Windrush

Debate between Lyn Brown and Joanna Cherry

Wednesday 2nd May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry]

I wholly agree with my hon. Friend. There are many people in the United Kingdom at the moment who make a great contribution to our society, but who are being made to feel very unwelcome at best and are being deported at worst, simply because they cannot evidence their right to be here.

These people have come to light as a result of another policy of the Prime Minister’s—the hostile environment policy, which is a racist policy. I say that quite clearly: it is racist. When people of a certain ethnic background, or with a name that does not look British, apply for a tenancy or a job, that is when they come to light, and that is when suspicion falls upon them. It is absolutely disgraceful. That is why, at Prime Minister’s questions this morning, despite the howls of derision from Conservative Members, I asked the Prime Minister to apologise for the policies that have caused this. I am still waiting for that apology, and I will be asking for it constantly. Policy has caused this problem, not mistakes—not mistakes by officials and not even mistakes by politicians. It is the direct imposition of policy that has caused this problem.

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

Does the hon. and learned Lady not agree that the Home Secretary must look at the issue of bonuses, because they create a culture? The buck stops at his door.

[Joanna Cherry]

It is absolutely astonishing that people should be given bonuses for the number of people they can boot out of the country. It is disgusting. What has the United Kingdom come to? I may be a Scottish nationalist, but I also consider myself British, and there are many aspects of the UK—[Interruption.] Yes, I am. Actually, I am half Irish as well—thank God, because I am getting an Irish passport. I am not one of those people who says the UK has never done anything good, but by God is this a smear on the UK’s reputation across the world.

Two weeks ago, the Prime Minister would not even speak to the heads of delegations from the Commonwealth about this issue; she thought she could get it swept under the carpet. Then she thought she could use the right hon. Member for Hastings and Rye as her human shield. That did not work either. She thought she could come to the House this morning and get off the hook. Well, she is not off the hook. She needs to answer for the policies that have caused this problem.

We are hearing a lot today about how the Windrush generation will be sorted out. The previous Home Secretary gave us an undertaking that there would not be any more enforcement action against the Windrush generation. However, my question to the Home Secretary is this: if he cannot get the Windrush generation, which vulnerable group is he going to go after next to meet his targets?

Leaving the EU: Security, Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice

Debate between Lyn Brown and Joanna Cherry

Wednesday 18th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Lyn Brown]

I have confidence that the European arrest warrant is far more powerful than any other extradition process anywhere in the world, and we would be stupid if we let it go.

Since the European arrest warrant was introduced in 2004, the UK has used it to bring 2,500 individuals from outside the UK to face justice. Let us not forget that it was the mechanism that ensured that Hussain Osman was brought to justice after he fled to Italy after a failed suicide bombing in London in 2005. The problem that we face is that the European arrest warrant is available exclusively to EU members. We will have to overcome considerable hurdles if we are to maintain the current arrangements and we are not in the European Union. In fact, as a recent briefing from the Centre for European Reform think-tank states, if, having left the EU, the UK wanted to get a similar deal,

“it would need to convince its partners to change their constitutions. In some cases, this would trigger a referendum.”

Do we really think that countries would hold such a referendum because we have decided to leave the EU?

Some countries outside the European Union have attempted to negotiate access to the common arrest warrant system. Norway and Iceland, for example, have concluded a surrender agreement with the EU that represents an attempt to get the same benefits, although it has not yet come into force. That agreement is weaker in two ways. First, it requires the alleged offences to be the same in both countries, thus losing the flexibility that comes from the agreement of member states to respect the decisions of each other’s criminal justice systems. Secondly, it allows countries to refuse to surrender their own nationals, which would make things tricky if a national of an EU country were to commit an offence on UK soil, for example.

On top of that—as if that were not bad enough—the agreement took 15 years to negotiate, and that was for countries in both Schengen and the European economic area, but as the Prime Minister made clear yesterday, there are no plans for us to be members of either. The alternative is that we fall back on previous extradition treaties that are far more cumbersome and will, in some cases, require EU countries to change their own laws in respect of the UK.

It is hard to see how any of those options are preferable to the current arrangements. I find it particularly hard to understand how this fits with the Prime Minister’s pledge yesterday to “work together more” in response to threats to our common security. While it is not difficult for an individual who has broken the law in Britain to hop on a cheap flight to another European country, I fear that it will be very hard indeed, without the European arrest warrant, for us to get them back again. For that reason, Labour calls on the Government to ensure that the current arrangements are maintained.

