Mark Harper
Main Page: Mark Harper (Conservative - Forest of Dean)Department Debates - View all Mark Harper's debates with the Home Office
Citizenship (Armed Forces) Bill
Mark Harper Excerpts(11 years, 1 month ago)
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Jonathan Lord
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing us back to the key point of the Bill with a good local example of how it will work.
The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)
I should like to assist the House on the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh). I ask him to hold on to the thought about naturalisation requirements, because I shall touch on them in my remarks at the end of the debate. I shall clarify how the current rules work, and how we expect them to work in the future. I hope that that will be helpful.
Harriett Baldwin
The question is whether those troops settled in Gibraltar and what the rules were for their naturalisation as British citizens prior to 1981. I can honestly say that I do not have the faintest clue, but that is an interesting historical point.
I was evacuated to the British sovereign base of Dhekelia as a child when, as a British citizen, I was growing up in Cyprus. We were living in Nicosia at the time, and we were often under threat of invasion by Turkish forces. I remember being evacuated to Dhekelia, and feeling incredibly safe and secure there, on British sovereign territory. My father, however, had to remain behind in Nicosia to do his job. He put a Union flag on the roof of our house, and we sincerely hoped that the Turkish air force would be able to spot it from the air should it decide to bomb Nicosia. However, I digress, Mr Speaker.
I am trying to find out how my hypothetical examples would be affected by the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Woking told us that the provision would probably apply to a citizen of Fiji. Let us imagine that that citizen of Fiji joins Her Majesty’s armed forces, does exemplary service and decides—I do not know what the residence requirements would be—that he or she wants to remain in the British Indian Ocean Territory. Does the territorial extent of the Bill mean that the first date of the five-year period includes residence in one of the territories I have listed? That is my interpretation.
In relation to the questions asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough, a situation might arise in which, as we heard, a Jamaican citizen who joined our armed forces abroad and served with great courage with them in other parts of the world decides to settle in Gibraltar, or perhaps closer to Jamaica, in the Cayman Islands. From there, could that person apply for naturalisation as a British citizen, without ever having resided in what we might more naturally think of as the United Kingdom? I particularly want clarification on that point. I understand that the 1981 Act requires people to spend five years resident in the UK, but does the territorial extent in the Bill define the UK more widely? I look forward to hearing from the Minister about that.
The first residence requirement in the 1981 Act is that applicants must have been resident in the UK for at least five years, and I am again interested in the Minister clarifying the territorial extent of the United Kingdom in that regard. The second requirement is that they must have been present in the United Kingdom five years before the date of application, which is the provision that we are tackling; the third is that they are free of immigration time restrictions on the date of application; and the fourth is that they are free of immigration restrictions for a period of 12 months before making the application. Will that remain in force when the Bill is passed?
The fifth requirement is that the applicants have not spent more than 450 days outside the United Kingdom during the five-year period. I understand that that is covered by the Secretary of State’s discretion with regards to serving members of the armed forces. The sixth is that they have not spent more than 90 days outside the United Kingdom in the last 12 months of the five-year period. The final requirement is that they have not been in breach of the immigration rules at any stage during the five-year period. Can the Minister confirm that all those aspects of the residency requirements in the 1981 Act will continue to apply, and that the Bill will change only one particular area?
Since the 1981 Act, there has been one major modification to what it takes for someone to be naturalised as a citizen of the United Kingdom. I refer, of course, to the UK citizenship test. I do not know whether you have ever had the chance to see whether you can pass it, Mr Speaker, but in preparation for this debate, I thought that I would see whether I could do so. I looked at some sample tests, and I regret to inform the House that in the first sample test I failed to reach the necessary 75% required to pass.
Let me give some examples of questions that I did not answer successfully. I will not put you on the spot, Mr Speaker, although I know you are an encyclopaedically knowledgeable man. The following question stumped me: in which year did married women get the right to divorce their husband? To help the applicant there are four possible answers, and I am happy to take an intervention from anyone who can answer the question correctly. The options are 1837, 1857, 1875 or 1882. I do not know the correct answer, but I know I got it wrong. I am glad to say that I did know that it is not the Prime Minister who calls a by-election and that we have two Chambers in our national Parliament, so I sailed through some of the questions.
