Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Seventh sitting)

Mike Tapp Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 11th March 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Matt Vickers]

Does the hon. Gentleman want me to use my fingers to help him to count? The deterrent is preventing people from getting in those boats. If people know that they will be detained and removed when they arrive in this country, they will stop coming.

[Mike Tapp (Dover and Deal) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that the crossings have risen from 299 in 2018 to more than 150,000 since then, the majority of them on the Conservatives’ watch? Does he also acknowledge that deportations have increased by 24% under this Government?

[Matt Vickers]

Does the hon. Gentleman know what has happened with global migration? If we compare the movements that have been made in the last week, those into Europe and those into this country seem to be slightly misaligned. The number of people arriving in this country is up 28%. The number of people put into hotels in communities across this country is up 29%; that is 8,500 more people. The number of people who have arrived in this country illegally and been removed is down significantly since this Government came to office.

It is clear that a new approach is needed. The National Crime Agency said that stopping channel migrants is not possible without a Rwanda-style scheme. It was a terrible mistake for Labour to cancel our deterrent before it had even started. The Labour Government like to point out the cost of the Rwanda plan, but a deterrent that stops illegal migrants from making the crossing and settling in the country will save the state billions in lifetime costs.

As Karl Williams from the Centre for Policy Studies pointed out,

“the Office for Budget Responsibility’s analysis last summer…estimates that a low-skilled migrant, or low-wage migrant as the OBR puts it, will represent a lifetime net fiscal cost to the taxpayer of around £600,000.”

Williams then pointed to

“analysis from Denmark, the Netherlands and other European countries that asylum seekers’ lifetime fiscal costs tend to be steeper than that” ––[Official Report, Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Public Bill Committee, 27 February 2025; c. 43, Q49.]

The evidence therefore suggests that if 35,000 people cross the channel a year—that is roughly where we were last year—at that sort of cost range, the lifetime costs will probably be £50 billion or £60 billion.

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I wonder just how long it will take the Labour Government to start to get into the same territory as the Tories. I can see it coming: they are backtracking on the Illegal Migration Act 2023 and some other features in this grotesque race to the bottom of who can be the hardest on Reform. I suspect that in a few years’ time the hon. Member for Stockton West might actually get his wish and the Labour party will introduce Rwanda mark 2. I say to Labour Members: “Think very carefully—particularly about clause 38, about the IMA—about wandering down this route.” I have my doubts that they will resist the temptation to revisit some of the territory that the Conservatives trailblazed with their last stupid scheme.

[Mike Tapp]

I thank the hon. Member for Stockton West for his creative statement. The chaos in our asylum system and the dangerous rise in illegal small boat crossings is, of course, one of the greatest challenges facing our country, and for years the British public have been promised solutions. They were told that the previous Government’s Rwanda policy would fix the problem, but instead it proved a costly failure. It got stuck in legal battles, was riddled with operational flaws and was utterly ineffective. I will go into detail about that soon.

In 2018, 299 people crossed the channel on small boats. By 2022, the number had surged to 30,000—a hundredfold increase on the Conservatives’ watch. Despite their grand claims that the Rwanda scheme would act as a deterrent, more than 80,000 people crossed the channel after the scheme was announced, and not a single asylum seeker has been successfully removed under it—not one. It is clear that this policy failed.

Let us start with the legal reality. The Rwanda asylum scheme was not just controversial but unlawful. In November 2023, the UK Supreme Court struck it down, ruling that Rwanda was not a safe country to send asylum seekers. The reason for that was systematic defects in Rwanda’s asylum system: almost no claims from Afghans, Syrians or Yemenis were ever approved. The Court found a serious risk that genuine refugees could be sent back to danger, in direct breach of international law. Let us not forget that Rwanda has a track record here: a previous deal with Israel, mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw, led to refugees being secretly deported back to their home countries, in clear violation of human rights protections. This policy depends on breaking the law, and that is no policy at all. It is a legal and moral dead end.

That is why the Bill repeals the Rwanda scheme and replaces it with a system that upholds the rule of law. It will focus toughness where it belongs: not on desperate people, but on the criminal gangs who exploit them. Instead of wasting years in court, we will implement a legally sound system that actually works.

Further, the Rwanda scheme was not just unlawful; it was an economic disaster. As of mid-2024, at least £318 million had already been spent on this failing policy. What did taxpayers get in return? Nothing—no removals or deterrent effect, just an ever-growing backlog of cases and ever-rising hotel bills, which we have inherited. Even if the scheme had gone ahead, it would have been staggeringly expensive. The National Audit Office estimated that removing just a few hundred people could cost up to £2 million per person, yet we are expected to believe that this was a serious solution to the problem of tens of thousands arriving each year on the Conservatives’ watch.

This Government are putting an end to that waste. Instead of throwing money at a scheme that does not work, we are investing in practical measures. This approach is already delivering results: since taking office, the new Government have increased enforced removals by 24%. That shows that when we have a working system, we do not need gimmicks like the Rwanda plan; we just need competence.

This is not just about law or economics. It is also about how we treat people. A core British value is strength, but another is decency. Strength without decency is weakness, as the previous Government demonstrated. The Rwanda scheme was not just ineffective; it was cruel. It was based on the idea that people fleeing war and persecution should be someone else’s problem, no matter the risk to their safety.

Let us be clear that many of those crossing the channel are genuine refugees—they include people fleeing the Taliban in Afghanistan, dictatorship in Iran and war in Syria—but the Rwanda policy, and, it would seem, the Conservatives, did not care. The policy made no distinction, lumped everyone together and treated them as a problem to be shipped off 4,000 miles away, out of sight and out of mind—although of course it did not work.

