amendment 15 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord German, as well as my noble friend Lord Dubs’s amendment.

My noble friend’s amendment points out that we should absolutely not rule out unaccompanied children from being admissible if they come via an illegal route. As we have heard from a number of noble Lords, this would not be in keeping with the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

The amendment from the noble Lord, Lord German, is a practical amendment on granting re-entry into the asylum system for those the Government are not able to remove, and we are happy to support it. It would avoid potentially thousands of children, as well as other asylum seekers, being kept in limbo. As he very fairly pointed out, this is a backstop for the Government because, if they are true to their aspirations for the Bill, they will never have to use the noble Lord’s amendment. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 28th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy (Lab)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 42 I will speak also to Amendments 45, 48 and 85 in the unavoidable absence of my noble friends Lord Davies and Lord Woodley. I have added my name to those amendments.

Clause 7(12) imposes a statutory duty on a captain of a ship or an aircraft, a train manager or a vehicle driver that, on the instructions of an immigration officer, they must prevent a particular person disembarking or they must detain a particular person. These duties go significantly beyond the existing duties on captains of aircrafts and ships in the Immigration Act 1971. If one of those postholders fails to fulfil that statutory duty, Clause 9(2) of this Bill will make it a criminal offence. This new statutory duty and the threat of criminal prosecution are likely to create major problems for the staff involved.

I appreciate that we have been discussing matters of fundamental human rights until now. These are more prosaic issues, but nevertheless significant for those affected. These amendments are designed to alleviate the difficulties caused for the staff to whom the clause is directed. I would be grateful if the Minister would explain precisely how, in the absence of such amendments, these problems will be overcome. I will give the House five examples of issues that might arise and need addressing.

First, all these jobs are safety-critical, and the individuals performing these functions have statutory safety responsibilities. What if those health and safety duties required all the passengers on a ship, train or bus to be disembarked? For example, if a train breaks down, the duty of the train manager is to make the train as safe as possible, disembark the passengers and take them to a place of safety.

The second issue is the problem of identifying the passenger or passengers who are to be prevented from disembarking or to be detained. The captains of scheduled air flights and cruise ships will have lists of crews, passengers and so on, but how is the manager of a crowded train or ferry to find the passenger concerned? The inevitable result is that the entire complement of passengers on the train or bus will have to be detained.

Thirdly, whether the individual is identified or not, the only way of detaining him or her, or preventing them getting off the train, is to keep the doors closed. How will the manager explain to the passengers on a train arriving into King’s Cross from Glasgow that the doors must remain closed until there are security staff or immigration officers to vet the passengers coming off and detain the individual they have identified? What of the consequences to the train operating companies? Are they to be reimbursed for the compensation payable to passengers or Network Rail in the event of consequential delays?

Fourthly, assuming the passenger has been identified by the train manager or coach driver, how will they physically detain them in the absence of any training, skills or desire to engage in physical violence? How and by whom will they be compensated should they be injured?

Fifthly—this is my final example—what will happen if the French driver of a Eurostar arriving into St Pancras, or the Irish driver of a train from Belfast to Dublin, does not keep the doors shut and prevent an individual disembarking? Is it proposed that there will be extradition proceedings if the foreign train manager goes back to their own country? Your Lordships will look in vain for the answers to these very practical questions in the impact assessment.

Paragraph 67 and Annexe A of the assessment deal with extra costs of escorts and other hired staff, but there is not a word about extra payment for the poor souls identified in Clause 7. Paragraph 84 recognises that

“there may be an increase in the level of disruption observed in detention prior to removal”,

but there is not a word about how the Clause 7 staff are to cope with such disruption. Paragraphs 117, 132 and 145 report that the Bill imposes no costs on business, but there is not a word about the costs of, among other things, delays to aircraft, ships, trains and buses as a consequence of preventing the disembarkation of passengers.

