Refugees (Family Reunion) Bill [HL]

Lord Paddick Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 8th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, before speaking to the Bill, I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, who never fails to move the House with his personal experience, even when speaking in the gap.

It is a great pleasure to support this Private Member’s Bill, which my noble friend Lady Ludford inherited from my noble friend Lady Hamwee. I hope she will not mind me saying so, not least because my noble friend Lady Hamwee said it, but it has improved since. Both my noble friends have demonstrated tenacity and stamina in their attempts to improve the situation for refugees and asylum seekers.

It is bad enough to be a refugee fleeing persecution or war, such as those displaced by Putin’s dreadful illegal war in Ukraine, let alone to be separated from your family, not least if you are a child under 18. It is at times of danger and trauma that we need our families around us most, let alone when you are in a foreign country, where you may not even speak the language and are navigating a complex legal system on your own. The noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft, reminded us of how we felt when we were separated from our families during the pandemic.

This very simple Bill puts some heart back into this country’s immigration policy when this Government have been doing everything they can to make it more difficult for people to claim asylum in the UK. In a quite reasonable and limited way, the Bill extends those eligible to be granted leave to enter and remain in the UK for family reunion. As my noble friend said, the definition is not extended as far as that which was used in the Ukrainian refugee scheme. Why was a broader definition adopted for Ukrainian refugees? If the Government will not support the Bill, what is the difference, as far as Ukrainian refugees are concerned? The Bill also restores eligibility for legal aid to make such an application.

The current rules are too restrictive if, for example, the sponsor of a child or partner has not yet received a decision on their asylum claim, or if the sponsor is under 18. As we heard, there is a mounting backlog of asylum claims that have yet to be decided, with some decisions extending into months and even years. An unaccompanied minor is in even more need of their family than a traumatised adult—yet the UK is almost alone in Europe in not allowing an unaccompanied asylum seeker to sponsor their family to join them, as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham said. His story of a family separated in Kabul was compelling. Apart from the welfare of the child, the cost of safeguarding them is bound to be higher than if they were placed with other family members.

A very similar Bill passed through this House in the last Session without amendment, with Labour support, but it ran out of time in the other place because the Government would not support it. As my noble friend explained, there are some differences from last time, brought about, I expect, by the need to counter the truly dreadful Nationality and Borders Act—for example by ensuring that the Immigration Rules do not contravene the 1951 UN refugee convention and apply equally to all who are granted protection status, whether they are deemed to be group 1 or group 2 refugees under the 2022 Act. The situation is being made worse by the UK-Rwanda migration and economic development partnership, potentially making family reunion even more difficult.

The Government’s response the last time a similar Bill was debated was vague, general and not based on evidence. What inevitable “challenging burdens” would such a Bill create for the Home Office, local authorities and wider public services, when the Government allow over a million migrants to enter the UK to study or work in higher-paid jobs? Asylum seekers represent a tiny fraction of immigration into the UK, and any increase as a result of the Bill would be smaller still.

In 2020, according to the excellent briefing provided by the House of Lords Library, the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration described the application process for family reunion as “potentially confusing”, in particular the guidance provided for applicants. He called on the Home Office to listen to stakeholders who had called for the eligibility criteria for sponsors and applicants to be expanded, enabling access to legal aid—exactly what this Bill attempts to do.

Refugee Action has criticised the rules as very restrictive when applied to families torn apart by war, such as people caring for orphaned younger siblings and unaccompanied children separated from their parents. This Bill would address those concerns. The Families Together Coalition has said that, if the Government are serious about their ambition to expand so-called safe routes, they should expand the criteria of who qualifies for family reunion and reintroduce legal aid for all family reunion cases. This Bill would address the coalition’s concerns as well.

My noble friend talked about how the visa fee waiver for family reunion is now based on affordability and said that that was progress. As we debated in the House on Wednesday, the affordability rules in themselves appear designed to deter anyone from applying, both because of the unreasonable definition of what is essential expenditure and the sheer complexity of the nature and extent of the proof required to show that the visa fee should be waived—perhaps two steps forward and one step back. The noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, reminded noble Lords of the likely consequences if the Bill is not enacted. This Bill has been crafted and improved over the years; it is now perfectly formed and we should support it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister was not wrong in that last remark. I thank him very much for his reply, which I will come back to, but I want to thank everybody who has spoken in this debate. I was extremely pleased that we had the bonus of two extremely valuable extra speakers in the gap, which was wonderful.

The noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, made a salutary correction to our historical perspective on the story of the Kindertransport. It was, of course, incomplete and she is right to focus our attention on the sadness and despair—I must get her note on the name of that book, though it will be in Hansard, obviously. I found what she said about the sense of abandonment very moving; how can children prosper in such circumstances? I was pleased that the Minister also picked up on that point. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham also raised the question of the trauma for the child in expecting them to grow up without their parents and quoted very moving testimony from Afghanistan.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, asked a pertinent question: do the Government want to be world leading in cruelty to child refugees? It is a fair question. She talked about not only having no one to embrace us, as refugees, in our sadness, but also having no one to share our successes with. I thought that was a very good point; it is not just about comfort but about celebration when we do well.

I am glad the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, reminded me; I second his thanks to the Library for its briefing note. Like everyone else across this House, I just think Alf, the noble Lord, is brilliant. I am pleased to serve with him on the Joint Committee on Human Rights. His efforts since 2017 especially, trying to keep the Dubs scheme going in the face of a disappointing response from the Government is nothing short of heroic.

The noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft, rightly reminded us of how the pandemic has highlighted our appreciation of family. Not to get noble Lords weeping for me, but I spent Christmas Day 2020 alone as a widow; I was supposed to go to a family Christmas but, because of lockdown, I could not. It was not that bad—I had loads of chocolate and silly TV and in my neck of the woods at least three shops are open on Christmas Day. I am not asking people to feel sorry for me but Christmas, if you celebrate it, is not normally a time when you like to be alone in this country; perhaps it brought home to me that sense of being alone.

My noble friend Lord Paddick talked about putting some heart back into immigration policy in this country. That is what this whole debate and the Bill are about. He reminded us of what a small fraction of total immigration family reunion—indeed, safe and legal routes generally—is. We are really not talking about some large extra cohort.

I very much welcome the support of the Labour Front Bench, expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark. He made the very correct point that we get loads of new legislation. Like him, one loses track of all the immigration and asylum Bills, but what is lacking is any real action on tackling the criminal gangs, for which we certainly need co-operation with France and Europol. Of course, one of the great holes in the trade and co-operation agreement with the EU was any co-operation on security and justice issues, which is absurd given the history of how the UK championed a lot of the co-operation. We had the director of Europol for 10 years, for goodness’ sake, and now we have made ourselves absent. We need to put the criminal gangs out of business, and the way to do that is through safe and legal routes, of which this Bill is one.

That brings me to the response of the Minister, which was not dissimilar to the response I had last September. He tells us that the Government fully support the principle of family unity which is why they have a comprehensive policy. He tried to reassure us of the width and generosity of this policy, but he will forgive me if I am not terribly persuaded of that. The Minister talked about this Bill encompassing an extended family, but it does not really; it is quite nuclear, apart from adult dependent children. It is not nearly as wide, as my noble friend Lord Paddick pointed out, as the Ukraine family scheme. The Minister’s response to why that scheme is about extended family was to say that it is Putin’s war.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

What about Assad’s war?

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

Other wars are indeed going on, and that is why refugees are fleeing, whether from Afghanistan, Sudan or the Middle East.

I regret that the Minister trotted out the “children are being forced to travel and exploited” line. It is rather like the debates during the passage of the Nationality and Borders Act on the right to work, when the Migration Advisory Committee told us there was no evidence that the right to work was a pull factor. There is also no evidence that the ability of a child refugee to bring their nuclear family to join them is a pull factor or used as some kind of anchor. I am afraid the Government are playing into the hands of the criminal gangs by restricting safe and legal routes, of which family reunion is one of the strongest. Many of us in this House, certainly on this side, deplore that the Nationality and Borders Act brings in this restrictive treatment of so-called group 2 refugees, who are going to be in a worse situation regarding rights, including to family reunion. You cannot have it both ways; the Government say they have a broad and generous policy but have brought in an Act which deliberately restricts family reunion rights. I am afraid that what they are saying simply is not true.

Finally, the Minister talked about the burden on the public purse. But how do you know whether child refugees, or any refugees, are going to prosper? The Minister gave me a name about a war, and I will give him a name: Nadhim Zahawi. He came here, apparently at the age of 11, unable to speak any English.