Home Department

Lord Harper Excerpts

Tuesday 15th October 2013 Ministerial Corrections

[Sir James Paice]

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many certificates of sponsorship for tier 5 visas have been issued by each sponsoring body in each of the last three years.

[Official Report, 25 June 2013, Vol. 565, c. 167-8W.]

Letter of correction from Mark Harper:

An error has been identified in the written answer given to the right hon. Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Sir James Paice) on 25 June 2013.

The full answer given was as follows:

[Mr Harper]

[holding answer 10 June 2013]: We are unable to provide the data regarding all tier 5 sponsors as the low volume of certificates issued by a third of them would make it possible to identify individuals or personal data.

The following table shows how many certificates of sponsorship (CoS) for tier 5 visas have been issued by the top 50 sponsors in each of the last three years. This information has also been placed in the House Library.

[Mr Harper]

[holding answer 10 June 2013]: We are unable to provide the data regarding all tier 5 sponsors as the low volume of certificates issued by a third of them would make it possible to identify individuals or personal data.

The following table shows how many certificates of sponsorship (CoS) for tier 5 visas have been issued by the top 50 sponsors in each of the last three years. This information has also been placed in the House Library.

“Go Home or Face Arrest” Campaign

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 9th October 2013 Westminster Hall

[Pete Wishart]

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman mentioned that, because I saw the Minister this morning, going from studio to studio, defending this decision. I think that he took some comfort from the fact that the ASA only banned it because it was misleading, not because it was offensive or racist. However, that is cold comfort to the Minister, because the ASA said that this campaign was reminiscent of the anti-immigrant campaigns of the ’70s and that people would find it offensive.

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

indicated dissent.

[Pete Wishart]

The Minister is scowling. The saddest thing about these TV appearances this morning is that he is still prepared to defend this absurd campaign and to revise it and bring it back to us, once again, aping his boss, the Home Secretary, who made the same remarks in an interview with Andrew Marr on Sunday. We might see the son of hate vans in the streets soon.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) asked me lots of questions and has not left me a great deal of time to answer them, but I will do my best. If colleagues will forgive me, I shall address my answers to him, as it is his debate. If I have chance, I will take interventions from others, but it is right that I try to address his questions.

I suspect that the hon. Gentleman and I, from the sound of his remarks, will not agree on the merits of the campaign, but it is worth setting out our thinking, because the campaign is not what he suggests. It is not focused at migrants; it is focused at people who are in the United Kingdom illegally—people who are here and breaking our laws. The campaign is not about migrants.

The hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil)—I apologise again, because I always mangle the name of his constituency—said that the Government do not welcome people to Britain, which is not true. Every single time we make a speech or publish something, we make it very clear that Britain is open to migrants from across the world: people who want to come here to work, to study and to make a contribution. That message, which is welcoming to people who want to follow our laws and rules, is perfectly compatible with a message that says, “For those people who come here and do not follow the rules, and who want to break our laws, we should be equally firm about telling them that we want to enforce those laws.” Frankly, if people are here illegally, they should go back to their country of origin. There is nothing wrong with suggesting that they do so. If it is as bad here at the moment as the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire suggests, the obvious question is why people are in this country illegally and not returning to their country of origin. We have worked closely with community groups and those involved in supporting migrants to help them to deliver that message sensitively.

The campaign to which the hon. Gentleman refers was a pilot, and we were trying to give a tough message about what will happen if people do not leave the country voluntarily: they will leave themselves open to arrest, detention and enforced removal. But the message also said that there is something that those people can do: they can contact the Home Office, and we will assist them in returning to their country of origin voluntarily, perhaps supporting them to do so. A significant number of people, more than 29,000, do that each year. That way of addressing the problem is greatly preferable, and it is much better for the taxpayer.

The hon. Gentleman referred to the cost. The cost of the pilot was just £10,000. If an individual who was in the country illegally chooses to go home as a result of the pilot, it will have paid for itself. We are doing a full evaluation. At the end of the three-month period, which is a reasonable period because of the time it takes to get travel documents, we will do the evaluation and then make a decision about the pilot.

However, I can tell the hon. Gentleman that the first voluntary departure as a result of the pilot took place on 2 August. It was that of a Pakistani national who had been living in the UK illegally since December. Interestingly—colleagues might find this slightly ironic—he did not see the ad van itself; he saw a picture of it in The Guardian newspaper. He texted the number and we arranged to support him for his flight home, so at least one individual has left the country as a result of the pilot. From a cost perspective—something that I think the Chair of the Select Committee on Home Affairs has mentioned—the pilot has already paid for itself. If we had had to arrest, detain and enforce the removal of one individual, it would have cost the taxpayer probably the best part of £15,000, so from a cost perspective, if we can persuade people to go home voluntarily, that is clearly the right thing to do.

The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire referred to the Advertising Standards Authority, but I do not think he accurately set out its view. It was very clear today and did not uphold any of the complaints about the vans or the allegations that the vans were offensive or racist. It said:

“We considered that, in context, the claim would be interpreted as a message regarding the immigration status of those in the country illegally...not related to their race or ethnicity.”

It concluded that

“the poster was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence or distress”

and was

“unlikely to incite or exacerbate racial hatred and tensions in multicultural communities...it was not irresponsible and did not contain anything...likely to condone or encourage violence or anti-social behaviour.”

The van referred to someone’s area, and the hon. Gentleman is right about the ASA’s view that people would interpret that as being quite a narrow area. For example, in a London borough, people would assume that it meant the London borough. Since our statistics were from a slightly larger area, the ASA said that it was misleading. We have therefore agreed not to use those advertisements in the form that was used.

The ASA did not support the outlandish claims that I think the hon. Gentleman suggested. He should also be aware that his views are not supported by the public. The poll conducted by YouGov on 13 August found that 66% of those polled in the United Kingdom did not consider the poster to be racist, so two thirds of those polled do not agree with him. Also, the comprehensive poll conducted by Lord Ashcroft and published on 1 September found that 79% of those polled supported the messaging in our posters, because they can see that giving a firm message to people who are in the country illegally is perfectly compatible with being welcoming and supportive of those who come to our country legally, follow our rules and comply with the law.

The hon. Gentleman got very heated on that point, but I do not think that he has the measure of public opinion on this issue. People want to welcome those who come here for the right reasons, but the public want to deal firmly with people who should not be here. The advertising campaign was squarely aimed at those who are in the country illegally and have no right to be here. Asking people in that context to return to their country of origin is perfectly reasonable.

The hon. Gentleman also mentioned the Scotland reporting centre. He should know that that pilot ran from 29 July, which is prior to his letter, to 4 October. It did not use any of the materials that we used for the ad van campaign. A significant proportion of those using the reporting centre are people who have no right to be in the United Kingdom. They should not be here and should be returning to their country of origin. Partly, the message is a tough one, but the other side of the message tells people that we can support their return and help them to go home.

Our immigration enforcement officers work closely with many communities in the United Kingdom. They work with faith and voluntary groups that know of people who want to return home, but need support to do that. They do not want to be arrested or detained; they want to come forward in such a way that they avoid that experience, and I think that that is perfectly reasonable.

The hon. Gentleman asked what we might do in future. As I said, we are evaluating the campaign to see how successful it has been in driving up significantly the number of voluntary returns. We will make that information available and then decide whether to continue.

On the street operations that we conducted, the hon. Gentleman referred to racial profiling. I absolutely refute that. Our officers do not have the legal power, and we do not have the ability, to do that. We use intelligence to identify where to run the operations, and when we encounter people, we decide whether to talk to them based on their behaviour, not their race, ethnicity or appearance. I absolutely refute his allegation that we are involved in racial profiling in street operations, and it is not supported by the evidence. Again, it is worth saying that the general public support the work that we do in enforcing illegal working laws and in making sure that people obey the law.

Our officers have a difficult job to do. I have been out with them on operations. They take their responsibilities and the intelligence seriously, and they are well aware of the legal environment. They have proper briefings before the operations and they deal with the people they encounter sensitively. I have seen operations where, for example, we have encountered people who have done nothing wrong, and our officers have dealt with them very sensitively and handled a difficult situation well. I do not think that the way in which the hon. Gentleman characterises the issue reflects the reality on the ground. It is hard and difficult work. Just as the police have a difficult job in enforcing criminal laws, our immigration enforcement officers have to enforce immigration laws. They deal with people who should not be in the United Kingdom, and who might not wish to return to their country of origin, but it is important that we enforce the law. It is difficult work and will remain so. It has to be done sensitively, which is what we have been doing.