Here is another question that I failed miserably to pass: what is the number of children and young people up to the age of 19 in the UK? Again, Mr Speaker, I will help you out, but I will not put you on the spot. I will take interventions from colleagues who know the answer. The four possible answers are 13 million, 14 million, 15 million and 16 million. I failed on that one and I can see that the House has also failed on that measure of citizenship. I was getting rather depressed with my results from the test until I discovered a crucial fact. I compliment my hon. Friend the Minister on any involvement that he may have had in this crucial fact, which is that this Government have now introduced a much more sensible citizenship test. Those examples were taken from the citizenship test that can only be described as a new Labour fantasy about the level of knowledge that we would all have about our country.
I will not go on with further examples of questions that I failed—
The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)
It is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker. I had prepared only a brief speech, but the debate has been so wide-ranging, and Members on both sides of the House—including the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson)—have asked such complex questions, that I fear that I may need to draw on some more material.
The Government’s support for the Bill will not come as a surprise to my hon. Friend the Member for Woking (Jonathan Lord), because he quoted my remarks earlier. I am grateful to him for presenting it. I had forgotten, until I was prompted by my hon. Friend the Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride), that this was his second private Member’s Bill in what has so far been a short, but I know will be a very long, parliamentary career. He has been rather more successful in the ballot than I have been during my time in the House, and he has used his opportunities well. I know that his first Bill was very good, and I hope that this one reaches the statute book as well. I am also grateful to those who have supported the Bill.
My hon. Friend said that part of his reason for presenting the Bill was the fact that the Pirbright establishment was in his constituency and was important to a number of his constituents. The 1st Battalion the Rifles is based at Beachley barracks, on the southern tip of my constituency, and I have spent a great deal of time supporting it. I was privileged to be invited to join members of the battalion for their pre-deployment, before they embarked on their first tour of duty in Afghanistan in 2009. I was fortunate enough also to join them—all too briefly—in theatre to observe their operations. The battalion contains a number of foreign and Commonwealth members, and I have provided many of them with advice on immigration matters in my capacity as their constituency Member of Parliament. I know this measure will be welcome, and I hope it will benefit one or two of them as well.
I also draw on my own experience from the last Parliament when I was a shadow Defence Minister and I had the opportunity to visit a number of armed forces establishments and meet many people who serve in our armed forces. From that, I know what a great contribution they make to our country both here and overseas. It is right to acknowledge that some Members of this House have served in our armed forces, including the Whip who is present, my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes North (Mark Lancaster). This matter is just one small part of the armed forces covenant and the process we are undertaking, which I think is very valuable.
I will not talk about the covenant at length, as I know that would test your patience, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I want to refer to it briefly. My hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Margot James) drew attention to the fact—indeed, it was a public service announcement—that each year we publish a thorough report that is available in the Library. That report sets out very comprehensively the purpose of the covenant with a foreword by the Secretary of State, and it also sets out a range of measures we have taken across Government policy to deliver benefits and to remove discrimination in respect of serving personnel.
I also want to refer to the embedding of the work we do with external groups as part of that process. There is a covenant reference group, the successor to the original external reference group. It includes service charities and those very knowledgeable about these areas. I recently had the opportunity to attend a meeting of the ministerial committee looking at these matters and the covenant reference group. It was held at No. 10 Downing street and the Prime Minister attended for a period. That close working between Government and the service charities means we have been able to deliver on these achievements, and it is one reason why this measure is supported by a number of organisations and not, as far as we know, opposed by any.
Veterans Aid says:
“We warmly welcome any initiative that removes obstacles to those who have served this country with honour from settling here legally and have campaigned on this issue. Veterans Aid, more than any other military charity, has championed the cause of Foreign & Commonwealth servicemen and women disadvantaged, through no fault of their own, by bureaucracy…This was an injustice and we applaud the Government for listening.”
I am grateful for those generous words. I worked with Veterans Aid when I was a shadow Minister and it is good that it has welcomed this move. The Army Families Federation has also welcomed it and fully supports the changes.
I should say at this point that I am grateful to the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North for two things. First, she put on record her party’s support for the work our armed forces do. That is a good cross-party acknowledgment which we can never hear too often. Secondly, she formally put on record the official Opposition’s support for this private Member’s Bill, which I hope means it has a relatively smooth passage through this House and the other place. You were not in the Chamber earlier, Madam Deputy Speaker, but my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire (Harriett Baldwin) referred to the citizenship test and I am very pleased to say that she passed one bit by being able to confirm that she knew there were two Houses of this Parliament. Once the Bill is finished in this one, it will wing its way to the other House, where I hope it will be as successfully endorsed and can then reach the statute book.
