Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill (Fourth sitting)

Nicholas Dakin Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2019 Public Bill Committees

[Stuart C. McDonald]

Q Finally, some of the witnesses in Tuesday’s session were concerned about the prospects of exploitation in a minority of cases because, if workers were tied to a particular employer or were towards the end of a visa that lasted for only a year or less, there was limited prospect of anyone else taking them on. One solution might be to have a multi-year visa so people at least have the opportunity to come back for a future season somewhere different.

James Porter: That sounds quite sensible. We had the SAW scheme previously, and we worked with it until it was ended when the EU accession countries came in. The agencies are quite closely on top of communicating with the people they place on farms, but I can understand that if someone was compelled to stay on one farm, it might be quite difficult for them to speak out if they did not have alternatives. I am sure there may be ways of trying to make that simpler. Perhaps if they received a visa to work in agriculture and were not compelled to stay in one place, that would give them a bit more freedom if they were not happy where they were.

[Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)]

Q Going back to tier 2 visas, at the moment the fee to recruit a tier 2 worker is more than £1,000. If that type of system went forward, would that present any difficulties, or does that seem a reasonable level?

James Porter: One thousand pounds per seasonal worker?

[Nic Dakin]

That is the cost for tier 2 at the moment.

James Porter: We are working to a pretty tight budget, so I would not be over-keen to pay that. It does not make sense to me. I can understand if there were rational reasons for putting in restrictions to labour, such as a ready and willing labour pool in the UK that was able to do those jobs, but that simply is not there. I do not understand the rationale for adding costs on an industry where things are already tight. There is no doubt about that.

[Nic Dakin]

Q You have illustrated very well the tightness of the industry. We had Alan Manning from the Migratory Advisory Committee here on Tuesday, who seemed to say that people just need to pay more.

James Porter: I think I have quite clearly illustrated how much more we have paid over the last 20 years—it has gone up significantly in the last five. It is all very well saying you have to pay more. We are paying more but we are not getting paid any more for what we produce, and we have no prospect of being paid more. The alternative is to say, “We will just export that production and we will pay someone £2 a day in Morocco or somewhere to grow it.” I do not think that is productive.

[The Minister for Immigration (Caroline Nokes)]

Q You have been very clear about the investment and innovation that have gone into the sector, with table-top growing, and so on. How far off do you think mechanised picking of soft fruit is?

James Porter: It could be a little like nuclear fusion—it might always be five years off, because it is so complicated. One of those robots takes about 10 seconds to pick one strawberry. They are really not quick. There are research and projects ongoing, but certainly, for the near to medium term I do not see it. You have to remember that you might get a strawberry picking machine, but you then have to develop a blueberry one, a raspberry one and a blackberry one. It is not in the near future.

--- Later in debate ---

[Eleanor Smith]

Q You mentioned the Americans and the figure of 45%, and we keep saying that it is realistic that we are trying to get 95%. Is that realistic? How is it feasible for the Home Office to do that in two years?

Joe Owen: It is very unrealistic that there will be 100%, although I may come to regret saying that. Considering that we do not entirely know how many EU citizens are in the UK and exactly where they are, trying to target them is a huge challenge. You have already heard from a number of people about the can’ts, the don’ts and the won’ts. There will be some who cannot get status, even if they want to, because they do not have the right information, they cannot access the internet or for other valid reasons. There will be the don’ts—children or elderly people, for example—who do not know that they need to apply. Then there are the won’ts, who are the people who say, “I completely disagree with this as a policy; I think it is ridiculous and I am not going to do it as a matter of principle.”

Those people will exist. The first two categories are likely to be filled with more vulnerable people, as previous people giving evidence have attested. There needs to be a recognition that designing for 100% is the wrong way to go. The right way to go is to make sure that there are sufficient safeguards and clarity in the system about what happens to people who do not have settled status at the end of the two years, possibly for very good reasons, and what will happen to those who we think do not have good reasons as to why they do not have settled status. Having clarity about what will happen to those people—they will inevitably exist—at the back end of the two years is really important.

[Nic Dakin]

Q What is your view about the proposals outlined in the European temporary leave to remain scheme for EU citizens who arrive in the UK after 29 March, in the event of no deal?

Joe Owen: As I have previously said, it seems like a workaround to a problem. There is a political imperative to do something to end free movement, but practically it is really difficult, because EU citizens need to be given time to apply; you need the White Paper and the new system needs to be up and running. Until there are those two things, it is almost impossible to meaningfully end free movement. We therefore have a system where, for citizens coming into the UK, it will be exactly as it is now; and then after three months, if they want to stay longer, they can apply for temporary registration, which will be largely a security check. There is nothing to enforce whether people have that or not. If I go to my employer at the end of 2020 with a European passport, they do not know if I am someone who has lived here for 30 years and has not claimed settled status yet, or if I turned up a year ago and I have not bothered to do the registration scheme. There is a real difficulty about how this will practically be enforced.

As I said, another issue is what happens at the back end, when the new system comes into place and people who are here—who have either registered or have not registered—apply for the new system. If they are unsuccessful, what happens to them and what is the treatment of them? What kicks in around that, again knowing that large groups of people are likely to be in that situation? People will be expecting that to be dealt with in a way that carries public confidence.

[Stuart C. McDonald]

Q You spoke a couple of times about the possibility that the enforcement system would have to adapt or changes would have to be made to the back end of the system, as I think you referred to it, to do with the large group of people that will inevitably miss the deadline. Can you say any more about how you can see this system adapting? How far can it really change from what it is? What sorts of things do you have in mind?

Joe Owen: There are some questions around built-in safeguards in the immigration enforcement and caseworking system within the Home Office. There have already been quite positive steps, with a team of senior caseworkers being established in response to Windrush last year. They are there to provide a bit more discretion—a second pair of eyes—on some of the difficult cases. How do we build that into the system to ensure that there is a safeguard for people who have characteristics that make you think that the person has been caught up without the right paperwork, but would have been covered under the withdrawal agreement? Addressing some of the structural and process questions—assuming that the policy around the hostile environment or compliant environment of enforcement through public services, landlords and employers continues—would seem to be one way. There is also more that can be done with people who end up being the arm of immigration enforcement, such as landlords and employers, through education and outreach. Those are some of the more processy things, rather than questions of policy.