No doubt the Minister would wish these amendments not to be pursued, but if so, I would be grateful for his full explanation of how these very pragmatic issues are to be addressed in the absence of these amendments.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Hendy, has clearly articulated a whole series of practical difficulties with the duties to be imposed on transport workers. From what the noble Lord said, it appears that the Government have quite clearly not thought through the consequences of the duties they intend to place on, for example, train managers. I will listen carefully to any argument the Minister might have that the duties imposed by the Bill go beyond existing duties but, clearly, subjecting these workers to being potentially convicted of a criminal offence for failing to act in accordance with the Bill, while not providing them with any advice, let alone training or equipment, in order to carry out their duties requires some explanation.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I very much agree with the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, particularly with respect to whether what is included in the Bill is an extension of existing powers, or simply a reiteration of what was in legislation that preceded the Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Hendy, did us a great favour in bringing forward a whole series of practical questions which the Minister started to answer in Committee. They are quite serious questions about the practicalities and, as the Minister knows, we have been concerned about not only some of our principled objections but also the workability of some of the clauses and powers contained in the Bill. It is worth reiterating, so it is on the record, what the noble Lord, Lord Hendy, said: the Government require transport workers—whether it be a lorry driver, a train operator, a train guard or a bus conductor—to act in an almost pseudo-police officer role to detain or search people.

If I were in that situation, I would be genuinely concerned about the implications. There are legitimate questions about the powers of detention, how long people would be detained, the use of force, and so on.

Can the Minister clarify one further point? His previous amendments added the words “immigration officer” to make the legislation consistent with later parts of the clause which refer to an

“immigration officer or the Secretary of State”.

Do the Government envisage any difference? Is that wording to cover any eventuality rather than any significant principled thing that the immigration officer could do that the Secretary of State could not, or vice versa? It would be interesting to know, and I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 3rd July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

My Lords, can the noble Lord explain why our courts, and our officials acting under their duties, reach such different decisions from the courts and officials on the continent? Why do we reject only 25% of claims for asylum, whereas France rejects 75%?

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, this is Report and that intervention is not appropriate, I am afraid.

[Lord Carlile of Berriew (CB)]

Whether it is appropriate or not—and I tend to agree with the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, on that subject—it seems to me that the noble Lord who just intervened has made a very selective judgment without analysing the continental cases that have taken place. I have given a fair description of what happens in our jurisdiction; it is the one that I regard well, and I hope that your Lordships will too.

--- Later in debate ---

I ask the Minister to reflect again on whether “compelling” could be more clearly expressed. If it is translated in one of these clauses, it needs to be done in all the others, which I have mentioned in my other amendments. That is my point and I cannot expand on it any further. It is a matter of fairness and proper notice to the person seeking to make these claims, so that they are not caught out by something that fails to achieve what the clauses require.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, for the reasons that both noble and learned Lords have explained, we support all the amendments in this group. Should the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, not get a satisfactory answer from the Minister, we will support him if he divides the House.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, the House will be aware that I support the direction of travel of the Bill quite strongly. It represents a serious effort—it may be a vain one, and will certainly be so if the Government accept all the loopholes in the amendments we have discussed this afternoon—to address an issue of considerable concern to our fellow citizens. But, although I support the direction of travel, that does not mean that I think it perfect in every sense. I will therefore take a minute to support Amendment 131, in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead—to which he has just spoken—and the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich.

I do not want to add to the background as the noble and learned Lord has obviously explained that very clearly. However, this does come under the issue that the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, and I tried to draw to the attention of both Houses when we chaired the Delegated Powers Committee and the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee respectively: the way in which power has been slipping through the hands of Parliament, with extensive and wide powers being taken by means of secondary legislation. Some might say that their use is improper, but let us say “extensive” for the purposes of this afternoon. Too often, these issues should have had a degree of scrutiny appropriate for primary legislation, and it is not satisfactory to introduce major issues of policy without that scrutiny.

We have to remember that we do need secondary legislation. Without it, the Government’s machine would gum up completely. But we need to make sure that its use is restricted to what it says on the tin—namely, issues of secondary importance. In my view, Clause 39, entitled

“Meaning of ‘serious and irreversible harm’,”


is of pretty fundamental importance.