[Mr Virendra Sharma]

Nobody is questioning that we are talking about illegal immigrants. We support the idea that there should be no illegal immigrants, but we question the tactics used—for example, when there is forced entry into shops and other places where they cannot find anybody and the intelligence is poor. The small sample of 500 people supporting the idea is not good evidence.

[Mr Harper]

On the point that the hon. Gentleman makes about entry, our officers have to obey the law in the same way as other law enforcement officers. I have attended operations on which we have encountered the “beds in sheds” phenomenon in his part of London, where there are some appalling pieces of accommodation. When we have to gain entry to those properties, we have to work with the local authority. The local authority has to seek a warrant for entry. We have to go through a proper legal process. We have to have evidence and intelligence when we deal with those things, and it is the same when we do illegal working operations. We have to have intelligence; we do not simply do it on a speculative basis. If we have intelligence, we approach people and gather evidence on whether people are working illegally. I make no apology for doing that, because it is not simply about the fact that they are breaking our laws. Employers who employ people illegally undercut legitimate business people. They compete with them unfairly, and we should deal with that.

The hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire both said that they are against illegal immigration. I am glad that they said that. All that the campaign was about was trying something—a pilot—to see whether it was successful. We have been frank about it and we will be guided by the evidence. If the evidence suggests that the pilot has been successful, I might flip the question round and ask why we would not go ahead with a pilot that is successful and that leads to more people leaving the country voluntarily. If the pilot proves unsuccessful, we will not roll it out. It will be based on the evidence. We will analyse the pilot properly.

The evidence from the public is that they support a tough approach. I make no apology for dealing with the concerns of the public. We are not, as was suggested, talking about a recent phenomenon. We said at the general election that we would deal with immigration. We have reduced net migration to the country by a third. We have cracked down on abuse. We have seen an increase in the number of students and skilled workers coming here. We want to give the message that we are open for business for the best and the brightest, but that should be combined with dealing firmly with people who break our immigration laws and either come here illegally or overstay their visa. Those things are compatible, and that is how we wish to continue.

Registered Travellers

Lord Harper Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2013 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

On 24 September 2013, Border Force launched a registered traveller scheme. Registered traveller will be beneficial to high value, regular travellers to the UK and have a positive impact on economic growth.

Individuals from Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand and the United States of America who have travelled to the UK four or more times as a short-term visitor in a preceding 52-week period will be able to apply to join registered traveller online at a dedicated website. Applications will be initially restricted to those registered on the iris recognition immigration system (IRIS) scheme, which has been in place since 2005 and will be fully decommissioned later this year.

Successful applicants will submit information contained in their passport to allow Border Force to undertake background checks prior to their next arrival in the UK, when, if their application is accepted, they will be able to enrol on the scheme. Once enrolled on the scheme, users will be able to access expedited clearance processes at the border. The scheme will initially be in operation at Heathrow and Gatwick airports before being rolled out to other ports in due course.

The period between now and April 2014 has been designated as a proof of concept phase for registered traveller. It is currently intended for registered traveller to operate on a permanent basis from 1 April 2014. The Home Office also intends for there to be an annual charge for the scheme from this point.

I have made an arrangement under paragraph 1 (d) of schedule 23 to the Equality Act 2010 to enable Border Force to process selected individuals from Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand and the United States of America as “registered travellers”. This arrangement came into force on 24 September 2013 and will allow the scheme to operate on a sound legal basis.

The arrangement is made under the nationality exception contained in the Equality Act 2010. The nationalities covered by the arrangement will be reviewed by the Home Office on a regular basis.

I am placing a copy of the arrangement in the Libraries of both Houses of Parliament.

Citizenship (Armed Forces) Bill

Lord Harper Excerpts

Friday 13th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[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.

[Jonathan Lord]

We look forward to hearing the Minister later.

--- Later in debate ---

[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—

[Mr Harper]

Please do.

[Harriett Baldwin]

Shall I? In that case, here is another one.

--- Later in debate ---

[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.

--- Later in debate ---

[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]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

I had hoped that that was a good explanation.

[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 Chope]

I raised the issue of retrospection. As a result of the retrospective nature of the Bill, how many people will be eligible who would not otherwise have been eligible?

[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.

[Mr Chope]

rose—

[Jonathan Lord]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

As it is my hon. Friend’s Bill, I will take his intervention first before listening to the response of my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch.

[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.

[Mr Chope]

rose—

Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme/Sector-based Scheme

Lord Harper Excerpts

Thursday 12th September 2013 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

The seasonal agricultural workers scheme (SAWS) allows fruit and vegetable growers to employ migrant workers from Bulgaria and Romania as seasonal workers for up to six months at a time. It will close, as planned, at the end of 2013. The Government do not intend to open any new SAWS for workers from outside the European economic area (EEA) as our view is that, at a time of unemployment in the UK and the European Union there should be sufficient workers from within those labour markets to meet the needs of the horticultural industry. The agricultural technologies strategy will support innovation by agricultural businesses, which will also help to offset future impacts.

Currently, there is an annual quota of 21,250 SAWS participants. From 1 January 2014, when the transitional labour market controls on Bulgarian and Romanian (EU2) nationals are lifted, growers will have unrestricted access to EU2 workers. Since the controls on the EU8 (the member states that acceded to the European Union in 2004) workers were lifted, those workers have continued to form the core of the seasonal agricultural workforce. At present, UK growers recruit about one third of their seasonal workers from the EU2, and about one half from the EU8. Seasonal agricultural work can pay good wages and the sector should be able to attract and retain UK and EEA workers.

Our migration policy is to allow only highly skilled workers from outside the EEA, with an annual limit of 20,700 workers. Unskilled and low-skilled labour needs should be satisfied from within the expanded EEA labour market. The SAWS was previously open to non-EEA nationals but was restricted in 2007 to EU2 nationals, consistent with an intention to phase it out as the EEA labour market expanded. That remains the Government’s position. We do not think that the characteristics of the horticultural sector, such as its seasonality and dependence on readily available workers to be deployed at short notice, are so different from those in other employment sectors as to merit special treatment from a migration policy perspective.

The independent Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) reviewed the impact of the closure of the SAWS on the horticulture sector earlier this year. They concluded that there was unlikely to be an impact on labour supply in the short term, although this might change in the longer term. They noted, however, that there is a wide range of uncertainty around the effects on migration flows to the UK of ending restrictions on labour market access for EU2 nationals. The MAC was also clear that a replacement SAWS would amount to preferential treatment for horticulture.

The Government recognise that the SAWS has for many years provided an efficient supply of labour for the horticultural sector. The Department for Work and Pensions has been working with JobCentre Plus, Lantra (the sector skills council), the National Farmers’ Union and others, including growers and horticultural recruitment firms, to help unemployed UK residents into horticultural work through training and guaranteed interviews. A pilot scheme to encourage unemployed UK residents to apply for, train and secure jobs on arable farms has shown encouraging results with a high proportion of participants going on to secure employment in the sector. We want to build on this and other innovative approaches. The Government, including the Department for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs, the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Communities and Local Government, look forward to working with the sector to monitor and address the issues, and will keep the situation under review.

The Government have also decided they will not replace the sector-based scheme which operates in the food processing sector when this closes at the end of the year. The scheme is not heavily used and the MAC concluded closure was unlikely to have any negative effects on the sector’s ability to meet its labour needs.

Spousal Visas

Lord Harper Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) for the opportunity to discuss this issue. He said very clearly at the beginning of his remarks that he very much supports the Government’s general position on the immigration system and the desire to restore some sanity to it after the uncontrolled immigration system that we saw under the Labour party, and I wholeheartedly agree with him.

As my hon. Friend correctly said in his opening remarks, the family rules have three aims. The first, which I know he strongly supports, is to deal with abuse, which is why we have extended from two years to five years the probationary period before partners can apply for settlement, to test the genuineness of the relationship concerned, which should help to deter applications based on sham marriages. Secondly, we are promoting the integration of family migrants by requiring those applying for settlement from 28 October this year to pass the new “Life in the UK” test and demonstrate that they can speak and understand English to the intermediate B1 level. That means that those intending to live permanently in the UK can communicate in the wider community and have a basic understanding of British history, culture and democracy. My hon. Friend said that he supported that as well.

The third issue, about which my hon. Friend has concerns, is the aspect of the rules seeking to prevent burdens on the taxpayer by introducing the minimum income threshold of £18,600 a year to be met by those wishing to sponsor the settlement of a partner. He said that that was an arbitrary number. It was the Migration Advisory Committee, the independent body that advises the Government, that proposed a range of numbers based on its analysis of the problem; we adopted a figure from the lower end.