We had a wide-ranging discussion on the citizenship test, Madam Deputy Speaker, and you will be delighted to know—as I am sure Mr Speaker would be if he were here—that although I have a copy of the guide containing all the material used for the citizenship test, I left it in my office so I will not be tempted to draw on it at length or, indeed, at all. My hon. Friend brought her copy with her, however, so she was not as disadvantaged as I am. I know that she did slightly test the patience of Mr Speaker, but he clearly was not upset with her, as he then referred to her “racy and intoxicating” speech. I have never made one of those in this House, and the Whip is probably hoping that I never do so. However, her speech was very welcome, and I am grateful for not only her support, but that of colleagues.
A number of hon. Members raised important points about the Bill, and I wish to deal with a couple of them. First, however, I should say that my hon. Friend the Member for Woking was supported formally in his Bill by my hon. Friends the Members for Bedford (Richard Fuller), for Keighley (Kris Hopkins) and for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford), who appended their names to it. It is worth saying that they are fully in support of it. For the benefit of colleagues in the House, the Home Office sought the permission of my hon. Friend the Member for Woking to prepare some explanatory notes, which he gave. I hope that the notes are helpful, and I know that a number of hon. Members have drawn on them today.
The explanatory notes briefly set out the purpose of the Bill and the fact that it amends the 1981 Act. Although I was not intending to go through this at length, my hon. Friends the Members for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) and for Christchurch (Mr Chope) both asked for a little more detail about how the naturalisation rules work and whether they are automatic or otherwise. The notes deal with that, but I will take the opportunity to discuss it, although not at enormous length, because I know that that would test your patience, Madam Deputy Speaker. I will just set out for the House what the requirements are and how the Secretary of State uses her discretion, to the extent that she has it.
Foreign and Commonwealth personnel in Her Majesty’s armed forces generally apply to naturalise under section 6(1) of the 1981 Act, and they have to meet the following requirements: five years’ residence in the UK; be aged 18 or over; and be of sound mind, a point to which my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire referred. My understanding is that the reference to “sound mind” in this context simply means that the person has the mental capacity to complete the application for naturalisation. I can reassure her that where a former member of the armed forces has a mental health problem, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, whether as a result of their service or otherwise, that would not prevent them from successfully applying for and securing naturalisation if they met the other rules. She rightly says that both in the armed forces and outside we have moved on in our understanding of such mental health conditions, and I am pleased to say that we do not, in any way, discriminate against people, be it deliberately or inadvertently, in this matter.
Applicants must also intend to continue to live in the UK, or to continue in Crown service, the service of an international organisation of which the UK is a member, or the service of a company or association established in the UK. That will be relevant when I go on to talk about the overseas territories, to which my hon. Friend referred. Applicants must also be able to communicate in English, Welsh or Scottish Gaelic—I heard lots of sedentary interventions from Opposition Members when that was mentioned and, although I cannot speak it, I try to pronounce it correctly. Applicants should also have sufficient knowledge of life in the UK and, importantly, be of good character.
I will not go through the residence requirements in enormous detail, but they are broadly that the person has been resident in the United Kingdom for at least five years; has been present in the UK five years before the date of application—that is, of course, where we run into the problem; and is free of immigration time restrictions on the date of application.
Foreign and Commonwealth personnel in Her Majesty’s armed forces are exempt from immigration while they are serving, which means they automatically meet the requirement to be in the UK without a time limit attached to their stay. The Secretary of State already has the discretion to overlook absences, and there are things in the rules that say for how many months someone is allowed to be outside the UK. She generally exercises her discretion in armed forces cases where the absence is caused by service overseas.
Therefore, foreign and Commonwealth personnel in the forces are eligible to naturalise as British citizens after they have served for five years. Alternatively, under the immigration rules, they might qualify for settlement—indefinite leave to remain—on discharge, after four years’ service. They cannot obtain settlement in service because someone who holds indefinite leave to remain is subject to immigration control. If the person opts to be discharged and settles in the UK after four years’ service, they can apply to naturalise after they have held ILTR for one year, thus fulfilling the five-year residence requirement and the requirement not to have a time limit attached to their stay.
My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough referred to family members. Partners of members of the forces can qualify for naturalisation in their own right or as the spouse of someone naturalised. They have to meet the same requirements of residence and good character, but they are subject to immigration control, so they cannot meet the requirement not to have a time limit to their stay until they have obtained settlement, and it takes the partner of a service person four or five years to obtain settlement.