I agree with the need for regulation. The world moves on much faster than the rather stately pace of primary legislation. That is why I could not support Amendment 132 in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, and the noble Lords, Lord Carlile and Lord Paddick, because it seeks to delete the whole clause. We need some regulatory power. In much the same way, I am concerned about Amendment 130, because it opens up a whole series of other loopholes that impede the impact of the Bill as a whole.

In response to the wider powers that the Government are seeking under the present formulation, Parliament is entitled to ask for some limits on future ministerial power. Let me use the analogy of driving down a road. The Government are entitled to drive down the road, but in turn Parliament is entitled to ask for guard-rails—guard-rails that will ensure that a future Minister cannot swerve off into parts of—

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 5th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I very much support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Swire. As has already been said so well by him and by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, this is an extremely sensible idea. The public, as well as ourselves and the House of Commons, are entitled to know where we stand and what is happening with the numbers.

I share, to some extent, the concerns of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, about the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, purely and simply because I wonder to what extent the National Crime Agency has actually been consulted on what its priorities are. I quite see the importance of giving this priority, and I totally support it, but I would be interested to know, before we make this a part of primary legislation, whether the National Crime Agency, which I happen to know has a large number of different duties and works extremely well in many areas in this country, sees this area as a priority.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, first, I address the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Swire. He wondered why the amendment had not captured the imagination of the House. Speaking for those of us on these Benches, the Bill is entirely focused on refugees and asylum seekers, who form a very small proportion—a tiny fraction—of the 1.3 million people given leave to remain in the country last year. So while I agree in principle with what the noble Lord says—that we should have a much firmer grip on the number of illegal immigrants in this country—his amendment is not germane to the Bill.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords—

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

I am very sorry, but on Report noble Lords are allowed to speak only once.

As the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, said, the Bill is focused entirely on criminalising the victims of people smugglers and not on the people smugglers themselves. We intend to support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Coaker: if his amendment is carried, at least there will be one line, or a few lines, in the Bill that will focus on the real problem, which is the criminal people smugglers and those who are carrying out modern slavery and trafficking, as the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, said.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, said, in effect, that this amendment was not necessary because under Section 1(4) of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, one reason for the National Crime Agency to exist is:

“The NCA is to have the function … of securing that efficient and effective activities to combat organised crime and serious crime are carried out”.


People smuggling, people trafficking and so forth are clearly organised and serious crime, but that then leads to the question raised by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, about priorities for the National Crime Agency. The strategic priorities for the National Crime Agency are set out in Section 3 of the 2013 Act, which says:

“The Secretary of the State must determine strategic priorities for the NCA”.


I have looked at the current strategic priorities for the National Crime Agency, as set by the Home Secretary, and people smuggling, trafficking and people facilitating the sorts of things that the Bill is supposed to combat are nowhere to be seen; there is nothing in the strategic priorities about it. How can the Government say that it is a priority of the Prime Minister to tackle small boats coming across the channel when it is not a strategic priority set by the Home Secretary for the National Crime Agency? The only way we can get the National Crime Agency to focus on people smugglers is to support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, which is what we on these Benches will do.

[The Advocate-General for Scotland (Lord Stewart of Dirleton) (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 168 moved by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, seeks to confer on the National Crime Agency a specific function in respect of tackling organised immigration crime and to require it to maintain a cross-border people-smuggling unit. The noble Lord opposite has spoken powerfully today, as he did at previous stages of the Bill. I am gratified to hear the powerful expressions of support from the noble Lord and the Benches behind him for the Government’s commitment to addressing these repugnant crimes.

I have sympathy for the underlying aim of this amendment, in that we all agree on the need to tackle organised immigration crime, but I put it to the noble Lord that his amendment is unnecessary. As we have heard from noble Lords in the debate, the functions of the National Crime Agency are set out clearly in Section 1 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013. I echo the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, who quoted from Section 1(4) of that Act:

“The NCA is to have the function … of securing that efficient and effective activities to combat organised crime and serious crime are carried out”.