In talking about regional pay, my hon. Friend touched on the interaction between the welfare and immigration systems. As I said in the Westminster Hall debate, it is interesting that Members who, in the context of this debate, say that £18,600 is a high number, often suggest—I am not suggesting my hon. Friend does—suggest in the context of a welfare debate that it is not high. We selected that number because it is broadly the amount more than which a couple must earn if they are not to be eligible for income-related benefits.

My hon. Friend is right that in the period when the migrant spouse is in the UK before they get indefinite leave to remain, they are not entitled to benefits, but they will be once they are settled and their spouse may be entitled to income-related benefits because of their being here—housing benefit, for example. As he said, we do not have a regional benefit system and that is one of the complexities of the case.

In practice, the previous requirement for adequate maintenance meant that any sponsor earning, after tax and housing costs, more than the equivalent of income support for a couple—about £5,700—was deemed to have sufficient funds to sponsor a partner. That was not an adequate basis for sustainable family migration and did not provide adequate assurance—

[Fiona Mactaggart]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

If the hon. Lady does not mind, I will try to address my hon. Friend, whose Adjournment debate this is. I want to deal with his issues.

The requirement provided little assurance of a sustainable basis over the long term. That is why we came up with the new financial requirement, based principally on the expert advice from the Migration Advisory Committee. It is the level of income at which a couple, once settled in the UK and taking into account children, generally cannot access income-related benefits. My hon. Friend said that his constituent had no intention of claiming benefits, but of course there is no way for us legally to enforce their not claiming benefits once they are in the United Kingdom.

We think that we have set out the right basis. The Migration Advisory Committee looked at whether there was a case for varying the income threshold across the United Kingdom, which is the substance of my hon. Friend’s point—I know that he did not want to make that point, but I will take it as a suggestion floating around that I can comment on. The Migration Advisory Committee looked at that approach but concluded that there was not a clear case for taking it. It would mean that sponsors, for example, could make an application when living in one area and then move around the United Kingdom. It would also penalise a sponsor living in a relatively wealthy part of a poor region; they would have a lower income threshold than a sponsor living in a deprived area of a relatively wealthy region. A single national threshold may not be more acceptable, but it makes things clearer for people than a much more complicated system of regional targets.

As my hon. Friend mentioned, I said in the previous debate that we would continue to monitor the impact of the new rules and make adjustments when appropriate. People who have raised issues with me—I see Members here who came to see me—will have noticed that in the immigration rule changes that I laid before the House on Friday last week, we set out changes in the flexibility of evidence, allowing details of electronic bank statements to be submitted. There will also be flexibility around the cash savings that people can have, to include net proceeds from the sale of a property owned by the applicant and a partner. That has been an issue in some specific cases.

We are also making provision for British sponsors returning from overseas to count future on-target earnings in some circumstances and to allow subcontractors under the HMRC construction industry scheme to evidence their income from that work as if it were from salaried employment. We have made changes.

On the change that my hon. Friend mentioned about taking account of the job offer of the migrant spouse, I have asked officials to look at that. The real challenge is how we could come up with a set of rules that were not liable to massive abuse. He highlighted that risk when he said that we would obviously have to deal with people being able to have fictitious job applications and people abusing those rules. I have asked for work to be done on that, and I will consider it. I know from the work that was done when the rules were introduced that it is not an easy issue to deal with, but we are looking at it.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman. This is a Back-Bench debate and he gets plenty of opportunities to speak.

I am conscious that in the specific case my hon. Friend raised, the gentleman concerned is not able to hit the income level. As I said, the real concern is about the interaction of the welfare system and the immigration system. That is why we have set the income level as it is. I suspect that a lot of Members who want us to reduce the income level would probably not support what would have to go with it—a reduction in the level at which someone could claim income-related benefits. Indeed, when I raised that in the Westminster Hall debate, many of those who were arguing for a lower level of income were rather silent in their support for a reduction in the welfare system. That is one of the interesting interactions that we have to deal with.

My hon. Friend said that people in his constituency have highlighted the difference between those coming from the EU and those coming from outside it. Several other Members who are present have raised that issue. I would say several things. First, it may not be the case in his constituency, but nationally EU migration remains the smaller part of immigration. About 30% of immigrants come from EU countries and over half come still from outside the EU. It is important to put that into context. It is also the case that if people coming here from the EU want to stay for more than three months they cannot just come here for no reason—they have to be working or looking for work, or to be self-employed, self-sufficient or a student. There are some rules around the treaty rights that have to be exercised.

The Government are concerned about the abuse of free movement whereby people may come to the United Kingdom simply to try to claim benefits or to get round the rules. My hon. Friend might be aware that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, together with her colleagues and her equivalents from Germany, Austria and the Netherlands, has written to the European Commission and demanded action on this. We are in the process of putting together evidence that will be discussed at a relevant Council meeting—I think in October or November—when we will look at how we can deal with the abuse of free movement, which I know from my hon. Friend’s remarks is a concern for a number of his constituents.

My hon. Friend suggested that this might be an area where a future Conservative Government may wish to look at detailed changes to our relationship with the rest of the European Union in order to deal with some of our constituents’ concerns. I know that he may well want to go a little further than the party’s policy, but whether it is leaving, as he would prefer, or having a robust negotiation, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister intends, either of those situations would improve the position that his constituents and many of mine are concerned about. We cannot apply the same rules to EU citizens because we are bound by our treaty obligations. It is important that we make sure that we enforce the rules that already exist. I completely understand that his constituents may find that a challenge.

Since I have three minutes left and I think I have dealt with my hon. Friend’s points, I will take a couple of interventions—one from my hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Jane Ellison) and then one from the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart).

[Jane Ellison]

I am grateful to the Minister. I thank him for the flexibility that he has shown and his preparedness to look at the rules and make adjustments. He is aware of a very long-running case that he has been dealing with and about which we have spoken very often. Self-employment can be an issue, particularly for someone who has had periods of maternity leave. Obviously, that challenge particularly affects women. Will he remain open to looking to make adjustments on such issues?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend mentions a case that she has raised extensively with me, including in writing, and I have set out a solution for her constituent. On self-employment, a couple of the changes we have made with regard to evidencing income will be helpful. We will continue to look at the detailed issues that are raised with us and we will, of course, deal with those that make sense and that we do not think are amenable to abuse. The rules have only been in place for a little over a year and we will continue to change them to make them more sensible where we think there are unintended consequences.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

I thank the Minister and am grateful for the changes he has made already; I think they are moving in the right direction. He has said that couples require a minimum income of £18,600 before they get benefits, but the problem with that is that the burden is placed on the British resident and citizen, not the couple. Will the Minister do more take into account the capacity of the migrant spouse to earn while they are here?

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Lady raises a perfectly good point, which was also raised in the Westminster Hall debate. The difficulty is dealing with the matter in a way that is not easy to abuse and to use as a way of driving a coach and horses through the system. We continue to look at the matter, but I know from the abuse we have seen in other areas of the immigration system that if we simply require, for example, a job offer without any detailed back-up, I am afraid there are plenty of people around who have—

Immigration Rules

Lord Harper Excerpts

Friday 6th September 2013 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is today laying before the House a statement of changes in immigration rules as set out below.

I will expand the process of genuineness assessments and interviews to tier 1 (general), tier 2 (minister of religion), and tier 5 (temporary worker) applications for entry and leave to remain, and to tier 4 students applying for further leave to remain. I will also be replicating for tier 4 in-country extensions the existing power to refuse applications where the applicant cannot speak English. We will add Barbados to the list of countries whose nationals benefit from different documentary requirements and are exempt from the genuineness test when applying for a tier 4 visa.

I am making several small changes to economic routes to make them more attractive and more flexible for businesses. These changes include new provision in tier 1 for artists of exceptional promise, removing the English language requirement for intra-company transferees, making it easier for graduate entrepreneurs to switch into tier 2, and waiving share-ownership restrictions for senior staff earning £152,100 or more.

I will also be introducing flexibility for tourists and business visitors to undertake some study where it is incidental to the main purpose of their visit, as well as increasing the permissible activities a business visitor can undertake in the UK. I am retaining the student visitor route for those whose purpose in coming here is for short-term study. The prospective student route is being removed because it is little used and anomalous.

I am adding Hong Kong to the list of participating countries and territories on the UK’s youth mobility scheme, further strengthening business, trade and cultural ties between us.

