Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Twelfth sitting)
Pete Wishart Excerpts(6 days, 10 hours ago)
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Matt Vickers
Lots of processes are in place, but we are putting down a principle. It is the same as the skilled worker visa threshold of £38,700. We have to set a line that requires people to be self-sufficient and not a drain on resources. This is the line that we are setting.
There are also Hongkongers. By 2025, nearly 180,000 British national overseas visa holders had escaped Beijing’s iron grip—huge British talent. More than 20,000 Afghans have been resettled since the Kabul airlift. Those were the right things to do, and we would exempt them from this proposal. These are not random arrivals; they are people we invited, whose stories of sacrifice and loyalty resonate with the values that we hold dear, from duty to decency. We would not renege on those commitments and tarnish the trust that we have built.
Let us cast our eyes across the globe, because other nations are not just theorising about this; they are proving that it works, day in, day out, with systems that do not just talk a good game but deliver tangible, measurable results that we would be foolish to overlook. Take Australia, a land of vast horizons and sharper borders, whose points-based residency system does not mess around. If someone is pulling in less than 53,900 Australian dollars—£28,000—and they are dipping into welfare, Australia will show them the door, an approach that is saving taxpayers billions.
These are not quirky outliers or flukes; they are lessons carved in policy stone and shining examples that tying status to contribution is not some pie-in-the-sky dream but a practical, proven playbook that delivers real savings and sharper borders, and stands up to scrutiny. New clause 32 lifts straight from that script, making £38,700 the line in the sand, with no benefits to lean on and no criminal record to tarnish the deal. It is not radical; it is road-tested, and echoes what works elsewhere on the globe.
Critics might cry, “Unworkable!” but the conditions in new clause 32 are trackable. HMRC already logs income for tax. The Home Office flags criminals under the UK Borders Act 2007, and the Department for Work and Pensions tracks benefits down to the penny. We are not reinventing the wheel—just syncing data to enforce the rules, with £38,700 as a clear line, 10 years as a fair test, and exemptions for the Ukraine, Afghan and British national overseas schemes, showing that we can tailor it.
This is a framework that says, “If you’re here for the long haul, you’ve got to bring something to the table, not just pull up a seat.” Australia and Canada have shown us the path with lower costs and tighter controls; we would be stupid not to take it. I would like to know why the Government would disagree with the principles behind the new clause. Why do the Government want foreign criminals to remain in the UK with indefinite leave to remain? If the Government believe in the £38,700 amount for skilled workers to obtain a visa, why would that not apply to people remaining in the UK indefinitely?
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
I was not going to speak to the new clause; I was just going to let the hon. Gentleman drone on, in the hope that we could possibly get away on Thursday morning, but I have been irked to my feet. I am not sure whether I prefer the new loquacious hon. Member for Stockton West. I do not know what he has done about his speechwriting, but I preferred the version that we had last week. That was probably more in keeping with the Conservatives’ contributions to this Committee.
This is a horrible new clause, which penalises lower-income workers, deters skilled immigration and harms vulnerable groups. The retrospective nature of some of the provisions is simply absurd, and would lead only to legal challenges and all sorts of administrative complications. The new clause would introduce retrospective punishments, taking ILR away from individuals who had received it under the previous rules simply because a future Government—thank goodness this will never be so—had later decided to raise the bar. People make long-term decisions to buy homes, raise families and contribute to communities based on the stability of ILR. Changing the rules after the fact destroys trust in the whole system.
The proposal sets an arbitrary income threshold of £38,700, meaning that a nurse, teacher or social worker—people the UK depends on—could lose their ILR. Many industries, including healthcare, hospitality and retail have workers earning below that level. Are we really saying that under no circumstances would they be welcome? The proposal also ignores economic realities. People face job losses, illness or temporary hardships. Should losing a job also mean losing the right to live in the UK?
New clause 32 states that ILR should be revoked if a person has received any sort of “social protection”, including housing support. This would punish people who have worked hard and contributed but who need temporary support due to circumstances often beyond their control. It targets families, disabled people and those facing financial hardship, effectively saying, “If you need help, you don’t belong here.” Skilled workers, investors and entrepreneurs want certainty. If they fear that a downturn in income or a short period of hardship could see them lose their right to remain, they will choose other countries over the UK.
As we have also heard, how can this be enforced? Constantly monitoring ILR-holders’ income, benefits and job status would be an administrative disaster; it would be costly, error prone and unfairly target individuals. This new clause is simply cruel. It is unnecessary and unworkable, and I hope that it is rejected out of hand.
Katie Lam (Weald of Kent) (Con)
We have spoken already about indefinite leave to remain, which is also referred to as settlement. We have discussed the most basic requirement for eligibility, which is time, and our suggestion that the timeframe be extended from five years to 10. The new clause covers revocation, or the circumstances in which we believe that indefinite leave to remain status should be removed from an individual to whom it has been granted.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton West set out, the first of these conditions is whether a person has engaged in criminality. Our definition for criminality is based on that used in section 32 of the UK Borders Act 2007, under which a person is a “foreign criminal” if they are neither a British nor an Irish citizen; if they have been convicted of an offence, where that conviction takes place in the United Kingdom; and if the period of imprisonment to which they are sentenced is at least 12 months. It also applies to a person who is a “serious criminal”, as defined in section 72(4)(a) of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002.
It is already the case that individuals with settled status can be deported from the UK by having ILR status revoked at the discretion of the Home Secretary. This new clause makes that process automatic. We can see no reason why a person who has committed a crime—particularly based on the current legislation—that is so serious that they are sentenced to a year in prison should be able to continue to be in this country at all, let alone to retain ILR status and with it all the generosity and safety net of the British welfare state, including social housing, benefits and free healthcare.
Secondly, we have included in this new clause a condition that is effectively a knock-on effect from our earlier new clause 25, which would revoke ILR status conferred after this Act comes into force, where that status would not have been conferred under these new conditions.
Thirdly, the new clause applies to those who have been in receipt of social protection, as defined by the Treasury’s “Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses”, which includes personal social services in various different categories, as well as incapacity, disability and injury benefits, pensions, family benefits, income support and tax credits, unemployment benefits, universal credit and social housing. Social protection is a fundamental part of modern British society, but we should be honest that it is also incredibly expensive. Such generous provision should be available only to citizens. It must be a fundamental principle of our system that those who come to this country contribute fiscally more than they cost. What they pay in tax should more than cover the cost of the public services that they use. That is the opposite of the situation that we have now; only a small proportion of those who have come to this country over the past few years are likely to be net lifetime contributors. That is unaffordable.
That reality also underpins our final condition of income falling below £38,700 for six months or more in aggregate. That figure of £38,700 was chosen to sit alongside the general skilled worker threshold, the minimum earnings threshold for skilled worker visas, and the minimum income requirement for a family visa sponsor proposed by the last Government. It was chosen as it represents the 50th percentile, or the median, of earnings for jobs at the skill level of RQF3—level 3 of the regulated qualifications framework—which is perhaps more easily recognisable as the equivalent of A-levels and BTECs.