I turn to our second concern. This House approved regulations confirming our opt-in to Europol only a few weeks ago, and we did that because it is vital to our national security. Europol—the European Police Office, to give it its proper title—exists to combat serious international organised crime by means of co-operation between the relevant authorities of member states, including those tasked with customs, immigration services, borders and financial policing. As we know, Europol is not able to mandate national forces to undertake investigations, but it provides information and resources that enable national investigations to take place.

In the words of the British director of Europol, Rob Wainwright, whose previous career was in UK security institutions, our decision to opt into Europol is:

“Good for Britain’s security, great for police cooperation in Europe.”

Indeed, the Minister for Policing and the Fire Service confirmed on 12 December during a debate in a European Committee that Europol provides

“a vital tool in helping UK law enforcement agencies to co-ordinate investigations involving cross-border serious and organised crime”.

He also said:

“About 40% of everything that Europol does is linked to work that is either provided or requested by the United Kingdom.”—[Official Report, European Committee B, 12 December 2016; c. 5-7.]

However, when pushed about whether we can maintain our membership of Europol, the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, speaking in this House last year, was able to say only that the Government will seek to:

“preserve the relationship with the European Union on security matters as best we can.”—[Official Report, 5 September 2016; Vol. 614, c. 45.]

When my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) asked him the same question about Europol yesterday, we got no more information about how that could be done.

[Joanna Cherry]

Is the hon. Lady aware that Rob Wainwright said last year that negotiating security pacts from outside the bloc of Europol, in the event of Britain leaving the EU, would be a “damage-limitation exercise”? Does she agree that what we need to hear from the Government is not a eulogy about how great Europol is—we all know that already—but an indication of how they are going to limit the damage caused by leaving the European Union and agencies such as Europol?

[Lyn Brown]

The hon. and learned Lady is absolutely right. I agree with her that this simply is not good enough.

Although Europol has arrangements for third-party access, they raise serious questions. The Government stated in a policy paper that was published last year:

“There are a number of important differences between what Europol provides to third country operational cooperation partners with which it has agreements, and EU members”.

In particular, they highlighted the inability directly to submit data and conduct searches within the Europol databases, the need to conclude a separate bilateral arrangement to connect to Europol’s secure information exchange network application, and the inability to sit on Europol’s management board, which sets the organisation’s strategy. That tells us that Mr Wainwright is highly unlikely to stay in his post. In summary, to borrow the words of David Armond, deputy director general of the National Crime Agency, any alternative arrangement to full membership would be

“sub-optimal, not as good as what we’ve currently got”.

Frankly, that does not feel comfortable to me.

Our third concern is about access to pan-European databases, which are important for the routine work of our police forces. Let me give some examples. Access to European criminal records data—the European criminal records information system—is limited exclusively to EU member states. The common European asylum system includes a fingerprint database known as Eurodac that prevents individuals from reapplying for asylum once a claim has been rejected. We currently have access to the Schengen information system, despite not being a member of Schengen, and that contains information on lost identity documents and, importantly, wanted persons.

The Minister’s permanent secretary stated in his foreword to the Home Office’s most recent annual report that strengthening data exchanges with our European allies was essential to combating terrorism. I would be grateful to the Minister of State, Department for Exiting the European Union, if he confirmed whether we will still have access to these databases outside the European Union and, if so, whether that access will come at a financial cost.

Rights of EU Nationals

Debate between Lyn Brown and Joanna Cherry

Wednesday 19th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry]

It is of course open to the right hon. Gentleman to bring forward such a motion. This motion is about protecting the rights of EU nationals in the United Kingdom, which the United Kingdom Government are in a position to do.

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

My husband is a UK citizen based in Germany, where he runs a very small business. He was horrified by the tone of his Government in looking after his rights as a person who is working and has established himself abroad. He said to me, “Do they not understand that threatening Europe is not the best way to open negotiations?” I merely said, “No, they don’t.”

[Joanna Cherry]

I could not agree more with the hon. Lady. As I have said, if, as we are constantly told by the Brexiteers, having trade agreements with Britain is such a fantastic option for the other 27 member states of the European Union, why must the Government keep individuals up their sleeve as bargaining chips?