Sir Edward Leigh
What does “settlement” mean? Say someone is married to a member of the armed forces and has been overseas most of the time. Their partner’s clock is ticking, but what is happening to their clock? Do they have to come back and gain settlement? I am sorry, but I do not quite understand how it works.
Mr Harper
The rules operate differently for the spouse. When serving, the service person is not subject to any immigration restrictions, so they could get naturalisation more quickly. Once they have been naturalised, that opens up some opportunities for their family member.
New section 4C of the 1981 Act, introduced in January 2010, enables a child born to a member of the armed forces serving overseas on an operational posting who would have been born in the UK but for that posting to register as a British citizen on application. Children may also register as British citizens if a parent is naturalised or settles in the UK.
The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North referred to a specific case. Obviously, I would not go into a specific case in the House, and I do not have all the details to hand either. As a general rule, there is provision in the immigration system, outside the immigration rules, for people to make an application for leave to remain on compassionate grounds. The Secretary of State and I have the ability to allow that. Clearly, we would not set out the details, but look at the application in the round, but we can grant that if the case is sufficiently compelling.
On the hon. Lady’s general point about testing the Secretary of State’s discretion, all the Secretary of State’s decisions in such matters are of course subject to judicial review. Although we do not use the powers frequently—that would drive a coach and horses through the rules—even during my time as Minister for Immigration we have allowed people to visit the United Kingdom on compassionate grounds when they would not normally have met the rules.
It is helpful to be able to operate with such discretion, which is of course the purpose of the Bill. The requirement for an applicant to have been in the United Kingdom at the start of the five-year period is unwaivable, and the Secretary of State cannot waive it however compelling the case. That is the benefit of putting the Bill on the statute book.
It is worth saying that there is already a provision, of which Members may not be aware, to waive that requirement in Crown service cases, but it applies only to those who are still in service and overseas when they apply. The Bill will enable the requirement to be waived for members and former members of the armed forces who have been discharged and have then applied for naturalisation or who have returned to the UK.
Mr Chope
My hon. Friend might be going on to say this, but there is already a provision on the statute book, in section 39 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009, that is identical to the provisions of the Bill. Why not use the legislation that is already on the statute book, rather than re-legislating?
Mr Harper
My hon. Friend appears to be working seamlessly in tandem with me, because if I turn over the page of my brief, I can see that I was about to refer to the 2009 Act. His general point is good. I am not someone who wants to legislate when provisions already exist in primary legislation. In general, more legislation does not necessarily make the world better. He has a formidable reputation for ensuring that all provisions brought before the House are properly scrutinised and challenged to make sure that they are necessary.
The reason we were not able to make the provision is that there was a provision in the 2009 Act to which my hon. Friend refers. However, it was all bound up with the earned citizenship measures that the previous Government wanted to introduce, and it is not possible, I am advised by lawyers, to implement the armed forces provisions independently of the earned citizenship measures because they contain references to the provisions that are not being implemented. That is why it was necessary to implement the provisions separately.
We announced in July 2010 that we would not be proceeding with the earned citizenship provisions in the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009, because we felt that the previous Government’s provisions under those regimes were considerably more complicated and bureaucratic than the current arrangements and would have imposed unwelcome administrative and bureaucratic costs on both central and local government and voluntary sector partners. Both parties represented in the coalition Government voiced concerns about those measures during their parliamentary passage.
So although there are measures on the statute book, they are bound up with measures that we do not wish to commence, and they cannot be commenced separately. I think I can give my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch the reassurance that he seeks, which is that this provision is necessary. There is not a current provision on the statute book that could be commenced by itself which would enable us to achieve the aim. Although I know that he is normally and rightly sceptical of legislating, I can assure him, given that he and others have welcomed the purpose of the Bill, that it is necessary to do so in the Bill. There is no existing provision on the statute book that we could use. I hope he will find that reassuring.
My hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire referred to the British overseas territories. I will not repeat the list that she read out, but she may be interested in one fact. She mentioned the Cayman Islands. It may interest the House to know that as of 6 September the Cayman Islands has a new governor, Helen Kilpatrick. The only reason why I mention that is that until she was governor of the Cayman Islands, she was the director general of finance and corporate services at the Home Office and is now resplendent, having been appointed by Her Majesty the Queen from 6 September, as governor of the Cayman Islands. It is not relevant to the Bill, but as I am a Minister in the Home Office and worked closely with Helen Kilpatrick, and as my hon. Friend mentioned the Cayman Islands, I thought there was sufficient reason to mention it in the House. But I digress only briefly.