We believe that the new clause will go some way to addressing the problems that we have set out of very high volumes of people coming to this country in recent years who are not set to be net fiscal contributors to the public purse over the course of their lifetimes. We hope that the Government will consider adding it to the Bill.
We also welcome the comments from the Minister on the fact that she is looking at this issue. Could she tell us specifically whether she is looking at any of these conditions, and, if so, which? How are her discussions coming along, and when does she hope to report back to the House on her plans?
Matt Vickers
We allow our domestic courts to use it. We have created the framework and put it in place, and they do what they can with what is in front of them. I am concerned about the way in which it is applied, and we need to change that if we want to impact the outcomes of those cases and appeals.
Last year alone, we saw far too many appeals built on article 8, the right to a family life, flooding courts with ridiculously broad pleas. This Parliament is elected to decide the laws of the land. Judges are there to uphold that law, yet they have morphed into border gatekeepers, perched on high and second-guessing Home Office decisions with interpretations so elastic they would snap any thread of reason, and family life ballooning to mean whatever they fancy on any given day. The new clause yanks that power back to where it belongs: with MPs, who are answerable to the people who elect them.
New clause 33 is not just a legal tweak; it is a turbocharge for a deportation system bogged down by endless appeals, with removals stalled by Human Rights Act challenges. Each case drags on, costing tens of thousands of pounds per detainee in legal fees and housing, and clogging up detention centres that are already at capacity. Disapplying the Human Rights Act for immigration would fix the logjam, letting Ministers and officials act fast, deporting those our domestic legislation was created to deport and freeing up resources for border patrols and visa processing, which actually keep us secure.
New clause 33 would restore public safety—a lifeline for a priority that has been fraying at the edges and unravelling thread by thread, as dangerous individuals exploit Human Rights Act loopholes to cling to our soil like barnacles on a ship. In 2024 alone, thousands of foreign national offenders—thieves, drug peddlers and worse—languished in UK prisons, costing taxpayers millions to house. Nowhere near enough were bundled on to planes and removed, leaving thousands to stroll out post their sentence, free to roam our streets, because of Human Rights Act claims tying our hands and deviating from Parliament’s intended outcomes.
New clause 33 would cut through that mess. It would mean swift, no-nonsense removal of those who have shattered our laws—not endless hand-wringing debates over some nebulous right to stay that keeps them loitering in our towns. Public opinion, or the view of British law-abiding taxpayers, is clear—nearly three quarters call for foreign criminals to be removed—yet here we are. The current set-up lets threats fester when they should be gone. As the months go by, more of these bizarre judgments emerge, undermining public confidence in the entire system and our legal institutions.
Let us take a tour beyond our shores, because other nations are not fumbling in the dark; they are lighting the way, showing us that this is not some wild, radical leap but a steady, proven path that we would be daft not to tread. For starters, France increased its deportations by 27%, and is also seen to be deftly side-stepping ECHR interim measures, with domestic law overrides. Twenty-seven per cent. sent home—no faffing about with Strasbourg rule 39 edicts; just a clear-eyed focus on keeping France’s borders taut and its streets secure.
Then there is Australia, where the Migration Act does not blink. Rights claims bow to border control, and many are whisked out yearly with minimal fuss. The law, created by those elected to do so, determines who stays and who goes. These are not rogue states; they are democracies—proud and pragmatic, balancing security with sovereignty. New clause 33 strides right into that company. Parliament would lay down the law, not Strasbourg’s fleeting winds, echoing what has clicked abroad, from Paris to Perth.
I would be interested in the Minister’s thoughts on this proposal—in particular, whether she thinks that some of the recent examples of failed deportations are acceptable. We are apparently very familiar with chicken nugget-gate. If she agrees that some of these outcomes are unacceptable but does not feel that this approach is the way forwards, how will the Government end these cases, which are making a mockery of our justice system and undermining public confidence in our legal institutions?
Pete Wishart
I am compelled again to rise in opposition to what is probably the most egregious of all the new clauses that we are having to consider in today’s marshalled groups. The hon. Gentleman has laid some competition before us, but this new clause is by far the most disgraceful and appalling. The Human Rights Act is an important guarantee. It is what makes us good world citizens and provides rights that are universal. It protects fundamental freedoms such as the right to life, the prohibition on torture and the right to a fair trial—and the Tories do not like it one bit. The right-wing nonsense that we heard from the hon. Gentleman is a fundamental departure from the principle that human rights apply universally, not just to those the Government deem worthy. It is a dangerous precedent that undermines the UK’s long-standing commitment to justice, fairness and the rule of law.
Katie Lam
In November 2024, a Congolese paedophile who sexually assaulted his own stepdaughter was allowed to remain in the UK despite the Government’s attempts to deport him, out of concern that forcing him to leave the country would interfere with his right to a family life. In December 2024, a Turkish heroin peddler was allowed to stay in the UK because it was ruled that deporting him would interfere unduly with his family life, despite the fact that he had returned to Turkey eight times since coming to Britain.
In February of this year, a Nigerian woman who was refused asylum eight times was allowed to remain in the UK because it was decided that her membership of a terrorist organisation might make her subject to persecution in her home country. Earlier this month, a Nigerian drug dealer escaped deportation because he believed that he was suffering from “demonic forces”. Meanwhile, Samuel Frimpong, a Ghanaian fraudster, has been allowed to return to the UK, having being deported 12 years ago, after claiming that he is depressed in his home country.
The list goes on and on. Absurd asylum rulings from our tribunal system seem to emerge on an almost daily basis. What do these cases have in common? In each one, a potentially dangerous person was spared deportation because of our membership of the European convention on human rights, and, crucially, the domestic legislation that enshrines the convention in British law—the Human Rights Act. This legislation is clearly not fit for purpose when it comes to managing and securing the border. It is enabling dangerous foreign criminals to remain in the UK, and putting the British public at risk.
It is time we recognised that decisions about asylum and immigration should be made by politically accountable Ministers, rather than by unaccountable judges and tribunals. That is the purpose of our new clause, which seeks to disapply the Human Rights Act and interim measures of the European Court of Human Rights in relation to the Bill and other legislation about borders, asylum and immigration.
Pete Wishart
Just to clarify, I think the hon. Lady is saying clearly that what she intends to do is to take decisions about immigration out of the hands of judges, and leave them in the hands of politicians. Is that her intention?
Katie Lam
New clause 34 prevents any foreign national who is convicted of any offence from remaining in the UK. It should be a fundamental principle of our system that immigration never makes the British public any less safe. Unfortunately, however, many of those who have come to the UK in recent years have broken our laws. According to Ministry of Justice figures, a staggering 23% of sexual crimes in the UK—almost one in four—are committed by foreign nationals.