I am introducing rules to give effect to the Secretary of State for Defence’s statement to this House of 4 June 2013, which provides for some locally engaged staff, who have been or will be made redundant as a result of our draw down, to relocate to the UK in recognition of the unique contribution they have provided to the UK’s efforts in Afghanistan. The new rules allow eligible applicants, their spouse/partner and their minor dependent children to be granted a period of five years’ leave to enter if their character and conduct is satisfactory.

In line with the statement of intent “Knowledge of language and life in the UK for settlement and naturalisation” published on 8 April, I am also making changes to the way in which applicants for indefinite leave to remain are required to demonstrate their knowledge of the English language and of life in the UK, together with necessary consequential amendments. These changes will come into effect on 28 October.

I am making changes to slow the path to settlement for refugees, and those granted humanitarian protection, who have committed crimes. Applications for settlement from refugees will be refused for 15 years from the date of their sentence if they have been sentenced to over 12 months’ imprisonment; for seven years if they have been sentenced to up to 12 months’ imprisonment; and for two years if they have been given a non-custodial sentence. Discretion to delay the route to settlement will apply in the case of repeat offenders.

I am creating new temporary immigration rules to facilitate the entry and stay of certain Commonwealth games participants and personnel during the 2014 Commonwealth games.

I am making minor changes and clarifications to the immigration rules, including those relating to family life.

I am making minor changes to repeal measures that are no longer required.

I am making a minor change to the curtailment rules. This change adds a power to curtail leave where a migrant’s offending is persistent or causes serious harm. The change supports the Home Office in its work to take tough action against those who commit offences while here.

I am making changes to the rules for dependants in the points-based system and other work routes, following the High Court judgment in R—(on the application of Zhang) v Secretary of State for the Home Department. The changes will allow dependants to apply from within the UK, providing they are not here illegally, as visitors, or on temporary admission or temporary release. They will still need to satisfy all other existing requirements.

I am making changes to the visit visa requirement for Kuwaiti nationals holding diplomatic and special passports issued by Kuwait. When travelling to the UK for the purpose of an official or general visit, they will no longer have to obtain a visit visa to travel to the UK.

Immigration (Detention of Pregnant Women)

Lord Harper Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller) for securing this debate. As he acknowledged, he and I have had detailed discussions on this issue. Yarl’s Wood, the principal immigration removal centre holding female detainees, is located in his constituency, so I completely understand his interest in this particular issue, both from a policy and a constituency perspective.

First, I would like to emphasise that the decision to detain someone is never taken lightly and only as a last resort. My hon. Friend acknowledged that in his speech. Generally, when we decide that detention is appropriate, we ensure that we take care of detainees’ welfare. That obviously includes pregnant women, who have particular needs. He set out the Government’s policy quite fairly. It is that we do not, in general, detain pregnant women except in two sets of circumstances. The first is when a woman’s removal from the UK is imminent and medical advice suggests that her baby is not due before the expected removal date. The second is, under the asylum system, when the decision not to grant asylum would allow for the woman to be removed.

I thought that the statistics that my hon. Friend cited suggested that we were doing as the policy required. He described the significant number of people who were detained, then said that only 100 of those were pregnant women. I think I have got that figure right; I was listening carefully to his speech. That shows that we detain very few pregnant women and that we do so only in the circumstances that I have described.

We factor into our decisions the timing issue that my hon. Friend raised. Obviously I do not have the details of the specific case that he mentioned, but I will explain in a minute why I do not think that that case would have contravened our existing policy. We factor into the decision on timing the International Air Transport Association’s guidelines to airlines on carrying pregnant women, which provide for travel up to 28 weeks or, if medically certified, up to either 32 or 36 weeks depending on the circumstances of the pregnancy. Women who are less than 24 weeks pregnant may also be detained under the fast-track asylum process operating at Yarl’s Wood, which would allow for a case to be processed and, if appropriate—that is, if asylum is not granted—for removal to take place within those time frames.

In regard to the case that my hon. Friend described, I can give him only a general answer as I do not have the details. If he would like to write to me after the debate with those details, however, I will of course look into the specifics of the case and correspond with him about them. We might have detained the woman for removal, and the removal might then not have gone ahead for a reason that was not anticipated at the time. There might have been a further legal challenge, for example, or perhaps a travel document was unavailable. Alternatively, she could have been detained under the fast-track process prior to the 24-week point. All those circumstances would fall within published policy, but it would be better if my hon. Friend could furnish me with the details of the specific case so that I can look into it.

[Richard Fuller]

The Minister has just indicated in his answer the very reason the current policy does not work. It is based on imminence, and imminence cannot be predicted, for the very reason that he has just set out. He has therefore just stated why ending the detention of pregnant women would be a clearer, fairer, better and more moral policy. We are talking about 100 women. That is it. Would it not say more about the ethics of his policy if he were to accept that reality and stop the policy now, rather than pretending that the policy is actually happening in practice?

[Mr Harper]

I do not agree with my hon. Friend, for this reason. The use of statistics was mentioned, but we do not collect statistics on this matter because women are not, of course, obliged to tell the Home Office whether they are pregnant. They may tell us, and if they do, the information will be held on their individual case file and they will be provided with appropriate health care, broadly comparable to what is available from an NHS general practitioner. The women are under no obligation to tell us, and I do not think forcing them to disclose the information would be right. That is an issue about the statistics.

Making decisions about the imminence of removal is clearly based on our best intelligence, but as we know, the people who have no right to be in the United Kingdom and who should leave the country voluntarily often throw all sorts of legal obstacles in the way. We may detain a woman when removal is imminent and she may attempt to secure a last-minute legal challenge to throw a roadblock in the way of her removal, and we have no way of anticipating that before she does so. That provides my hon. Friend with an example.

If we were to do what my hon. Friend suggested and have a blanket policy of not detaining women, first, having read many cases, I fear we would find quite a lot of people saying they were pregnant as another method of delaying their departure from the UK. I have seen people throw many obstacles in the way when they have no right to be here, and I do not want this to be one of them. We are committed to treating pregnant women properly, providing proper health care and treating them well. I do not want this to be an excuse that women who are not pregnant dream up in order to throw a legal obstacle in the way. I fear that that would be the result of adopting the blanket policy suggested by my hon. Friend.

A logical follow-on policy from what my hon. Friend suggests would mean not removing the women from the UK when they were pregnant and allowing them to give birth to their child, but then seeking to remove both the woman and the very young child from the UK to their home country or country of origin—and I am not sure that that would be an improvement. If I anticipate correctly, if we did that, we would then be criticised for trying to remove the mother with her very young child back to their country of origin. As I say, I am not sure that that would be an improvement on the present situation, because the fact remains that these women have no right to be in the UK: they should not be here and they should leave voluntarily. [Interruption.] I cannot quite tell whether the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) is dying to intervene.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

I was squeaking—the Minister is right—because I cannot believe that someone is going to get pregnant in order not to be detained. Secondly, it is quite easy to find out whether someone is pregnant, so that bit of the Minister’s excuse proves his hon. Friend’s very powerful argument that this is a moral case. I fear that I hear in the Minister’s response a kind of Home Office “jobsworthness”, which I think he should be above and is usually above.

[Mr Harper]

I am not going to let the hon. Lady put words into my mouth. I did not say—I chose my words very carefully—that women would get pregnant; I said women would say they were pregnant in order to throw a legal challenge. I know it is perfectly easy to test whether women are pregnant, but we do not have the right to do that. The Home Office does not have the right to insist that a women disclose that she is pregnant. We do not have the right forcibly to test people to see whether they are pregnant. If I were to propose that, I doubt whether the hon. Lady would support it. To be clear, I did not say that people would get pregnant; I said that they would say they were to throw a legal obstacle in the way of their removal from the country. I have seen enough cases—and I know the hon. Lady has—to know that there are people who would stoop to doing that to delay their removal from the UK.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

However, the Home Office could easily say, “We will release you if you provide evidence of pregnancy.”

[Mr Harper]

That may be the case, but our objective is not to let the people out of detention, but to remove them from the UK. That it is the point, and it is one I think my hon. Friend is missing, too. The fact is that these women have no right to be in the UK and should leave. I am not sure that a policy that allowed them stay in order to give birth to their child, when we would immediately want to remove both the woman and the child from the UK, would be a better policy than the one we have today.

[Richard Fuller]

If the purpose is to remove people, will the Minister counter my statistics with statistics of his own, and explain why only five out of 100 women have been deported and 95 have been returned to the community? I am not sure that his argument stacks up.