At this point, I gratefully echo and adopt the points made by my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier. This function covers all forms of organised crime, and therefore includes organised immigration crime. Accordingly, adding the proposed new function would add nothing to the NCA’s remit. One reads in the NCA’s annual report of the range of activities in which it is already engaged to help address the problem of cross-channel people-smuggling gangs. That commitment also appears on the face of its website, which looks at border vulnerabilities, modern slavery and human trafficking.

As for the second limb of the amendment, which would require the NCA to establish a bespoke cross-border people-smuggling unit, I put to the noble Lord and to the House that this would undermine the operational independence of the NCA—a point made by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss. It is properly a matter for the director-general of the National Crime Agency to determine how best the agency is to be organised to deliver its statutory functions. In saying that, I again respectfully echo the point made by my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier from the Benches behind me.

I say in answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, that the Government are committed to confronting serious organised crime in and against the UK. To help achieve this outcome, we have made significant progress in strengthening the National Crime Agency. The NCA’s budget has increased by at least 21% in the last two years to more than £860 million, which will help it continue to develop the critical capabilities it needs.

I will address a couple of specific points put by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, in opening this section of the debate. He asked about the manner in which the activities of organised crime through social media are being addressed by the NCA. The National Crime Agency works closely with the major tech companies to take down organised and information crime-related content where it appears on social media. Between November 2021 and March 2023, the NCA made more than 3,400 referrals to social media companies regarding posts and accounts related to suspected organised immigration crime. Some 97% of these referrals have been taken down by the respective platforms. I hope that offers some grounds for confidence to the noble Lord as he carefully addresses the provisions of the Bill and his response.

The noble Lord also asked me about the number of prosecutions arising from this. I will go on to touch upon that subject as I move on to the manner in which the NCA’s work, along with that of our partners abroad in other jurisdictions, is organised and co-ordinated. The Government have a dedicated multiagency organised immigration crime task force, to which the NCA contributes and in which it participates. This task force is committed to dismantling organised immigration crime groups engaged in immigration crime internationally, including criminal networks that facilitate people smuggling from source countries to Europe and then to the UK, knowingly putting people in life-threatening situations. If I may, I will rehearse a couple of statistics that I gave to your Lordships’ House in Committee. The task force is currently active in 17 countries worldwide, working with its partners to build intelligence sharing as well as investigative and prosecution capability.

I will now address the specific question regarding prosecutions that the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, put to me from the Front Bench. Since 2015 and the inception of Project INVIGOR, the United Kingdom’s organised immigration crime task force has been involved in more than 1,400 arrests both in the United Kingdom and overseas with, on conviction, sentences collectively amounting to more than 1,300 years in prison being imposed.

Following the pledge made by the Prime Minister on 13 December to stop the dangerous small boats crossings, the Government have doubled funding for the next two financial years for this task force. This increased funding has as its aim doubling the number of disruptions and enforcement activity against organised immigration crime and the criminal gangs that facilitate it.

As the noble Lord said from the Dispatch Box, he has had an opportunity to discuss these matters with the NCA, and I am grateful for his kind words in relation to Home Office Ministers for assisting with facilitating that. I hope that, in light of what he learned in that meeting and what I have been able to say from the Dispatch Box concerning the activities of the NCA, the desirability of maintaining its operational independence and the increased funding under which it is operating, the noble Lord will be content to withdraw his amendment.

I turn to Amendment 168AZA tabled by my noble friend Lord Swire, which would place a duty on the Secretary of State to publish a report on illegal migration, including statistics on the number of illegal migrants in the United Kingdom. I understand that my noble friend Lord Murray of Blidworth has also discussed this amendment with my noble friend following Committee. We recognise the importance of having clear and coherent datasets, but I invite the House to reflect on this: by the very nature of that body, it is not possible to know the exact size of the illegal population or the number of people who arrive illegally, so we do not seek to make any official estimates of the illegal population. I hear what my noble friend has to say about the way in which such figures might be gathered, but they would remain estimates.