The overall imprisonment rate for foreign nationals is 20% higher than that for British citizens. Of course, the trend is not uniform: some nationalities are more heavily represented than others. Albanian migrants are nearly 17 times more likely to be imprisoned than average; those from Algeria are nearly nine times more likely and those from Jamaica nearly eight times more likely to be imprisoned than average.
Those who seek to harm this country, to break its laws and to undermine what we hold to be fair and right should not be allowed to remain here. As the Government are well aware, our prisons are already overcrowded. We must not allow foreign criminals to continue exacerbating this problem and we must not endanger the British public by allowing foreign criminals to stay in this country.
Under our current system, too many of those who break our laws are being allowed to remain in the UK. Often, Home Office attempts to deport foreign criminals are blocked because of absurd and ever expanding human rights rules. In the interests of public safety, we must not allow foreign criminals to remain in Britain; that includes by making sure that the Human Rights Act cannot be used to prevent us from deporting those who break our laws.
How, specifically, does new clause 34 do that? It amends section 32 of the UK Borders Act 2007, which we have already mentioned today. Section 32 would be amended from its current form, which defines a foreign criminal as a person who is neither a British nor an Irish citizen, who is convicted of an offence that takes place in the United Kingdom and who is sentenced to a period of imprisonment of least 12 months, or is a serious criminal as defined in section 72 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002. What would replace section 32 would be much simpler; it would instead say that a foreign criminal was anyone who is neither a British nor an Irish citizen who is convicted of any offence in the United Kingdom, and explicitly include within that anybody who has been charged with or convicted of an offence under section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971, which sets out the situations in which a person can be considered to have entered this country illegally. That includes if they do so in breach of a deportation order; if they required leave to enter the United Kingdom and knowingly came here without that leave; or if they required leave to enter the United Kingdom and knowingly stayed here beyond the time conferred by that leave, among other specific conditions.
New clause 34 also seeks to ensure that the rules will be upheld in all circumstances and asserts therefore that the principle of removing criminals from this country is of utmost importance and must be prioritised above other legislation. That includes human rights legislation, for the reasons we have already set out.
I turn to new clause 42, which requires the Secretary of State to use a visa penalty provision if a country proves to be unco-operative in the process of removing any of its nationals or citizens from the UK. Such a lack of co-operation may arise in verifying their identity or status or it may pertain to the process of removing people whose identity and status has not been established. New clause 42 seeks to do that by amending section 70 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022. That Act set out the idea of a visa penalty provision, effectively allowing the Home Secretary to suspend visa applications from countries that do not co-operate with the activity that the Government are trying to take to secure and protect the border. The new clause would strengthen that Act by changing that from an option for the Home Secretary to a duty and by adding explicitly the point about countries that are not co-operating with the process of verifying the identity or status of individuals whom we consider likely to be nationals or citizens of the countries in question.
Pete Wishart
I am struggling to understand this new clause. There are a number of reasons why other countries may not be able co-operate with the UK on immigration and visa cases—it could be political instability, or there could be a right-wing despot in charge—but that impacts on ordinary asylum seekers. Does the hon. Lady not accept that there are a number of political or even administrative reasons why they are not always able to co-operate?
Matt Vickers
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
The new clause is vital to giving immigration enforcement the powers it needs to smash the gangs and tackle any criminality surrounding those who arrive here illegally. It would give immigration enforcement access to asylum accommodation centres. Currently, there are limitations around the detention of those arriving illegally on small boats. These limitations arise from a lack of statutory power, as well as a lack of state capacity to detain those arriving illegally.
In government, the Conservative Administration set up accommodation centres, which provided a plausible alternative to hotels. Because the centres were not used to make immigration decisions, in practice immigration enforcement officers did not find it possible to enter them for the purposes of examining, arresting and detaining persons residing therein for the purposes of refusal and removal.
Tony Smith, the former director general of UK Border Force, has powerfully argued that immigration enforcement teams must have clear authority to enter all places where asylum seekers are residing to examine, interview, arrest or detain them as appropriate. The Opposition agree wholeheartedly, for these would be proportionate powers for the state to use to enforce the law. Currently, centres housing thousands of small boat arrivals are not detention hubs. Instead, they are in effect halfway houses between the point of processing and where decisions can be made. Consequently, there is a substantial asylum backlog, which has created bottlenecks in the system. This is simply inadequate for everyone involved. It cannot continue, and it must stop.
The new clause therefore tries to end this predicament and failure in the system. Enforcement cannot be allowed to be bereft of action, unable to chase absconders who vanish into the ether without a trace. We need to empower officers to go into these sites to interview, arrest and detain where appropriate. That would allow faster decisions, faster refusals and quicker removals. The clause would not only mean a more efficient system that saves hardworking taxpayers’ money, but help decimate the business model of the people-smuggling trade. In just the last two years, traffickers have accumulated hundreds of thousands, if not millions of pounds in profit. We all know the tragic consequences of people who have made this life-threatening journey.
We must, at all costs, undermine the business model of the people smugglers. That is the truly compassionate thing to do, so I am proud to support clause 36 because it eliminates gaps in our asylum enforcement system, ends centres being off limits and hence makes it much more difficult for people to get lost in the system. So we have to act, and act now. As such, clause 36 appears to be common sense, allowing our enforcement agencies the access that the average person would probably assume they already have. Does the Minister think an amendment or power such as this would be of operational benefit to immigration enforcement, and if not, why not?
Pete Wishart
I do not want to detain the Committee for long with this amendment, but this is just another abhorrent amendment from the warped imagination of the Conservative party. I do not know where they come up with things like this. They would have to be very creative and very cruel to propose something quite like this. The amendment would allow immigration enforcement officers to visit accommodation centres at any time without prior notice. Asylum seekers and other residents at these centres are often fleeing persecution, war and violence and will have suffered severe trauma. The constant threat of unannounced visits from immigration enforcement will create an atmosphere of fear, making it even more difficult for individuals to feel safe.
Allowing immigration enforcement to visit any resident at any time is a clear violation of privacy. It undermines their dignity and wellbeing and could lead to harassment or increased surveillance, further marginalising already vulnerable populations. Vulnerable individuals should not be made to feel constantly watched or threatened by authorities, especially when they are seeking safety and stability. The presence of immigration enforcement officers may discourage asylum seekers and migrants from seeking support or reporting issues of abuse, exploitation or trafficking. All this could do is undermine the very support structures designed to help individuals rebuild their lives in the UK.
The amendment lacks any clear safeguards or accountability mechanisms for how immigration enforcement would operate, and I urge the Committee to reject it. I hope it rejects the rest of the Conservative party’s amendments, too.