My hon. Friend spoke about the British overseas territories and whether somebody living in an overseas territory could naturalise under the provisions of the Bill. I mentioned in response to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough in my list of conditions that normally the person is supposed to want to settle and live in the United Kingdom, so if someone was settling in an overseas territory, they would not normally be able to naturalise under section 6(1) of the British Nationality Act because they would not meet the requirement of intending to make their principal home in the United Kingdom. They could qualify if they were intending to continue in Crown service. For example, if they still worked for the Crown and were based overseas in an overseas territory, that would apply.
The appropriate route for somebody in that circumstance—a former member of the armed forces settled in an overseas territory—would be for them to apply for British overseas territory citizenship. They would then need to meet the requirements on the knowledge and good character test.
Harriett Baldwin
I thank the Minister for giving way and for beginning to answer some of the questions that I raised about the territorial extent of the Bill. Does he have any plans to amend the territorial extent of the Bill in Committee, in the light of the fact that there seems to be some ambiguity about whether someone may reside in one of those other territories at the point at which they apply for British citizenship?
Mr Harper
The question is not so much where the person physically is when they apply, but what their intentions are. One of the requirements in the Act, as I read out, is that somebody is supposed to intend to continue to live in the United Kingdom. They are supposed to have residence in the United Kingdom or continue in Crown service. If they intend to continue to live in the overseas territory, they ought to apply for British overseas territory citizenship, rather than British citizenship, as in the Bill.
Harriett Baldwin
I know that I am being obtuse, but I do not understand what the purpose is, then, of having all the overseas and dependent territories in the territorial extent of the Bill.
Mr Harper
I would never accuse my hon. Friend of being obtuse. She and I had a great exchange on her previous private Member’s Bill, as she mentioned, when I occupied a different ministerial role. Of course, it is not just the overseas territories, because the Bill states that the Act will extend to England and Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man and the British overseas territories.
On my hon. Friend’s specific question about why it is necessary to refer to the overseas territories, I will reflect on that and, I hope, come back to it at the end of my remarks. Her specific point was about where someone resides. If someone intended to live in an overseas territory, they would be applying for British overseas territory citizenship, rather than what we have been discussing today.
My hon. Friend also mentioned the requirement to have a sufficient level of English and asked whether that requirement can be waived. The Secretary of State can waive the knowledge-of-life and language requirements for citizenship only in very limited circumstances, which are set out. That means someone who is under 18 or over 65 or someone with a specific physical or mental condition that prevents them from being able to fulfil the requirement. My view is that someone who has served for five years in our armed forces will have no problem with being able to speak English. I do not think that it is unreasonable to expect them to do so.
Harriett Baldwin
What I am really trying to clarify is that language acquisition takes place in a specific part of the brain, in the cerebral cortex, that can be damaged later in life, perhaps as the result of a stroke, so someone might have had a good command of English during their period of service but lost that later. Would the Secretary of State have the discretion to waive the requirement in those circumstances?
Mr Harper
The Secretary of State has the ability to waive the requirement if someone’s physical or mental condition is such that they cannot meet it. That would of course mean somebody who has had the particular medical circumstances my hon. Friend raises, and it would of course cover a former member of the armed forces who had suffered an injury in service that had damaged their ability to communicate. The Secretary of State will have the ability to waive that requirement in those circumstances. Assuming that someone does not suffer from that sort of disability, we would expect them to be able to speak English, and I do not think that would be a problem for someone who had served in our armed forces for a period.
My hon. Friends the Members for West Worcestershire and for Gainsborough referred to the extent to which applying for naturalisation was automatic. It is not automatic; it is something that is considered. There are requirements to be met. Some of them are tick-box requirements, such as how long they have resided, but some are more judgment-related, such as those about good character. For those, the Secretary of State has to apply a considerable amount of judgment.
My hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire referred to the new citizenship test that we have introduced, which is much more focused on understanding Britain, our history and culture and, in particular, our democratic values and institutions. I will probably make her blush, but she mentioned that she scored 100% in the test, and the pass mark is 75%, so she is well up there. She referred to how the statistics might have changed. I do not have the precise figures, but the pass rate under the old test was around 75%. It was getting higher as the tests became older and the question bank became out of date and the number of questions reduced. Now that we have introduced the new test, the pass rate has fallen a little, down to about 60%, so it is still quite a challenge. But citizenship is something that people should have to work for. She brandished a book earlier, and all the information required for the test is available. We do not expect people to know it all without putting some study in, but the information is all available.