[Mr Harper]

I am not sure that I agree with my hon. Friend’s statistics, but I do not have the details. Because, as far as I know, the Home Office has not been given the details of the 20 people to whom Medical Justice referred, it is difficult for us to validate its assertions. The difficulty with giving my hon. Friend overall statistics is that although when women provide the information that they are pregnant, that information is held on their health records, we do not log it statistically, and obviously we can do so only when they disclose the information to us. Of course, in the early stages of pregnancy they may not even be aware of the fact themselves.

When a pregnant woman is detained she will, like all other detainees, have access to free on-site health care facilities and medical advice broadly equivalent to that which is available from national health service GPs in the community. At Yarl’s Wood, for instance, all midwifery services are provided by Bedfordshire NHS Trust. Midwives from the trust visit the centre every week. At Dungavel immigration removal centre, where women may also be detained, midwifery services are provided by NHS Lanarkshire. In line with practice in the community, the visiting midwives will determine how frequently they need to see patients.

Women can make requests for additional midwife appointments through the health care centre if they wish. The centre is staffed by nurses around the clock, and the GP can be called upon seven days a week when necessary. In the event of a particularly difficult medical problem, health care staff can refer women to the antenatal clinic or early pregnancy unit in the local hospital, or to another appropriate health care service. I therefore do not agree with my hon. Friend that there is a health care issue.

My hon. Friend asked about pregnant women being returned to countries where malaria is prevalent. We take steps to ensure that they are given the appropriate course of anti-malaria medication before their removal, but decisions about that medication must, of course, be made by doctors.

As for my hon. Friend’s point about advice to British nationals who are travelling, he should bear in mind that these women are nationals of their home countries, the countries where they should live. The NHS is a national health service whose purpose is to provide health care for citizens and residents of the United Kingdom. It is not an international health service. I do not think that the comparison between the health care that a woman would receive in the United Kingdom if she lived here and the health care that is available in her home country is relevant. Her home country is the country in which she should live. It is not the job of the national health service to become a health service for everyone in the world. If it were to do so, it would rapidly collapse, and I do not think we want that to happen.

[Richard Fuller]

The Minister is right to say that the NHS is a national and not an international health service, but that is not quite the point that I was making. One of the consequences of losing control of immigration is that people have been in this country for a long period, and when people have spent a long period in another country, their immunity to malaria is lowered. We are sending back pregnant women with low immunity. Their health condition is not the same as the health condition of a lady who becomes pregnant in her country of origin. That is the comparison that I was trying to make. I certainly do not want us to have an international health service, but I think the Minister must accept that delaying the repatriation of people who are here illegally has consequences in terms of their health status, particularly when it comes to malaria. That is a key point for pregnant women.

[Mr Harper]

And that is exactly why we ensure that pregnant women are given a course of anti-malaria medication. We also provide them with mosquito nets, free of charge, to use in their countries of origin. I am not sure that I follow the logic of my hon. Friend’s argument. If we allowed those pregnant women to remain in the United Kingdom and give birth here, we would still later be removing both mother and child to that same country of origin where malaria may be prevalent.

The fact is that we will not allow women to stay here when they do not have a right to do so. Not only will their cases have been judged by the Home Office, but a number of appeal routes will have been open to them, and only when all those routes have been exhausted will we be in a position to remove them from the country. We try to persuade people to return home voluntarily, and that includes providing assistance when they are in their home countries. Those whom we do detain—those to whom my hon. Friend is referring—will be people who have no right to be here. We will have tried to persuade them to leave voluntarily, and to give them support that would help them to do so. Only when they have refused all those offers of assistance and help from the United Kingdom will we seek to enforce their removal. Therefore, by definition they are people who are not co-operating in their removal from the United Kingdom. That is why I anticipate that if we change the policy to the one my hon. Friend suggests, people will use that to throw legal obstacles in the way—not to do what the hon. Member for Slough said, but at least to suggest to us that that is the case, which would at least delay, if not stop, their removal.

I am therefore unable to give my hon. Friend the outcome he desired. I am very happy to continue this dialogue with him and to look into the case he has raised with me, and if he thinks there are other cases where the Government are not following the policy we have set out, I will look into them. On his central request, however, I am afraid the Government have no plans to change the current policy.

Question put and agreed to.

Border Force

Lord Harper Excerpts

Wednesday 4th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Hon. Members]

Where is she?

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

I hear Opposition Members shouting out about where the Home Secretary is. I know that the shadow Home Secretary has no confidence in the shadow Immigration Minister, after his extraordinarily successful summer, but I am responsible for these matters in the Home Office and I am dealing with the urgent question.

Early in 2011, the independent chief inspector of borders and immigration—

[Mr David Winnick (Walsall North) (Lab)]

Where’s the Home Secretary?

[Mr Harper]

It is no good Members complaining. They ought to remember that this Government inherited from Labour a border system that, like many other parts of government, was not functioning very well at all. This is another area where we have had to put things right.

In 2011, the independent chief inspector of borders and immigration reported that border security checks were often suspended without ministerial approval, and found poor communication, poor managerial oversight and a lack of clarity about roles and responsibilities in Border Force. In response, the Home Secretary removed Border Force from the old UK Border Agency and brought it back within the direct command of the Home Office. Since then we have seen a considerable improvement in performance. As the NAO recognises, all passengers are now checked and queue times are reduced. Indeed, as set out in its last report, targets for detection and seizure of harmful goods and substances are being met and exceeded.

The UK operates one of the most secure borders in the world, with more than 200 million people crossing the border and hundreds of billions of pounds of goods imported and exported. The capability delivered by our border systems is one of the most advanced in Europe and among the best in the world. We are one of only a handful of countries that operate a pre-departure checking system, preventing those who would do us most harm from even boarding aircraft, but of course there is some way to go. Border Force has carried out extensive works on its systems, including the warnings index, which ensures that dangerous persons are identified at the border, to ensure that it continues to operate effectively. We will continue to drive up the performance and resilience of the warnings index and other key systems to ensure that they fully support our officers’ efforts to protect the border.

The culture and morale in Border Force are very important. We are dedicated to ensuring that every member of staff is motivated, trained and developed. Challenges remain, but I and Sir Charles Montgomery, the new permanent director-general, a former Second Sea Lord, have visited many staff at the border to speak to them. I have found a work force proud of the work they do, committed to the task in hand and always keen to tell me about their successes and the challenges that exist.

People have said that we are not checking everyone who comes into the country, but the report is clear that that is not the case. Since we introduced the ministerially endorsed operating mandate last year, full checks are being delivered at our ports. Last year, more than 135 million passengers and crew were screened even before they reached the border, resulting in more than 2,880 arrests, including for murder, rape and kidnap.

As well as checking all passengers arriving, we continue to perform intelligence-led checks on goods and freight coming into the country. The National Audit Office confirms that Border Force is meeting and exceeding targets for seizures of some of the most dangerous and harmful materials that criminals attempt to bring into the country. Our class A drugs and firearms targets are being met and exceeded, as are our targets for illegal entrants at our juxtaposed border controls in France and Belgium. Last year we detected 6,000 clandestine attempts at Calais alone and this year we are running ahead of that rate.

Since its establishment last year, Border Force has been working to ensure that the chief inspector’s recommendations have been addressed. During last year’s Olympics, Border Force received significant recognition for its work ensuring that athletes, VIPs and visitors from across the world entered the country without delay, in order that the UK could deliver a world-class games. I am delighted to say that the NAO’s report confirms that we have improved against every one of the recommendations in the chief inspector’s report. I commend this statement to the House.

[Yvette Cooper]

That was a very complacent response from the Minister, with no explanation of where the Home Secretary is. Today’s National Audit Office report reveals that customs examinations, including for drugs and firearms, are being suspended to cope with passport controls, that checks for illegal migrants hiding in lorries are frequently being stopped, and that staff are reducing the questioning of those with suspect visas in order to meet other pressures. The report also reveals a culture of fear and low morale, as well as leadership problems, with five different directors-general in the past 18 months, staff shortages, understaffing at countless ports even after the latest recruitment, and a funding gap. It states that the Department’s internal auditors have confirmed that the Olympics and wider resourcing issues have had an impact on the security of the border. Will the Home Secretary now publish that internal audit report, so that we can find out how many times checks were stopped?

The NAO report also states:

“In Calais, we observed officers being taken off controls to detect clandestine illegal entrants to the UK concealed in lorries in order to deal with passenger queues”.

That was seen to happen three times in three days, and freight searching was suspended on a further 19 occasions due to understaffing. So, if checks were stopped 21 times in three days, how many times have they been stopped in the past year? At that rate, it would have been 2,500 times at Calais alone. It is no wonder that officers stopped trying to fingerprint stowaways; it seems as though they stopped trying to catch them at all.