Katie Lam
New clause 36 would give access to asylum accommodation centres to our immigration enforcement officers. Members of the public may be surprised to learn that this power does not already exist. It seems to me common sense that when a person has come here illegally and is being housed by the state, immigration enforcement—an arm of that state—should be able to enter that accommodation to carry out their work.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton West rightly set out, these accommodation centres exist because the volume of those coming here illegally is such that it is not possible to hold everyone in immigration detention. There are therefore substantial numbers of people on immigration bail, and a reasonable number of those are held in accommodation centres. Immigration decisions are made elsewhere, but this is the criterion set out in current legislation. In our view, this is a quirk of the current system, and not how one would design it if starting from a blank page. These sorts of accommodation centres did not exist when our rules were written, and we think that this corrects that quirk.
I echo the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton West: does the Minister think that this would be of operational benefit to immigration enforcement officers? If so, will she include it, and if not, why not?
Dame Angela Eagle
I want to put something on the record before we vote. There is a specific meaning in law for the phrase “accommodation centres” under the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002. Since that law was passed, no Government have actually stood up accommodation centres under that specific meaning. Therefore, the shadow Minister in his new clause 36 is asking for powers to enter something that does not exist.
Pete Wishart
While the Minister is on her feet, could she perhaps ask the Opposition spokesperson whether he actually means hotels?
Dame Angela Eagle
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that. I was trying to help the shadow Minister, because I thought he might be trying to talk about accommodation generally. If that is the case, we already have the powers we need to enter when and where we wish. This power is much broader, and we would not like to see it put into effect, which is why I hope the Committee will vote against the new clause.
Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.
Matt Vickers
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
The new clause would require the revocation of asylum or refugee status, or leave to remain, in relation to an applicant who returns to their country of origin, either subsequently or while their application is being processed. It would also apply to people who make an immigration human rights claim.
If an individual has made a claim that being made to return to their country of origin would violate their human rights and put them in danger, then their choosing voluntarily to return to their home country would suggest that something does not add up. Fundamentally, no reasonable person would consider an individual’s returning to their home country to be compatible with their claim for asylum in such circumstances. If a person needs to remain in this country because they have a legitimate fear of persecution in their country of origin, a return to that country of origin fundamentally undercuts that claim.
Pete Wishart
I have studied this measure closely. Conditions change within the countries that people leave, and asylum status and human rights records change accordingly. Is the hon. Gentleman trying to say that there is no reason whatsoever that an asylum seeker may go back to their country of origin and then come back to the UK? What about family emergencies? Surely the Conservatives are not so callous as to suggest that people cannot go back to their country of origin for a family funeral, for example.
Matt Vickers
People arrive in this country out of fear of persecution. People come from the most awful, extreme circumstances. That is the bar that we put to asylum. We allow people to come here to claim asylum out of fear for their welfare, and if they are happy to pack their bags and pop back for a break, then that is on them. I believe, and I think the public would believe, that if someone comes here claiming fear of persecution in their country of origin then they should not be going back. It is not an opt-in or opt-out—it is not a holiday. If they are coming here out of fear of persecution in that country then they should not be going back.
We have tabled new clause 41 in order to address a loophole that people can and do exploit. The new clause would uphold British fairness—a value that welcomes those in need but rejects exploitation. As Members from across the House know, the United Kingdom has supported over 20,000 Afghans since 2021 through the Afghan relocations policy and over 200,000 Ukrainians since 2022 via visa schemes, alongside our Hong Kong friends with British national overseas visas, backed further by £4.7 billion in asylum costs in 2023-24. These commitments reflect our readiness to help those with genuine cases—those fleeing real danger who have ties to Britain. The value of fairness demands a fair system that is not abused.
Matt Vickers
People who claim asylum arrive here from some of the most terrible, awful circumstances—their life is threatened and they are at real risk. If someone is at that level of risk, on the balance of probabilities, they would not be going back. If someone fears persecution in the way that many of the people who get asylum in this country do, then they would not be returning.
Pete Wishart
We really cannot let them away with this, because it is just cruelty personified. Would the hon. Gentleman not make every effort and take every risk to return to his country of origin if it were the funeral of his mother or father?
Matt Vickers
I hear what hon. Members are saying, but in the current system we allow people to pop back on holiday. Is that acceptable?
Matt Vickers
I am talking about those circumstances. We have heard one extreme; at the other extreme, we have people claiming asylum at huge cost. That is not a cost to well-heeled people, in particular, but to British taxpayers, some of whom are struggling to get by, but are contributing to this country and this system, which pays out for various other things. We want to be generous. We want to support the people who need that help. It is the right thing to do and, I have just outlined, we have done that. But we cannot allow that generosity to be abused; we cannot allow people to pop off on holiday back to wherever they came from and then come back. That is the principle that is at stake here. People out there feel that it is very unfair that people pop back, and use asylum here as something hotel-like. That is the other extreme. That is the abuse that we are seeing, and that is what the new clause aims to end.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Eleventh sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsTuesday 18th March 2025
(6 days, 10 hours ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 View all Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Public Bill Committee Amendments as at 18 March 2025 - (18 Mar 2025)
Matt Vickers
The hon. Gentleman has got me. I was hoping he was going to spout some more of the common sense that I have contributed to Hansard.
Matt Vickers
The details and the need for people to engage with the authorities are already in place. This new clause is literally about saying “10 years” instead of “five years”. No part of it amends existing provisions regarding migrants’ responsibility to account for themselves during that period. There is no suggestion of any change to that; it is beyond what we are amending through the new clause. If we wanted to change that, there would certainly be a debate to be had, and there would probably be opportunities to bring forward amendments, but that is not what we are proposing here. We are proposing to increase the period from five to 10 years.
Our country is our home; it is not a hotel. We can guess what the Government’s response to this will be—more deflection and criticism—but they must remember that they are in government now and have a duty to protect the British taxpayer from unnecessary costs. If they do not act, every UK household is forecast to pay £8,200 as a result of between 742,000 and 1,224,000 migrants getting indefinite leave to remain in the next couple of years. The Government must act to ensure that everyone who stays in the country is a net contributor.
It may interest the Government to know that changes to indefinite leave to remain have happened before—and can and should happen again now. In 2006, under the then Labour Government, the Home Secretary extended the time required to obtain indefinite leave to remain from four years to five years, an extension that applied retroactively to those already actively pursuing indefinite leave to remain. It is hoped that this Government will make a similarly bold move and support new clause 25.
Before the accusations start to be thrown around, let me make it crystal clear that new clause 25 is not some cold-hearted exercise in exclusion; it is a robust, principled stand for expectations—a line in the sand that says that if someone wants to live here, stay here, and call Britain their home, that comes with a reasonable cost. That cost is not measured just in pounds and pence, but in commitment, in responsibility, and in proving that they are here to lift us up, not weigh us down.