That is not the British way. This country has a proud history of offering sanctuary to those in need, and we do not abandon our humanitarian duties for the sake of a headline and a gimmick. Of course, those who should not be here will be deported, as we are already seeing, and those who genuinely need help will receive it under this Government. A true deterrent is taking out the smuggling gangs and deporting those who should not be here. The truth is that we do not stop the boats by shouting slogans; we stop the boats by giving people an alternative.

Finally—I thank hon. Members for their patience—the Rwanda plan was never operationally viable. Even if it had survived the legal challenges, the logistics were impossible. To make it work, the Government would have had to detain nearly every small boat arrival indefinitely—a task for which we simply do not have the detention space, the staff or the legal authority. Rwanda itself had agreed to take only a few hundred people a year, which is a drop in the ocean—excuse the pun—compared with the scale of the problem. Meanwhile the real criminals—the smuggling gangs—continued to operate freely. The Rwanda plan did nothing to target them. It was an illusion of control, rather than a real solution.

This Government take a serious, workable approach. That is how we secure the border: not through wishful thinking, but through real enforcement. The Conservatives have tried gimmicks. They tried grandstanding; they tried expensive, legally dubious, headline-chasing policies, and they failed. It is time to move forward. We will uphold the rule of law, protect those in genuine need and take real action against the criminals exploiting them.

[Katie Lam (Weald of Kent) (Con)]

These are difficult problems and challenging questions. Practically every country in the western world is struggling with this and, with the notable exception of Australia, effectively none has solved it. The basic logic of the situation is that, if someone comes here illegally from a place to which it would be dangerous to return them, there are only four options.

First, they could be sent back to the country they came from. That is not legal in our current framework—even before getting to the morality of doing such a thing. Secondly, they could be put in immigration detention indefinitely. That is also not legal; a person can be held in immigration detention only if there is a realistic prospect of removal, which there would not be in this case. Thirdly, they could stay here indefinitely. That is not fair, and it is not what the public want. Finally, they could go somewhere else—a safe third country. Such an agreement was very difficult to broker; indeed, until the Rwandans agreed, many considered it to be impossible.

Clearly, the Government have little time for the Rwanda scheme and destroying it was one of the first things they did in office, but the basic logic problem remains. The last Conservative Government did not get everything right—that is for sure—but the Rwanda scheme was a genuine attempt to solve this truly hard problem, and it remains the only solution that we can see.

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[Pete Wishart]

I am glad that the Home Secretary stated that, as she always does when it comes to our relationship with, and compatibility with, human rights. I want to raise a couple of issues and ask a couple of questions about just how very loosely this Bill is connected with the Government’s obligations and about some of our real concerns on human rights. I will come to that in the course of what I hope will be a short contribution.

It is completely incomprehensible that the Government have chosen to repeal only some aspects of the IMA rather than the whole Act, particularly since so many members of this Government have been so vocally opposed to the IMA in the past. Can we please just have a look at some of the stuff that they want to retain? The one that concerns me most, and the one that concerns the range of organisations, groups and charities associated with refugees and asylum seekers, is the retention of section 29.

Let us remind the Committee what section 29 does. It extends the public order disqualification originally introduced by section 63 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 and mandates that victims of trafficking and modern slavery who have criminal convictions or are considered a threat to public order be disqualified from support and protection. To me, that provision is deeply concerning, as it means that victims of trafficking, many of whom have been coerced into committing crimes as part of their exploitation, could face detention, deportation or removal rather than the support and recovery that they need.

[Mike Tapp]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that, prior to section 29 coming into law, Home Office figures show that up to 73% of foreign national offenders were using modern slavery as a means to avoid deportation, which could in turn put members of the public in danger?

[Pete Wishart]

I do not know where the hon. Member gets his figures, but let me give him some in return. Home Office statistics from 2024 revealed that 70% of the individuals disqualified under the provision had elements of criminal exploitation in their case. What is so wrong about this particular measure is that it stops us giving the necessary and relevant support that we should give—that we owe—to people who have been victims of human trafficking.

[Mike Tapp]

Does the hon. Gentleman also realise that under compelling circumstances, if there is evidence that they have been victims of modern slavery, those who have been convicted and apply will fit into the system?

[Pete Wishart]

This is where we start to get back into very uncomfortable and dangerous territory, where it is going to be up to the individual to prove that they are not guilty of such crimes. This is a blanket clause that will entrap them and leave it to them to make their way through the courts to prove their innocence when they have been innocent all the time, or particularly when they have been victims of trafficking and forced into criminal activity. The system could punish vulnerable individuals who were coerced into committing crimes, often by their traffickers, thus reinforcing the power dynamic that allows traffickers to exploit their victims further.

The retention of section 29 increases the likelihood of re-trafficking and re-exploitation as victims might fear coming forward to the authorities due to the threat of detention, removal or criminalisation. That has issues for us in Scotland. Quite rightly, I suppose, immigration is totally and utterly reserved, but we have responsibility under our devolved powers to ensure that victims of modern slavery who come to Scotland are looked after and tended to by Scottish legislation. There are powers that we have within Scotland.

In retaining section 29 of the IMA, the Bill also restricts the ability of the Scottish Government to support the victims under the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015. The Scottish Act places a duty on Scottish Ministers to secure immediate support and recovery services for victims of human trafficking and exploitation. In Scotland we have tried to design a system that, unlike this Bill, places an emphasis on victim care and rehabilitation.

That is the approach that we take in Scotland, and that is what we want to try to deliver within our range of devolved power, but it relies on the national referral mechanism identifying and supporting victims of trafficking. The disqualification provisions in section 29 could result in vulnerable individuals in Scotland being detained or deported without being properly identified and supported as trafficking victims, thus weakening the Scottish Government’s ability to implement their own modern slavery protections.