My noble friend bemoaned the fact that his amendment has not caught the attention of your Lordships’ House and that the House has not demonstrated affection for it. In my experience, your Lordships’ House has demonstrated on many occasions its feeling for the importance of statistical evidence as a guide to policy-making. I hear very clearly what the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier and my noble friend Lord Swire said about that. However, in circumstances where such figures cannot be known exactly, I invite the House to reflect that it would not be appropriate to pass my noble friend’s amendment in its current form.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

3rd reading
Monday 10th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I associate those of us on these Benches with the kind words of the Minister and others around the House in relation to the sad news about the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood. He will be greatly missed.

Since Second Reading, we on these Benches have made clear our opposition to what we consider to be an illegal—to use the word of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew—and immoral Bill. If there were any way in which a Bill of this kind might have any chance of stopping the boats, it was by acting as a deterrent. Despite its proposed retrospectivity, record numbers crossed the channel in June and again this weekend, as the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, said. The Government’s own impact assessment describes a consensus among academics that the Bill is unlikely to deter those seeking sanctuary in the UK. Both in theory and in practice, the Bill appears destined not to achieve what it sets out to do.

Instead, as introduced into this House, the Bill undermines both the UK’s international reputation and the global consensus that mass migration needs to be dealt with through international co-operation, not unilateral action. Unamended, the Bill is all pain and no gain, potentially creating a permanent underclass of tens of thousands of people who cannot be removed, whose claims for asylum will not even be examined, let alone accepted, and who will be unable to work legally—a permanent drain on the taxpayer.

Contrary to what the Minister has said, some noble Lords, whose attendance during our lengthy debates on the Bill has been—how can I put it?—sporadic, claim that no alternative has been offered. Nothing could be further from reality, as the official record shows. For example, some 15 years ago claims for asylum were higher; the backlog of claims awaiting decisions was a fraction of what it is today; and the number of those being removed was far greater. The only immigration crisis in the UK today is one created by the Home Office, and a Bill targeted at criminalising asylum seekers, rather than people smugglers, is bound to fail.

Illegal Migration Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments
Wednesday 12th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, as someone who rarely goes to bed after 11 pm, I will be incredibly brief. I will comment on both propositions and give my support to my noble friend Lord Coaker and to the most reverent Primate.

We reached an agreement with the French 21 years ago that tackled organised criminality, not its victims. For a time, it was successful. The business model changed, and we must change with it. The National Crime Agency, working with its counterparts in France, could do a similar job, with the Government negotiating with the Government of France. We could pay for a licensing scheme in France that would make it a criminal offence for anyone to purchase, transport or sell a boat without a licence. Our agencies and theirs could then work together to tackle the organised criminal fraternity, who are bringing such misery.

In support of the most reverend Primate, if we ever needed a long-term strategy of 10 years rather than 10 months, one geared not to a general election but to solving a problem, and to dealing with it internationally, on a long-term basis, we need it now. That is why this House should support both propositions.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, today the Government heralded a reduction in the vacancies in the social care sector. This was achieved mainly through the arrival of 70,000 overseas workers in the last year, while the Bill tries to stop 45,000 people desperately seeking sanctuary in the UK. We on these Benches support Motions X1 and Y1. In a Bill devoid of any measures that target people smugglers, Motion X1 is the very minimum required. It is remarkable that stopping the boats is one of the Prime Minister’s five priorities, and yet it is not one of the Home Secretary’s strategic priorities for the National Crime Agency.

The most reverend Primate has made a compelling case in Motion Y1. The Government have set out in legislation the need for a climate change strategy. But, again, on one of the Prime Minister’s five top priorities, there is no need to set out in legislation the need for a strategy in relation to the movement of refugees and human trafficking. How can the Minister possibly say that that is a consistent position for the Government to take? We on these Benches will support both these Motions if the noble Lord and the most reverend Primate decide to test the opinion of the House.