A recent study undertaken by the Adam Smith Institute found that, according to figures produced by the Office for Budget Responsibility, the average low-wage migrant worker will cost the British taxpayer £465,000 by the time they reach 81 years of age. It is clear that opening the ILR door to millions of new migrants will impose a considerable and unwanted financial burden on the British taxpayer for decades to come.
The OBR report explores the opportunity to reform indefinite leave to remain rules, which new clause 25 seeks to do, to help mitigate the long-term fiscal burden of low-skilled migrants, who are unlikely to be net contributors to the public purse. A refusal to back new clause 25 is not just inaction, but a choice to prioritise the untested over taxpayers—to keep the welcome mat out while the costs pile up. The Opposition say no, this is our home, and we expect those arriving to treat it as such.
Pete Wishart
It is a pleasure to once again to serve under you as Chair, Dr Murrison. When I look at the Tory amendments in their totality, they are quite frankly an absolute and utter disgrace. It is as if the Tories have learnt absolutely nothing from the Rwanda debacle and the Illegal Migration Act 2023. Some of the amendments that we will be debating are simply heinous, lacking in any reasonable standard of compassion and empathy. What a country they would create: one devoid of human rights and international protections, where people are simply othered and deprived of any rights whatsoever. Some of the most desperate and wretched people in the world would be denied and booted out.
I used to say that the Tories would never beat Reform in the race to the bottom, but looking at the collection of amendments that we are debating today, they are going to give it their best shot. It is just possible that they will out-Reform Reform colleagues in the House of Commons. The amendments are not only terrifying but ludicrously unworkable—blatant political grandstanding, designed to appeal to the basest of instincts. We have the grim task of having to debate them one by one; I just hope that the Committee will reject them totally out of hand.
New clause 25 was raised in a blaze of publicity at the end of the self-denying ordinance from the Leader of the Opposition when she announced her new immigration policy, which I understand has been changed and finessed over the course of the past few weeks, but is still as grotesque underneath as it started. The Conservatives do not believe that British citizenship should be a privilege; they believe that British citizenship should be virtually unobtainable, and that the strongest possible tests must be applied before anybody is ever going to get the opportunity to call themselves a British citizen. That is totally and utterly self-defeating.
The provision will apply to work-based visa holders, skilled workers and global talent, who can currently apply for ILR after five years. Extending that period to 10 years could deter highly-skilled workers and investors from coming to stay in the UK. It may lead to workforce instability, particularly in sectors reliant on international talent. It would also disadvantage certain migrants and people who have lived legally in the UK for 10 years but do not hold one of the listed visas. This is an unworkable, crazy proposal that can only be self-defeating and have a massive impact on our economy. It would create a massive disincentive to the very people we need to come into the UK to fill some of our skills gaps. I hope the provision is roundly rejected.
Jo White
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. We should never be surprised by the audacity of the Conservative party, which now exists in a state of amnesia following the previous 14 years of failure, collapse and chaos. Let me take a moment to remind Opposition Members of their failed promises.
A good place to start is the general election campaign of 2010, when David Cameron said that his Government would reduce net migration to the tens of thousands. At that point, net migration stood at 252,000. In 2011, he went further, saying that his target would be achieved by the 2015 general election—“No ifs. No buts.” But when the ballot boxes were opened in that election, numbers had risen to 379,000. Then along came Theresa May. At the snap 2017 general election, net migration stood at 270,000, and she had an election pledge to get net migration down to the tens of thousands, but by 2019 the number had risen to 275,000.
Matt Vickers
I hope the Minister agrees that we should be doing more, rather than less. We need to give agencies all the opportunities and powers to do so, with or without the consent of people who aim to deceive. That is the right thing to do.
If we rewind to 2022, 490 disputes in quarter 1 ballooned to 1,782 by quarter 4. Now we are at 2,088 and counting. This is not a fading headache; it is an escalating emergency. It is a conveyor belt of fraud clogging our borders and spilling into our schools. Failure to conduct these vital checks would mean that we are not just blind, but complicit in handing traffickers a playbook that says, “Send adults, call them kids and watch us flounder.” The public sees it and parents feel it, and every day we delay, the risk festers. We need science, not sentiment, and we need it now.
Pete Wishart
I rise to speak to new clause 43 on age determination by the Home Office. The one thing we can agree on with the Conservative Front Benchers is that my new clause could not be more different in objective and tone than what we have heard from the shadow Minister. My new clause aims to uphold a simple yet vital principle that no child should be wrongly treated as an adult, subjected to detention or placed in inappropriate accommodation, as happens right now. The new clause would ensure that the Home Office treats as an adult an individual who claims to be a child only in exceptional circumstances or following a Merton-compliant age assessment conducted by local authority social workers. Furthermore, any decision to treat a young person as an adult would have to be made by an appropriately trained official, with reasons recorded and subject to independent oversight. Where such a decision results in the person being placed in adult accommodation or detention, the relevant local authority would have to be notified immediately.
Labour Members are right to have a go at the shadow Minister, but it is imperative that we get this right. This is life-determining and life-shaping for the individuals at the sharp end of these age assessments. The consequences of flawed age assessments at our borders are severe.
Recent data reveals that between January and June 2024 alone, at least 262 children were wrongly assessed as adults and placed in adult accommodation or detention, exposing them to significant safeguarding risks including exploitation, violence and even criminal prosecution. It is worth noting that in many cases, those children endure months of uncertainty before being correctly identified and moved into appropriate care settings. Such errors not only violate child protection principles but undermine the credibility of our asylum system.
The current process of visual assessment, often conducted at the border by immigration officers, is wholly inadequate. Assessments based solely on appearance and demeanour are inherently flawed and have led to serious misjudgments. International and domestic guidance is clear that age assessments should be undertaken only when necessary and should be conducted using holistic, multidisciplinary approaches, yet that is far from the reality.
Concerns about visual assessments have been raised not just by non-governmental organisations, but by the independent chief inspector of borders and immigration, the Children’s Commissioner, parliamentary Committees and the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child. In response to those great concerns, the Government have argued that they are improving the age assessment process through the national age assessment board, and by introducing scientific methods of assessing age—we are back to that debate again. It is important to note that neither of those initiatives has any impact on visual assessments made by officials at the border. Biological methods such as dental X-rays and bone age assessment remain highly unreliable, as medical and scientific bodies repeatedly state. I listened to the hon. Member for Stockton West make great play of saying that that is what all of Europe does, but there are countless cases that the EU and other European nations have got wrong. I can send them to him; he can spend most of the day looking at them. They get cases wrong, just as we do with visual assessments.
It is right that in this Bill the Government seek to repeal clause 58 of the Illegal Migration Act, which would have meant that children who refuse to undergo these invasive and questionable procedures are presumed to be adults by default—an approach that runs contrary to any safeguarding principles. The previous Government attempted to justify that policy by highlighting the risk of adults falsely claiming to be children to access benefits and services designed for minors. However, the reality is that the greater danger lies in the wrongful treatment of children as adults, which places them in unsafe environments, denies them their rights and can have devastating long-term consequences. The number of children found to have been misclassified as adults outweighs the number of cases where an adult has falsely claimed to be a child, so we have the balance totally wrong.