It also seems as though the Home Secretary’s only answer to illegal immigration is to get a man in a van to drive round in circles with a poster asking people if they would mind going home. People do not want gimmicks; they want the Government to get the basics of border security right. The Home Secretary cannot duck her responsibility for that. She ignored the warnings and cut 500 staff from the Border Force before the Olympics. She is just shunting the problem round in circles. First the passport checks, then hours of queues, and now drops in checks on stowaways, guns and drugs and, still, a big drop in the number of illegal migrants being stopped at our border.

The Government are not sorting out the fundamental problems. Each time, the Home Secretary blames someone else, reshuffles the deckchairs and sends someone else to answer the questions. So, will this Minister answer the questions? How many times have the checks been stopped? Will he publish the internal report? And will the Government stop ducking their responsibility and sort the fundamental problems out?

[Mr Harper]

First, the right hon. Lady is not right to say that checks were suspended. That is not what the report says. As she will know, there is a layered approach at Calais. Checks are done by Border Force officers, and searching by the port authorities also takes place, using equipment supplied by us. We also have contractors, who were absolutely excellent and very successful when I visited in the summer. The day I was there, one of our contractors with detector dogs had that morning found 24 people attempting to enter—[Interruption.] Well, with the greatest respect, I know that labradors are intelligent, but I do not think that that labrador was aware that a Minister was arriving to observe the search for clandestine immigrants. I believe that that level of performance is sustained every day. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) has not had a great summer for well-researched thought-through speeches, as everyone in the House is well aware. Perhaps it would be welcome if we heard a little less from him. It is not the case that checks were suspended, even if Border Force officers were dealing with queues. Freight searching was still being carried out, both by our contractors and by the port authorities.

The shadow Home Secretary also referred to the decision not to fingerprint clandestines. I remind her that that decision was actually taken by the former Government of whom she was a member. It was taken early in 2010, which, if I remember rightly, was before the last general election. As I said in response to the chief inspector’s report, that is something that we are reviewing to see whether the decision remains sensible.

On the issue of a culture of fear, all I can say is that I have visited a number of our ports—both airports and seaports—and our juxtaposed controls and, in my experience, the officers I met were, as I said in my statement, dedicated staff. I did not find any reticence on the part of officers in either saying what they were good at or stating where they thought there were issues. They raised their concerns directly with Ministers, and my experience was also the experience of the director-general. I say simply, then, that what the right hon. Lady mentioned was not my experience.

I think I have dealt with the shadow Home Secretary’s point about leadership, as we have now appointed a permanent director-general who, in his capacity as Second Sea Lord, has a record of achievement from outside the Department. I believe that he has already started to lead the organisation in a very powerful way.

Finally, the right hon. Lady made a last throwaway remark about our pilot of publicity on vans. I would point out here that most of the public support the tough stance we have taken on illegal immigration and that the majority of voters of all parties—72% of the public—support the vans. They want to see our tough approach continue and they do not want the weak approach of the Labour party.

[Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

I would like to thank the Minister for a very visible improvement in the performance of the Border Agency over the last year or so, and urge him to work with his staff to ensure that ever-higher standards are achieved by promptly and courteously allowing the legal people in and by ensuring that we find all the illegals at the first point of entry.

[Mr Harper]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. I know from a conversation we had that he has seen the work that our border officers do in our juxtaposed controls, where attempted illegal entries are prevented from even getting to the United Kingdom. He makes a good point, too, about the rest of the UK Border Agency after the agency’s split into the two component parts of UK visas and immigration and immigration enforcement. It is doing exactly what my right hon. Friend said, which is to welcome those who come to Britain to contribute—skilled workers and students, for example—while deterring those who do not and ensuring that those who overstay their welcome are removed from the country.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

Ministers were right to respond to public concern and the recommendations of the Home Affairs Select Committee by putting in additional staff to check passports, but it appears from this report that that came at the expense of those who should have been checking vehicles and people before they entered the country. Will he confirm whether that was, in fact, the case; and will he further confirm that the legal loophole, mentioned in the report by John Vine, has now been closed? Does he agree that co-operation with our EU partners is essential, given that the UK border is actually the border between Turkey and Greece—that is where illegal migration enters the EU—and that unless the French are prepared to work with us in furthering that co-operation, we will not be able to stop people entering our country?

[Mr Harper]

I welcome the remarks of the Chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee. He raised three questions, which I shall endeavour to answer. The first was about resources, and given that the checks were not being conducted as they should have been in all cases, it would be fair to say that in responding to the chief inspector’s report and implementing the operating mandate, it was clearly necessary to increase the resources going into the Department. As to whether we have the balance right, it is obviously something that we keep under review, and it is a challenge for all operational managers. I refer back to the National Audit Office’s last report, not the one published today, that looked into our detection and seizure of serious goods—class A drugs, firearms and so forth—that people were attempting to get through the border. The report said that in all those cases we were meeting and exceeding our seizure and detection targets. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and I think that we are succeeding.

I do not have time to go in detail into the right hon. Gentleman’s point about the legal loophole, but I can say that we are making considerable progress and that his general point about the importance of partnership working is absolutely true. I recall a visit last autumn when I met the new French Interior Minister, and I visited Calais and Coquelles this summer in order to see for myself the co-operative work going on between the French port authorities and our Border Force officers. Such co-operation is excellent and we need to keep it in that good shape as we go forward.

[Martin Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD)]

Does not the report demonstrate that endless headline-grabbing reorganisations and legislation—with four Acts coming from the last Government alone—were always less important than ensuring that the system we have is effective, efficient and well managed? Is that not something on which we should all be able to agree, instead of turning this serious issue into a party political football?

[Mr Harper]

I agree with my hon. Friend and Gloucestershire near-neighbour. It was clear from the chief inspector’s report that we had inherited an organisation that was not doing the day job properly, and was not checking everyone who was coming into the country. The whole point of splitting Border Force from the UK Border Agency was to improve that situation. The NAO report has made it clear that we have made progress in regard to all the chief inspector’s recommendations, that we are dealing with the issues that have been raised, and that Border Force is in better shape. However, we are not complacent. There is always more to do, and we now have an excellent director-general who is leading that important job of work.

[Paul Goggins (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)]

Will the Minister confirm that he and the Home Secretary have been receiving monthly reports about the length of queues? If that is the case, will he tell us whether those reports have included details of the number of checks carried out in relation to illegal entry and, indeed, items such as drugs and firearms?

[Mr Harper]

As the report says, there was a period when there was a real problem with queues and the Home Secretary and I were receiving frequent reports every day, but I am pleased to say that that is no longer necessary, because the organisation is now in much better shape. We focused very much on that problem, but it has largely been fixed, and I think more than 99% of passengers entering the country are now dealt with through our service level agreements.

As I said to the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), we are meeting and exceeding our targets in relation to the detection of firearms and substances such as class A drugs which people attempt to bring into the country. Border Force is delivering on that.

[Yvette Cooper]

That is not what it says.

[Mr Harper]

If the right hon. Lady looks at the NAO’s report, which it compiled specifically on this issue for the 2012-13 financial year, she will see that during that period we were meeting and exceeding our targets on class A drugs and firearms. [Interruption.] It is true. I will be frank and admit that we were doing less well on tobacco and counterfeit goods, but in relation to the really important things such as class A drugs and firearms we were meeting and exceeding our targets. I think that that should reassure Members.

[Nicola Blackwood (Oxford West and Abingdon) (Con)]

The key question must be whether Border Force has the capacity to carry out both the customs checks and the passenger checks that are necessary to protect our national security. The NAO report expresses concern about that. Does the Minister think that Border Force’s current recruitment process will deal with any concerns that he may have?

[Mr Harper]

I thank my hon. Friend—who is also a member of the Home Affairs Committee—for her question. As I explained in my response to the shadow Home Secretary, there was a problem to start with when we introduced the operating mandate. Full checks of people coming into the country were not being carried out. We accordingly provided more resources, and, as my hon. Friend acknowledged in her question, we are now hiring new Border Force staff in a number of ports. Our best assessment is that both funding and manpower are sufficient to enable us to do the job, and, although of course we keep the position under review at all times, I think that the balance is right at the moment.

[Mr David Winnick (Walsall North) (Lab)]

If everything is fine, why is the National Audit Office so critical of so many aspects, including what it describes as “a culture of fear” and “low morale” among Border Force officers? Incidentally, should not the Home Secretary, rather than the Minister, be here to respond to my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary?

