Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Mike Tapp and Tom Hayes

Committee stage
Thursday 27th February 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Mike Tapp]

Yes, we are. It is coming in this year.

Tony Smith: We do not have a biometric entry/exit system. The EU is bringing in EES, which means Brits will have to give their biometrics on entry and exit. We are bringing in the electronic travel authorisation—the ETA—but that is different from an entry/exit system.

[Tom Hayes]

Q My question is for Mr Williams. In a previous panel, I asked Dr Walsh whether he thought it was difficult to make emphatic assessments of the fiscal burden of migration, given the quality of the data available. You authored a February 2025 report that makes broadly the same points about some of the quality gaps. I would welcome you talking about the gaps in that data, which obviously affects the ability to make emphatic assessments.

I also want to ask you about that report. In a previous answer, you raised the importance of counterfactuals. In reaching the overall recommendations and assessments in your report, did you consider counterfactuals such as the fact that migrants might move up the wage and skills distribution and might not always remain on low pay? In the absence of migrant workers, for instance in health and care settings, there would need to be other people who could do their work. Did you consider the economic impact of having nobody in those roles to do that health and care work, and whether that would affect the worklessness in our country? Did you consider whether there could be a reallocation of British workers into higher-skilled and higher-wage jobs as a consequence of those migrant workers? Did you think about the economic impact of potentially more people doing unpaid care because of a lack of paid carers?

I ask those questions not because I feel we should rely on migrant workers—I do not—but because your report has been lauded by the shadow Home Secretary and other Conservative Members of Parliament. I want to make sure that if it is being used as a point of reference, the data and the assessments have integrity. If you were to consider those counterfactuals, I wonder whether that would affect your report.

Karl Williams: To clarify, we are talking about the report on indefinite leave to remain that came out recently, not the report from last year.