Crucially, there are greater risks and consequences to placing a child among adults, where there are no safeguards in place, than to placing a young adult in local authority care. It is essential that we restore local authority-led age assessments as a primary mechanism for resolving age disputes. As child protection professionals, local authority social workers are best placed to conduct those assessments in a manner that is thorough, fair and in the child’s best interests. The new clause would ensure that young people who assert that they are children are treated as such unless and until a proper assessment proves otherwise. It also guarantees transparency, independent oversight and accountability in decision making, thereby restoring trust in the system.
Matt Vickers
People who arrive here deceptively claiming to be children cannot be allowed to succeed. We should make use of the best scientific age assessment methods available to us, with or without consent. Those will not be used in isolation, but alongside all the other possible assessment methods available to us. We can debate the science all day. The new clause would require the Secretary of State to define those methods within six months through a statutory instrument, using expert advice to do so. One deceptive adult migrant in a classroom or care setting alongside children or vulnerable youngsters is one too many. Giving our agencies the ability to use the best scientific methods available to them to assess age without consent can further their ability to protect children. I would therefore like to press new clause 26 to a Division.
Pete Wishart
I am grateful to the Minister for her response to my new clause 43, but a lot of what she claims is in it is not actually there—I hope she accepts that. Those of us who visit asylum seekers in our constituencies will recognise that the determination is probably the most contentious issue that asylum seekers bring to us; it is the thing that perplexes and concerns them the most. They are very sensitive to it being done wrong, and it gets done wrong in both directions, as the Minister said.
The number of children found to have been misclassified as adults outweighs quite significantly the number of cases where an asylum seeker has falsely claimed to be a child. Everybody is right that there is no scientific or other method to determine age that is 100% effective—visual assessments certainly are not. Surely, however, the people who are best qualified to make these assessments are people who work with children—whose main business is to make these sorts of judgments about children. That is why we have asked for Merton-compliant age assessments, so that an holistic view is taken of the individual and they are assessed properly by social workers trained to work with children. Surely that is the most effective means to determine these things.
I am not saying that we should not use other things, but where the issue is in dispute—perhaps I should have included that in my new clause; clearly, the people sitting in this Committee could not be classified as children—we must get it right. That is so important as we go forward. It is life-changing, dangerous and damaging to be misclassified. As I said in my initial contribution, this is not an immigration issue, but a safeguarding issue. We must get it right. That is why I will press my new clause to a vote as well.
Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Seventh sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsTuesday 11th March 2025
(1 week, 6 days ago)
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Jo White (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
I welcome the opportunity to examine the failed Rwanda scheme. The Israeli scheme, which was set up more than a decade ago, provides stark evidence that the previous Government should have considered before recycling an idea that has cost taxpayers £700 million. In Israel, asylum seekers were given a stark choice: be sent home, go to a migrant detention facility or take $3,500 on a one-way flight to Rwanda. One such asylum seeker quickly found that he was not welcome on arrival. No sooner had he landed in Kigali than he was told he had to leave again for Uganda, and for a fee. He said that he quickly left for Greece on a small boat and then travelled over land to Switzerland, where he is now settled. Another used a $5,000 payment that he received to catch a flight to Amsterdam, where he then claimed asylum status.
The previous Conservative Government entered into the agreement with Rwanda with full knowledge of the previous failings there and offered individuals a personal payment of £3,000 to resettle their lives. Figures have been bandied about on how many asylum seekers Rwanda was willing to take, with the previous Government saying 1,000, and Rwanda saying between 100 and 200. It is not clear who was right, but a question that has often been repeated to me is: how can that be regarded as a deterrent? Indeed, our witnesses from the refugee support organisations made the point that people will continue to come and try their luck, and 84,000 took that risk. I welcome the fact that we have our common sense back and we are repealing the Act, but I despair at the waste of taxpayers’ money on pursuing a fantasy that had already failed elsewhere.
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
Good morning to you, Mr Stuart, for week two of our fascinating journey into the depths of the Bill. There will be absolutely no argument from me about this one, and I wholeheartedly agree that the Bill must go through. When we look back at the whole sorry Rwanda debacle, we will wonder how on earth such a crackpot scheme was not only conceived, but actually constructed and delivered. A few words will be forever on the gravestone of the last Conservative Government: “stop the boats” and “Rwanda”. It was the first time, in my experience, that an Act decreed a new reality. Through sheer willpower alone, the Conservatives declared that Rwanda was a safe place, and in true Orwellian style, they even called the legislation the Safety of Rwanda Act. It was the most blatant political attempt ever to try to convince us that black was white.
Rwanda is so safe that it is currently accused of supporting the M23 militia, which is claimed to be recruiting child soldiers and carrying out killings and rapes of civilians in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Saying all that, Rwanda played an utter blinder. It milked this for all it was worth. It saw these mugs coming. So far, Rwanda has made £240 million—money that will not have to be paid back. The Bill was described by the Law Society as “defective” and “constitutionally improper”, and it was declared unlawful in the Supreme Court. All those rebukes did nothing for the Conservatives other than to encourage them to ensure that the idea became a reality.
We just have to look at the sheer waste and the sheer stupidity that was the very essence of the Rwanda policy. The headline was that it cost taxpayers £750 million and failed to deport a single asylum seeker against their will. There was £270 million to support economic development in Rwanda, £95 million for detention and reception centres and £280 million for other fixed costs. Fifty million pounds was spent preparing for flights that never took off.
Then there is the farce of the Kigali four—the four volunteers sent to Rwanda, who were the only people who actually made it through the whole scheme. Tortoise did us a favour by unearthing the script that was used when the Home Office tried to persuade people to take up a “generous one-time offer” of a relocation package to Rwanda. One source said that demonstrated an
“insane level of resource that went into just proving the concept”.
Dame Angela Eagle
First things first: the hon. Gentleman was not going to send to Rwanda only those whom we could not return to their own country; in theory, he was going to deport to Rwanda absolutely everybody who arrived to claim asylum after March 2023—that was what we were told. In reality, those people all ended up in hotels, unable to be processed and growing in number, while the Conservative party indulged in its expensive gimmicks and fantasies of how the world should be.
As many Committee members have pointed out, the day job was not being done while that parallel universe policy was being developed. It took all the attention away from running what is a complex enough system as it is. Many resources were diverted to try to create that new reality, resulting in the neglect of the system, and huge backlogs were built into the system because of how the Illegal Migration Act interacted with the Safety of Rwanda Act. That made it impossible to run the current system or to move to a new system that was remotely workable, thereby landing this country with a huge, dysfunctional series of backlogs, and a system that we have had to literally start up again from scratch to try to get working coherently.