Harriett Baldwin
Is the Minister saying that although the pass mark for both tests has remained at 75%, about 75% of people got through on the previous version of the test but the more recent data suggest that the pass rate has dropped to between 60% and 65%?
Mr Harper
My hon. Friend is spot on.
I have now been inspired so let me answer my hon. Friend’s question about the territorial extent of the Bill. Because the Bill amends the British Nationality Act, we were keen to make the territorial extent the same. Because the BNA has provisions dealing with British overseas citizenship, it extends to the British overseas territories. If the extent of the amending Act were different, that could cause confusion and doubt in a case in which the overseas territories were involved. The amending Act therefore needs to have the same territorial extent as the Act that we are amending.
Harriett Baldwin
I thank the Minister for his excellent explanation. It answers the question I asked my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) about the territorial extent of the 1981 Act. However, it remains for me to ask the Minister whether, because this is a separate piece of legislation, it could have a narrower territorial extent in order to address some of the points I raised about the possibility that someone could not even live in the UK and still acquire British citizenship.
Mr Harper
I heard my hon. Friend ask that question of my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough and I think that he disabused us of our expectation that he was supposed to have followed all the detail when he reminded us that he was not in the House in 1981 when the Act was passed. Whether the original oversight was, to use his phrase, cock-up or conspiracy, I know not. I was only 11 when the Bill went through the House. I fear that I did not follow parliamentary proceedings very closely when I was 11—perhaps that is a terrible admission—and so I did not follow its passage very closely either. I suspect that he is right and it was more cock-up than conspiracy.
When I was setting out the details on family circumstances, my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough asked whether, to use his phrase, the clock was ticking. Family members of armed forces personnel are not exempt from immigration control, but, provided they have appropriate leave under the immigration rules, the time they spend with their armed forces sponsor, either in the UK or when they are on accompanied service, is time they can count towards naturalisation. They need to meet the residency requirements, but, as for service personnel, the Secretary of State has the discretion to waive and overlook those requirements if the absence from the UK was as a result of accompanying a person on service overseas. I hope that that is helpful and answers my hon. Friend. He is nodding, which suggests that that is the case.
The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North asked about medical discharge. For settlement applications, the requirement for four years’ service can be waived if an illness or injury is attributable to service and is sustained in an operational theatre. If not, a number of factors will be considered, including the severity of the injury, length of service, the prognosis for recovery, and the applicant’s ability to support himself or herself. We may give limited leave where the applicant does not qualify for settlement but needs a period of recovery before they leave the United Kingdom. A member of the armed forces who is granted settlement following medical discharge will be able to apply for citizenship after 12 months. I do not know whether the specific case that the hon. Lady mentioned relates to one of her constituents. If so, and she wants to write to me to raise particular issues, I will obviously be happy to look into them and respond accordingly.
I shall return to the remarks I intended to make—I have not made a great deal of progress because I have dealt with a number of questions. I support what my hon. Friend the Member for Woking said in introducing the Bill. The Government agree that it is wrong that a member of our armed forces should have to wait longer to gain citizenship just because they happened to be posted overseas at the relevant time. The service charities have told us that, and it was recognised as a priority commitment under the armed forces covenant. Once implemented, the Bill will enable us to overlook the requirement to be in the UK on day one of the qualifying period for naturalisation in the same way that we overlook the requirement to have resided in the UK.
My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough or my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch—I forget which, because they were sitting next to each other and both raised a number of points—asked whether the Bill will be retrospective. The Bill will not be retrospective in the sense that it will go back and alter anyone’s existing naturalisation status. However, there is a retrospective element in the sense that the Bill will look back at what happened to applications five years ago and where people were. When the Bill is enacted, not being in the UK at the beginning of the five-year period will cease to be a disadvantage. To that extent, the Bill will be retrospective, but it will not alter the position of someone who has gone through the process of making an application.
When the Bill becomes law—I hope it will—someone who made a failed application or who held off making an application and had to wait for a longer period because they did not meet the requirement will be in a position to make an application under the new rules. If the other conditions are met, the Secretary of State will be in a position to overlook the requirement to have been in the UK at the beginning of the process. The Bill will therefore benefit people who are not currently serving but who have served previously, and that will be welcome.
Mr Harper
It is difficult to be precise, because we do not know how many foreign and Commonwealth members of the armed forces would necessarily want to become British citizens. We estimate—that word has been used previously—that 100 to 200 members of the armed forces each year could benefit from the Bill. That estimate is based on the number of people who seek naturalisation and the number of those who could benefit. That is the order of magnitude. It is not a huge number, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Woking said, that relatively small number of people have served our country. In the past decade, many of them have probably served our country in an operational theatre on not just one occasion, but on several occasions.