[Mr Harper]

I think I explained that in my response. I am the Immigration Minister, I am responsible for these parts of the Home Office, and the Home Secretary is content for me to deal with this. [Interruption.] The shadow Immigration Minister should stop chuntering from a sedentary position. He has not had a great summer. I can understand why the shadow Home Secretary—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Let the point be made from the Chair that the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who has exercised his vocal cords very fully, should now cease to do so. Let us hear from the Minister.

[Mr Harper]

I am very pleased, on this occasion, to agree 100% with that sentiment, Mr. Speaker. I think I speak for most Members when I say that.

Let me respond to the serious point made by the hon. Member for Walsall North (Mr Winnick). I do not think I said in my response that everything was rosy. I said that we had inherited an organisation with problems, that we were tackling the problems and that there was more to do. I also said that in response to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood), and I pointed out that we had a new director-general.

My experience in the Home Office is that there is always more to do. We have to keep on top of the task of dealing with people who try to come into the country and should not be doing so—while welcoming those who should—and we have to deal with the ever-changing security threats. That is a challenge that I think we are meeting, and meeting every day. I should add that our front-line officers do an excellent job in keeping the United Kingdom safe.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Should not the Border Force, like any organisation that has to deal with pronounced peaks in customer demand, be allowed the flexibility that would enable it to transfer staff from other activities to assist when there are such peaks in demand? Obviously, if we are given intelligence that drugs are coming through, we shall not want to transfer the staff who will deal with that, but is not transferring people who are carrying out fewer random checks than others an example of sensible management?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend has made a sensible point about intelligence. Obviously, as I said in my response, we use it to guide the efforts that we put into freight checking. My hon. Friend has also made the sensible point that there are peaks and troughs in the number of passengers crossing the border. As well as our permanent work force, we have staff on whom we can call at those peak times to ensure that we continue to deliver a secure border, but we are also mindful, of the need to deliver value for money, which the National Audit Office mentions in its report. Of course, all Departments have to deal with the appalling financial legacy that we were left by the Labour party.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The Minister has laid much stress on the quality of border checks. As he will know, at the end of the last Session I was privileged to be elected chair of the all-party parliamentary group on human trafficking, and in that role I have been meeting groups who work with trafficked people. Kalayaan tells me that it has yet to meet a holder of an overseas domestic worker visa who, under the new visa system, has actually carried his or her own passport through the passport check. The passport is always held by the visa holder’s employer. What will the Minister do about that?

[Mr Harper]

The operating mandate specifies that everyone who crosses the border must have his or her passport checked and must have the necessary documents. On the basis of what I know, I do not think that what the hon. Lady says is correct, but I will make inquiries and then write to her. I think that that is a reasonable way to approach the matter. In the meantime, given her position as chair of the all-party group, I shall be happy to maintain a sensible dialogue with her on human-trafficking issues.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

UK Border Force did an excellent job during the Olympics, welcoming millions of new visitors. We hope that they will come back, in which case we will welcome them warmly again. However, is it not time that there were separate streams at our airports and ports—one for UK nationals with UK passports who are returning to the country, one for EU entrants and one for everyone else? Would that not enable us to streamline the whole process?

[Mr Harper]

First, as my hon. Friend knows, one of our obligations as members of the European Union is to deal with European passport holders together with those from the UK. Secondly—this is a practical point—adopting his suggestion would require us and the airports to spend an extraordinary amount of money on remodelling all our airports and ports, which I do not think would be very sensible at present.

The basis of my hon. Friend’s point, however, is the need to ensure that British citizens returning home, EU nationals coming to Britain and people coming here from outside the EU all have a good experience at the border. The NAO report suggests that we are performing the necessary checks to make certain that the border is secure, while processing people within the provisions of our service level agreements and enabling them swiftly to enter the United Kingdom, where they will be able to work and spend some of their hard-earned money to benefit our economy.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

There may well be an argument for some staff flexibility, but can the Minister positively assure us that there is no danger that some officials are more worried about television pictures of queues than about the risks at our borders?

[Mr Harper]

I can assure the hon. Gentleman of that. I make it very clear on my visits, as does the director-general, that we must deal with both those challenges—people crossing the border and freight. As I said in response to the shadow Home Secretary, there was no suspension of freight checks at Calais. We adopt a multi-layered approach. Even when Border Force officers are not searching vehicles, the staff at the port and our contractors are doing so. I am confident that there are proper checks on people coming into the United Kingdom, and proper intelligence-led checks on freight and goods as well.

[Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock) (Con)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that the Border Force team in Tilbury, in my constituency, has been reporting much higher morale since being spun out from the Border Agency? Does not the report also confirm that that was exactly the right decision?

[Mr Harper]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s comment. I had the great pleasure of visiting Tilbury with her early in my time as Immigration Minister, and was very impressed with the engagement of staff there. As she says, the report confirms making Border Force a stand-alone organisation in the Home Office was the right thing to do. It has enabled the organisation to focus on delivering on the operating mandate, and I think that under the new permanent leadership of Sir Charles Montgomery, that process will continue.

[Dr William McCrea (South Antrim) (DUP)]

Is the substance of what is reported in the national newspapers accurate or inaccurate, and what challenges does the Minister think still remain?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Harper]

Having gone through the report very carefully, I think that it is probably fair to say that not all the national newspapers over-egged the pudding in how they reported the report. I thought that the report was very balanced. The interviews that the National Audit Office did this morning were very balanced. It made the point that Border Force is doing lots of things very well, but it recognises that there are still challenges. I think that I echoed that tone in my remarks. We have made significant improvements, but there is still more work to be done. That, in a nutshell, is what the NAO said in its report, and we are grateful for the work that it does.

[Sir Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con)]

My hon. Friend said that last year Border Force detained some 6,000 people at Calais trying to enter the UK. Presumably, all of them were already illegal immigrants in France. Following on from the comments of the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), can my hon. Friend tell the House what the French are doing to remove from their jurisdiction illegal immigrants who are intent upon entering our jurisdiction?

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend asks a two-part question. The first part was whether everyone trying to enter the UK illegally is necessarily in France illegally. That is not necessarily the case. France is in Schengen, of course, and there are people who are entitled to be in France but who do not have the right to enter Britain illegally in the back of a lorry, so we stop them entering. Some of them are, of course, in France illegally, however, and we work with our French colleagues by doing what we can to help them to make sure they are removed from France. Not all of them will be in France illegally, however, and I reiterate what I said in response to the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee: partnership-working with our colleagues in France is very important and works very well, and we want to make sure that that strong relationship continues because it is how we keep our border secure.

[Mr Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West) (Lab)]

Did I hear the Minister right when he said we are doing less well on illegal cigarettes? That is very noticeable in Coventry, which has become a centre nationally for massive trafficking in cigarettes. Does he agree with the NAO director, Louise Bladen, that—despite all the reassurances he has given us, with great politeness and courtesy—it is just not the case that the resources are there to deal with cigarettes, for example, which are continuing to flood in?

[Mr Harper]

We do a very good job in intercepting hundreds of millions of illegal cigarettes every year, bur I was making a point about the relative focus. The last NAO report found that we were meeting and exceeding our targets on class A drugs and firearms. On cigarettes, we were doing less well, but we are still intercepting hundreds of millions of cigarettes. We work with our colleagues overseas to intercept where they are being manufactured and brought into the country. I have seen lots of examples from visits of where our officers have intercepted considerable volumes of cigarettes. That work needs continuous attention. I was simply making the point that, clearly, if we are going to focus our resources, I would prioritise dealing with class A drugs, firearms, illegal immigration and people who put weapons together above cigarettes, but that was in no way to say that dealing with the illegal smuggling of tobacco was in any way unimportant.

[Michael Ellis (Northampton North) (Con)]

I congratulate the Minister because it is clear that the Department under his leadership has been doing much—

[Michael Ellis]

Under his leadership on the immigration issue, the Department has done extremely well to improve UKBA over the last year, because is it not true that we inherited a massive pig in a poke from the last Labour Government, including massive net immigration, uncontrolled transitional arrangements for eastern Europeans, the Human Rights Act 1998, a 450,000 asylum backlog and all the rest of it? The Minister inherited a complete mess from the Labour party, and does he agree that we are doing everything to improve that position?

[Mr Harper]

I agree with my hon. Friend, and let me say two things. On the cigarette point, despite the fact that the last report found that we were not hitting the target for cigarette seizures, cigarette seizures were still up by 7%, so Border Force was improving its performance; it just was not improving it fast enough to hit our very ambitious targets. In answer to my hon. Friend’s general point, what he said provides me with a good opportunity to say that I am glad to be able to report that that huge asylum backlog was largely sorted out before I became Immigration Minister by my excellent ministerial colleague, my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Damian Green), so I had a much better inheritance than the one that he inherited from the Labour party.