Pete Wishart
The Minister may have been coming on to the second part of the question asked by the hon. Member for Stockton West, but will she be brave enough to tell the Committee that this Labour Government will never consider sending asylum seekers and refugees to a third country?
Dame Angela Eagle
The Home Secretary has said that she does not rule out third country processing; that is not the same as the Rwanda scheme, which was deportation to a third country permanently. I think the hon. Gentleman is talking about third country returns, such as reviving the Dublin system. When the previous Government negotiated the EU withdrawal agreement, they perhaps should have included something about returns to Europe. Had they done so, perhaps we would be in a different situation, but those would also have been third country returns. He asked a wide-ranging question, and I have been as honest as I can in answering it at this point.
We could spend all day, and probably many more days, talking about the failure encompassed in the interaction of the Safety of Rwanda Act and the Illegal Migration Act. Our job today, though, is to tidy it up. Clause 37 will take the Safety of Rwanda Act off the statute book and put it in the dustbin of history, where it belongs.
Question put, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Matt Vickers
There is a lot to do in the way of commencement; the Bill is there and could be commenced at any time, if the Government felt it was of help. In fact, in a few years’ time, when they come back to the drawing board to try to find a deterrent, they might well want to do that.
Sections 31 and 32 of the Illegal Migration Act prevented people who have entered the country illegally from obtaining British citizenship. The Labour Government are repealing this provision. Their position is hardly surprising when the Prime Minister does not think that British citizenship is a pull factor, but that does not mean it is the right thing to do. Why are the Government repealing this clause, allowing illegal migrants to get British citizenship?
Do the Government not believe that British citizenship is a privilege rather than a right, especially for those who have entered the country illegally? If so, why have the Government not included measures to stop illegal migrants obtaining British citizenship, and instead only issued guidance stating that
“applications made after 10 February 2025 that include illegal entry will ‘normally’ be refused citizenship, regardless of when the illegal entry occurred.”?
Section 58 of the Illegal Migration Act states:
“The Secretary of State may make regulations about the effect of a decision by a relevant person (“P”) not to consent to the use of a specified scientific method for the purposes of an age assessment…where there are no reasonable grounds for P’s decision.”
This means that, if a migrant refused to undergo an age assessment, they would be considered an adult. Labour have removed age assessments for illegal migrants who claim to be under 18, resulting in the risk that grown men may end up in schools with teenage girls. In fact, the most recent data on age disputes shows that more than 50% of migrants claiming to be under 18 were actually adults. How do the Government therefore intend to ensure that migrants claiming to be under 18 actually undergo age assessments, and why is that not included in the Bill?
The SNP’s new clause 2 would repeal the Illegal Migration Act entirely, so the SNP must be agreeing with the Labour Government that illegal migrants should be able to get British citizenship and should not have to undergo age assessments. Therefore, I ask the same questions: does the SNP not believe that British citizenship is a privilege rather than a right, especially for those who have entered the country illegally? How would the SNP ensure that migrants claiming to be under 18 actually undergo age assessments, and why is that not included in new clause 2?
By repealing the Illegal Migration Act in its entirety, the SNP want to stop the seizure of mobile phones from illegal migrants, something that helps to establish identities and obtain evidence of immigration offences. As Tony Smith said:
“Passport data, identity data, age data and travel history data are often held on those phones—all data that would be useful when considering an asylum application.”––[Official Report, Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Public Bill Committee, 27 February 2025; c. 40, Q43.]
The Liberal Democrats’ amendment 9 would have repealed section 29 of the Illegal Migration Act, which requires the Secretary of State to remove people who have sought to use modern slavery protections in bad faith. Do the Liberal Democrats think that people using modern slavery protections fraudulently should be allowed to stay in the UK? If so, do they believe that people who make fraudulent immigration claims should be allowed to stay in the UK? We believe that the effect of repealing the majority of the IMA and the entirety of the Safety of Rwanda Act will be an increase in the number of people arriving in this country illegally and remaining.
I have therefore asked the Government whether they would be prepared to be transparent about the numbers. If they are convinced that the approach set out in the Bill will be successful, let us measure it. Will the Minister commit to publishing all the numbers, and the nationalities, of all those who might have been excluded from the UK asylum system on grounds of connection with a safe third country or a late claim, but have not been—with reasons why not—and to setting out the obstacles to returning them to their country of origin and what steps are being taken through international agreements to overcome that, as recommended by Tony Smith in evidence to this Committee? We will oppose the inclusion of this clause in the Bill by way of a Division.
Pete Wishart
I must say to the hon. Member for Stockton West that he really does not want to know my views on British citizenship, because they are likely to blow his head—but we will leave that one at that.
It is disappointing to note the absence of our Liberal colleagues. Back in the day—the good old days, Mr Stuart —when we had an effective, efficient, diligent and conscientious third party, there would always be someone present to ensure that the views of the third party were represented. I am sure that the Liberal Democrats have good excuses, but I hope they start to take a bit of interest in this important Bill, because it has been disappointing thus far.
I say to the Minister, “‘Useful clauses?’ Come on!” We are talking about sections 29, 12, 59, 60 and 62, some of the nastiest and most pernicious parts and aspects of the Illegal Migration Act. I cannot believe that this Government want to continue that horrible and heinous Tory set of proposals and clauses in this Bill. This was their great opportunity to wipe the slate clean of the previous Government’s hopeless and useless crackpot Rwanda scheme and their heinous and horrible Illegal Migration Act.
I will give the Minister a few quotes from some of her colleagues, some of which I wish I had come up with myself. The now Prime Minister said at the time that the Illegal Migration Bill would drive “a coach and horses” through protections for women trafficked to the UK as victims of modern slavery. The now Home Secretary said that that IMA does the “total opposite” of providing support for those who have been trafficked, and that it was nothing other than “a traffickers’ charter”. There are other prize quotes from the Home Secretary and various Ministers within the Home Office—absolutely and totally correct, right and true—about the horrible Illegal Migration Act. Now we have a Labour Government inconceivably standing by large swathes of an Act that they so rightly and widely rubbished and wanted rid of only a short while ago.
It would be different if the Government were maintaining some benign, useful or helpful parts of that Tory Act, but they are maintaining some real, pernicious nasties. Provisions that were damaging, dangerous and contrary to human rights under the Tories are just as damaging, dangerous and contrary to human rights under this new Labour Government. I remind the Minister what the then Home Secretary said on that Bill when introducing it:
“I am unable to make a statement that, in my view, the provisions of the Illegal Migration Bill are compatible with the Convention rights, but the Government nevertheless wishes the House to proceed with the Bill.”
The previous Government could not care less about our obligations under international law or about human rights, and they were quite happy to set them aside. Now we have a Home Secretary who stands by certain provisions of that Act, with all its difficulties concerning its relationship with convention rights.