Jonathan Lord
Perhaps my intervention will pre-empt a further one. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) is interested in, and perhaps even concerned about, the retrospective element of the Bill. However, I should point out to him that, by the Bill’s nature, the time elapsed will mean that the people affected— whether they live in the UK, are in the armed services or are in Crown service and wish to naturalise as British citizens and live in the UK—will already have qualified. In that sense, there are no great numbers waiting for any retrospective aspect of the Bill. They will already qualify. I hope that that point is helpful.
Mr Harper
It is helpful. Before I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch, it is worth saying that the disadvantage suffered by members of the armed forces under the existing legal position did not mean that they could not seek naturalisation. The disadvantage was that they had to wait longer than someone who was not serving overseas.
To the extent that the disadvantage they suffered was a delay in seeking naturalisation, my hon. Friend is right that the people who suffered from that disadvantage in the past will almost certainly have been in a position to seek naturalisation since.
Mr Chope
My concern was about eligibility: I did not ask how many people would take advantage of the Bill. I wanted to know how many people would legally be eligible. That brings us back to the big national debate about how many people are eligible to come here from Bulgaria and Romania to work, compared with the number of people who will come. How many will be eligible as a result of the retrospection?
Mr Harper
The difficulty with answering that question is that, technically, everyone who is a foreign or Commonwealth member of the armed forces could potentially, depending on their circumstances, be eligible. The problem is that the provision will make a difference only if five years before the point at which someone makes an application for naturalisation they were not in the UK because of their service. It would be impossible to go through everyone’s record of service and do that calculation, because we do not know how many will apply for naturalisation or how many would have been delayed in seeking naturalisation because of where they were five years before making the application.
We think that the number who will not have to suffer a delay is in the order of 100 to 200, and that is based on the fact that most foreign and Commonwealth personnel do not have this problem. Veterans Aid talked of “many cases”, but that is tens and hundreds, rather than thousands. It also said that the Bill would help “quite a few” of their clients, and our estimate of 100 to 200 is based on our knowledge of the process and on talking to those service charities that talk to people who have fallen foul of the existing provision. It is our combined intelligence that enables us to say that it is around 100 or 200. That is the kind of number that we are thinking about. Those who are concerned about the numbers need not worry that the Bill will extend to thousands of people. A relatively small number of people will be affected, but it is important to make the change for the benefit of those people who have served their country. In the last decade, many of those people have served not only in the armed forces generally, but in an active operational theatre, so it is important that the House makes sure that they are not disadvantaged.
My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch also wanted some clarification of the MOD’s general position on the number of foreign and Commonwealth service personnel. This is largely an issue for the Army, rather than the other two branches. The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North also referred to the numbers. In a written statement on 11 July—relatively recently—made by the Minister of State, Ministry of Defence, my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois), the MOD said that it would now be enforcing the five-year UK residence requirement when recruiting Commonwealth personnel. The residency rules already exist for Commonwealth recruits to the regular armed forces, but since 1998 they have been waived. My right hon. Friend informed the House that from 11 July those residency rules will be more strictly enforced, which means that applicants to the armed forces will have to demonstrate that they have lived in the UK for five years lawfully—with leave to remain. That requirement will not affect Gurkhas, because they are recruited only in Nepal under separate arrangements agreed with their Government. If my hon. Friend wants more detail, he can look at the statement made by my right hon. Friend the Minister of State.
Without wishing to be too slopey-shouldered about it, if my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch has detailed questions about the attitude of the Ministry of Defence and recruitment processes and so on, to which I think he alluded, I suggest he speak to my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces. I do not think that the Home Office wants to start trespassing on those requirements, although it is worth putting it on the record that as a result of the work we have done on the covenant, officials and Ministers in my Department, the Home Office and the Ministry of Defence have worked very closely to ensure that the system does not disadvantage anyone. I know that that has been welcomed by members of service charities, who have seen an improvement in how we deal with service personnel, their families and former personnel when they go through immigration and naturalisation stages.
This is probably a good time, as I move towards the end of my remarks, to say that the Home Office takes its responsibilities under the armed forces covenant very seriously. In addition to this proposed legislative measure, we have made good progress against a number of our other commitments. We introduced a new process earlier this year, where service leavers could obtain settlement on—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. I would just say to the Minister that of course the covenant provides important context, but only where it is relevant to the Bill. I hope he is not now going to go into a rather lengthy set of comments about other items in the covenant. I hope he will stick to the Bill, because time is ticking on.