[Pamela Nash (Airdrie and Shotts) (Lab)]

The NAO report and the Minister’s answers today have made it clear that freight checks were adversely affected as a result of staff shortages and policy changes. Can he tell us how many illegal migrants have been found on freight this year and in previous years?

[Mr Harper]

I do not think I acknowledged that at all. In terms of the figures that I set out for Calais, 6,000 attempted illegal migrants were intercepted last year and so far this year we are running ahead of that rate, so I am confident that the full-year total will be ahead of it. The performance is improving, therefore. I saw that myself when I visited, and our officers do an excellent job in stopping people even getting to the UK. That is why the juxtaposed controls are so important.

[Mr Nick Gibb (Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend share my constituents’ anger about the last Labour Government’s record on immigration? They allowed net immigration to rise from about 35,000 a year to over 200,000 a year in the Labour years. May I congratulate my hon. Friend and the Home Secretary on reducing net immigration by a third in just three years in office?

[Mr Harper]

My right hon. Friend is right; that is certainly the view that I get, too. There is one thing that Labour never acknowledge when criticised on this. They happily acknowledge that they made mistakes on immigration from eastern Europe, but they forget to tell the public that, under their watch, immigration from outside the EU went up by far more. They have never apologised for that.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

Will the Minister assure me he will not bring these xenophobic “go home” hate vans to Scotland, and will he remove the unwanted, disgraceful “go home” materials from the UKBA office in Glasgow?

[Mr Harper]

I do not think the hon. Gentleman reflects the views of the public in the way that he characterises those vans. The majority of people in this country want a very robust stance. Asking people who have no right to be in the UK—who are here unlawfully, taking the mickey out of everyone else—to go home, as they should do, rather than forcing the taxpayer to spend up to £15,000 on arresting, detaining and enforcing their removal, is a very sensible thing to do, and I am not going to apologise for it.

[David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con)]

I represent the port of Heysham, where we have had success in stopping tobacco smuggling. Does my hon. Friend agree that this is good news under your tenure, and would you like to come to the port and see how it does it?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I have no plans to do so, I must say, and I am not aware of any tenure of mine, but the Minister may seek to address the matter.

[Mr Harper]

Mr Speaker, you are, of course, always welcome to visit any of our ports if you want to do so. I would be very pleased to take you on a conducted tour if ever you have a moment and are willing to do so.

In answer to my hon. Friend’s question, I will look at my schedule of visits. I am always happy to visit our operations around the country to see what our officers are doing on the front line. I find those visits very illuminating, and as I have said, officers take advantage of them to share with Ministers and the director-general both the things that are going well and the things that they think we ought to focus more on.

[Mr Speaker]

The Minister’s public-spirited generosity is truly boundless.

[Mr Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham, Perry Barr) (Lab)]

What checks have been made on individuals with serious criminal records from eastern Europe entering the UK?

[Mr Harper]

Checks are made, but to some extent we are dependent on what other countries tell us. The hon. Gentleman may be aware that the second generation of the Schengen information system will hugely improve our ability to share criminal record information with our European partners, and when that comes online in the next year or so, it will give us a much greater ability to stop known criminals entering the UK and therefore enable us to protect the border better.

[Gavin Barwell (Croydon Central) (Con)]

May I draw my hon. Friend’s attention to what the NAO had to say about the improvements that Border Force has made at Gatwick? Does he agree that that is illustrative of the wider picture, which is that there is absolutely no room for complacency and further improvements are needed, but today our border is more secure than it was under the last Government, when hundreds of thousands of people were allowed to come into this country illegally?

[Mr Harper]

I am pleased to agree with my hon. Friend’s sentiments. He might be interested to know that, as announced just today, our Border Force officers seized 8 kg of cocaine, with a street value of up to £800,000, at Gatwick airport. That demonstrates the sort of work that they carry out every day to keep the country secure, both from those who come here who should not be here and from harmful goods that people try to bring into the country.

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

A week after the Home Office’s racist “go home” vans had been touring English cities, I visited the mosque in Corby and was appalled to find outside it the words “go home” in very large letters. That was the act of a tiny minority of people in my community, spurred on by the Government’s racist attack on people in this country.

[Mr Harper]

I simply do not agree with the hon. Gentleman and, if the polling is to be believed, neither do the British people. Most people in this country do not agree with that characterisation of our pilot. It was clearly aimed at people who have no right to be in the country, not at British citizens or people who are here lawfully. We were asking people who were here illegally to leave the country. We are running a pilot and we will look at its results to decide whether or not it should be rolled out. I simply do not agree with him, and I do not think the British public do either.

[Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)]

Massive net immigration, 450,000 asylum seekers in a backlog, no transitional controls and the Human Rights Act—that is the shambles we were left by the Opposition. May I say how brilliant it is that the Government are sorting it out?

[Mr Harper]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s comments. As I have said, it is a bit rich listening to the Labour party moan about all the things that it left us and we are fixing—that constant refrain applies across all Departments. May I say, in answer to a previous question, that the second generation of the Schengen information sharing system will be online, under the current plan, at the end of October 2014? That will very much improve our ability to deal with criminals from elsewhere in the European Union.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Cigarette smuggling through the airports in Northern Ireland is excessive; there is also some indication of paramilitary involvement. Border Force staff have told me that, if there were more staff, they could combat the issue clearly at the airports. What steps will the Minister take to ensure that extra staff are made available in Northern Ireland to take on this issue?

[Mr Harper]

Obviously, we look at the intelligence available to us, particularly on freight. I am well aware of the potential paramilitary implications in Northern Ireland of cross-border smuggling and the fact that organised crime may be funded in this way. So we look at that information on organised crime. We have also created the National Crime Agency, albeit with restrictions on its actions in Northern Ireland in the criminal justice sphere. In the border field, however, the border policing command, the improved intelligence that we get and the increased ability to combat crime will be helpful in combating both the crimes the hon. Gentleman has mentioned and others that cross our borders.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

The London Gateway port is opening this autumn, so my constituents will welcome the improvements identified by the NAO and the tightening of our border controls. Does the Minister agree that it is time for the Labour party to just say sorry for the chaos that it left us to sort out?

[Mr Harper]

I agree with my hon. Friend. I have looked at some of the plans for the London Gateway, which is an excellent development; it is a really important port. I sense that London Gateway and Felixstowe will be competing with each other as to which is the largest port in the United Kingdom. We work closely with the port operator, and we will properly resource the checks at the port. He can have confidence that we will do that.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

My constituents, many of whom work at the controls in Dover and Calais, think that the Government have had real success in stopping illegal entry into this country, after years when people could basically just wander in. However, my constituents do have concerns about smuggling and trafficking, so will the Minister seek to prioritise lorry checking at Dover and investment in smashing international supply chains for traffickers and smugglers?

[Mr Harper]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s comments. Again, I had the pleasure of visiting the port in his constituency and talking to officers, who raised some of the points that he has just raised with me about getting that balance right across Border Force between checking people and checking goods. We keep that under review, looking at the intelligence about the threats to the United Kingdom. We deal with that on a daily basis, and I hope that I can give him that reassurance.

British Citizenship Applications (War Crimes)

Lord Harper Excerpts

Tuesday 16th July 2013 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (Mr Mark Harper)]

I have made the Equality (War Crimes etc.) Arrangements 2013 and the Race Relations (Northern Ireland) (War Crimes etc.) Arrangements 2013 to enable the Minister to subject applications from certain nationalities for British citizenship to more rigorous scrutiny than others for the purposes of determining whether the applicant has committed, been complicit in the commission of, or otherwise been associated with, the commission of war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide.

The Equality (War Crimes etc.) Arrangements 2013 are made under paragraph (l)(l)(d) of schedule 23 to the Equality Act 2010, and replace the Equality (War Crimes etc.) Arrangements 2011. The corresponding Race Relations (Northern Ireland) (War Crimes etc.) Arrangements 2013 are made under article 40 paragraph 2(c) Race Relations (Northern Ireland) Order 1997 and replace the Race Relations (Northern Ireland) (War Crimes etc.) Arrangements 2011.

The condition for subjecting these applications to more rigorous scrutiny is that the applicant is a national of a state specified on a list approved personally by the Minister for the purpose of the arrangements.

I have now reviewed and approved this list. I am satisfied that the conditions set out in the arrangements are met in respect of the countries on the list.

The arrangements will remain in force until revoked. I will review the arrangements and the list annually.

I am placing copies of the arrangements in the Libraries of both Houses of Parliament.