Mr Harper
I am conscious of that, Madam Deputy Speaker. I do not have a lengthy list. It is a short list and the reason for raising it is that it is relevant to the Bill. For example, we have made provision whereby service leavers can obtain settlement on the day of discharge. Of course, settlement for some is the precursor to seeking naturalisation. That is important, because there is not then a gap. Several hon. Members referred to making sure that there is no gap, so that personnel have settled status and no problem in seeking support from the Government or elsewhere.
I will not, Madam Deputy Speaker, test your patience by reading out the list, but I would like to draw to the attention of the House the new set of armed forces rules that will come into force in December. You will be pleased to know, Madam Deputy Speaker, that I laid out the details in a written ministerial statement on 4 July, to which I draw the attention of hon. Members on both sides of the House who are interested in the subject. The new rules will address a number of areas that have been problematic in the past, and I hope that that is helpful.
I will not refer to every paper in my sheaf, but I want to refer to a couple of important questions that came up in the debate. We take the criminality or good character provisions seriously, but we have made a change, which was referred to by at least one Member. Any offences that are offences in service law but not in normal criminal law will no longer be treated in a way that is not subject to judgment. There were a number of cases where it was felt that service personnel who had had a conviction under military law that would not have had the same level of seriousness in civilian criminal law had suffered, and that we had had no ability to judge their case in the round, based on their service. We do, of course, expect the highest standards from our armed forces and apply the same standards as those for civilians. Non-criminal convictions or disciplinary offences are considered when good character is considered, but there is no automatic factor in ruling out somebody. A number of hon. Members referred to that issue, so I thought it was right to deal with it.
A couple of Members referred to what was encapsulated by the definition of “the armed forces”. The definition is the same as that used in the Armed Forces Act and, for the avoidance of doubt, applies to those who serve in our reserve forces, to which several Members have referred.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge gave a wide-ranging speech, in which she referred to some of the service charities and the points they have made about the service they received from what was the UK Border Agency. It is worth putting it on the record that the splitting of the UK Border Agency and the creation of UK Visas and Immigration, which is the relevant part of the Home Office that deals with naturalisation applications, means that we are focused on delivering better customer service. Some of the changes we announced in the written statement mean that we will be better able to look at applications from the armed forces, which will be made on a special, separate application form, to ensure that we can deliver a settlement on the day of discharge.
Mr Chope
I think the Minister is nearing the end of his remarks, but before he does, can he address my question about why this issue cannot be dealt with in the forthcoming immigration Bill? Doing so would enable us to consider, for example, the case that I raised of a constituent who has been out in Russia for a long time, because she has been married to a British citizen living out there, looking after their children. She has been unable to apply for naturalisation because she has not been living in the UK.
Mr Harper
Without tempting Madam Deputy Speaker to chastise me, what I would say is that if my hon. Friend writes to me, I will look at the details. At the end of my remarks, I will set out briefly why the immigration Bill would not be the right place to deal with this issue, but I will not do so at any length.
Let me finish what I was saying in response to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge raised. I hope that former members of the armed forces and the service charities they deal with will notice—indeed, I hope they have noticed—an improved level of customer service from UK Visas and Immigration. That is certainly something that the Home Office wants to achieve, and I hope we will be able to deliver that.
Before I close my remarks, let me briefly address the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch raised earlier—to be fair, I said that I would do so. His question was: why would it not have been appropriate to deal with this issue in the immigration Bill? The short answer is that that Bill addresses three topics: first, access to public services; secondly, putting into primary legislation the rules on article 8 that the House put in the immigration rules last year; and thirdly, dealing with appeals and removals. That Bill does not make changes to the nationality provisions of our legislation, because I did not want its scope to be that wide. I wanted to focus on the Government’s priorities for reforming the immigration system; I did not want us to get bogged down in the many nationality questions that I know we might otherwise have considered.
My hon. Friend the Member for Woking has introduced a focused Bill, dealing with a genuine problem. It is not a problem that affects thousands of people; rather, it affects potentially hundreds of people, but they are people who have done great service to our country. The approach he has adopted, in introducing a very focused Bill that has support from both sides of the House—the official Opposition and the Government—is the right way to proceed. I very much hope that the Bill will receive a Second Reading and a fair wind in reaching the statute book.