Dame Angela Eagle
The hon. Gentleman will have noted on the front of the Bill that we are debating the statement from the Home Secretary on the European convention on human rights:
“In my view the provisions of the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill are compatible with the Convention rights.”
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.
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.
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.
Dame Angela Eagle
Work is going on in the Department to assess the accuracy of the various methods of age assessment, which ministerial predecessors from the hon. Gentleman’s party commenced, but which has not yet been finished. As soon as we have more idea about how reliable scientific age assessment can be, how expensive it is and all those things, I will either come to Parliament or make a statement about how we intend to proceed. The hon. Gentleman must not assume that because these sections have been repealed we are not interested in scientific age assessments and their potential per se. They were simply unworkable because they were attached to the duty to remove, which was such a feature of the Illegal Migration Act.
The six measures that the Government intend to retain, including where provisions are in force, have been identified as having operational utility and benefit. These powers are all ones that the Government see as important tools to allow for the proper operation of the immigration system and to achieve wider priorities alongside the powerful measures set out in the Bill.
The hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire talked about section 29 of the Illegal Migration Act. The public order disqualification under the Nationality and Borders Act is currently in operation. It enables decisions to disqualify certain individuals from support and protections afforded by the national referral mechanisms on grounds of public order and bad faith. Public order grounds include serious criminality and threats to national security. Such decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, considering the individual’s vulnerabilities. That is the sole modern slavery measure in the Illegal Migration Act that is being retained. It would, if commenced, amend the public order disqualification to allow more foreign national offenders to be considered for disqualification from modern slavery protections on public order grounds. Disqualification will continue to be assessed on an individual basis.
Pete Wishart
I am glad that the Minister got to that last sentence, because it is quite clear from section 29 that victims of modern slavery only have to be considered a threat to public order. It is quite likely that many victims of modern slavery will get caught up in this; in fact, they already have. Is the Minister happy that those who were probably coerced into criminal activity will now almost be blanket-banned from any opportunity to go through the asylum process in the United Kingdom?
Dame Angela Eagle
There will not be a blanket ban. Individuals who have been subject to public order disqualification will have been disqualified for things such as multiple drug offences, possessing a firearm and ammunition, multiple counts of sexual assault and assault by beating, grooming and engaging in sexual communication with a child. Those are the kind of things that currently lead to public order disqualifications. Nothing in the retention of section 29 will mean that individual circumstances on a case-by-case basis cannot be taken into account. It is important to understand that that will still happen. If it were commenced—it has not yet been—section 29 would introduce a duty to apply the public order disqualification, unless there are compelling circumstances that the disqualification should not apply. That still ensures case-by-case consideration.
The citizenship ban is removed from the Bill because it was unworkable and unenforced; that is, again, attached to the duties to remove. We have updated the good character guidance to prevent people from gaining citizenship if they arrived illegally by dangerous journeys. The idea is to emphasise that citizenship is not a right, but a privilege. We will continue to make those decisions on a case-by-case basis.
The other sections that we have retained are thought to be useful. The six measures in section 12 emphasise the right of the Secretary of State to determine what constitutes a reasonable time period to detain a person for the specific statutory purpose of effecting removal from the UK. Section 52 allows flexibility in our judiciary by making first-tier tribunal judges eligible to sit in the upper-tier tribunal. I cannot imagine anyone in the Committee would worry about that.
Section 59, if commenced, would extend the inadmissibility provisions to asylum and human rights claims from nationals in a list of generally safe states. Section 60 requires an annual cap to be set on the number of individuals admitted to the UK by safe and legal routes. Section 62 adds failing to provide information, such as a passcode to an electronic device, to the behaviours that could be considered damaging to the credibility of an asylum and human rights claim. All those issues are thought to provide utility, but outside the context of the duty to remove.
Question put, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Eighth sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsTuesday 11th March 2025
(1 week, 6 days ago)
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Katie Lam
As the Minister has outlined, clause 40 inserts schedule 1 into the Bill. That provides that the Immigration Services Commissioner is not to hold office for a term exceeding five years. The current regime is based on there being a commissioner and deputy, so schedule 1 sets out that the commissioner may appoint a deputy. There is also a provision to enable a member of the commissioner’s staff to act in the commissioner’s place in certain circumstances, such as the roles of commissioner and deputy both being vacant. That effectively allows for the appointment of an interim commissioner.
As was said in evidence to the Committee, these amendments do not seem to us to have operational consequence. We will not oppose them.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 40 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 1 agreed to.
Clause 41
Detention and exercise of functions pending deportation
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
I beg to move amendment 7, clause 41, page 35, line 32, leave out subsection (17).
This amendment would leave out the subsection of this clause that applies subsections (1) to (13) (relating to detention and exercise of functions pending deportation) retrospectively, i.e. as if they have always had effect.
Pete Wishart
It is great to see you in the Chair, Dame Siobhain; it makes a pleasant change from what we have had in the past couple of weeks. I say that in the nicest way to Mr Stuart.
Pete Wishart
Clause 41 introduces a significant expansion of detention powers, allowing individuals to be detained from the moment a deportation is considered rather than waiting for a formal order. However, my main concern with the clause is that it is to apply retrospectively, meaning it would legally validate past detentions that were previously unlawful. As would be expected, the provision has sparked serious concerns among legal experts, human rights organisations and advocacy groups, raising critical questions about the rule of law, human rights and judicial oversight.
We had the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association with us as part of an evidence session. They have expressed great concern with this provision, saying:
“We are concerned with the dangerous precedent which would be set if unlawful deprivation of liberty were to be treated as lawful—such retrospectivity undermines the rule of law and remains wholly unjustified in the materials accompanying the Bill.”
I have looked at this issue and there does not seem to be any sufficient justification for this exceptional measure. The ILPA warns us that it could rewrite history, denying justice to individuals who could have sought remedies for unlawful detention.
Amnesty International, which again gave very good evidence to the Committee, has also voiced strong objections. It has highlighted how detention powers have expanded significantly while judicial oversight has weakened, leading to risks of serious injustice.
Bail for Immigration Detainees has stressed that clause 41 risks
“further criminalising migrants and refugees”.
It urges instead for a system that upholds human rights and dignity.
Combined with the Illegal Migration Act, the clause could lead to longer, more expensive and potentially unlawful detentions in breach of article 5 of the European convention on human rights. The Government’s own impact assessment acknowledges that clause 41 effectively makes lawful past detentions that were not compliant with due process at the time, yet the European convention on human rights memorandum does not properly address whether that retrospective validation aligns with the fundamental legal safeguards of article 5. I would particularly like the Minister to address those concerns.
Clause 41 therefore undermines accountability, weakens judicial scrutiny and risks setting a dangerous precedent through which the Government can retroactively legitimise actions that would otherwise have been unlawful. Given the weight of these concerns, there is a strong case for leaving out the retrospective provisions from clause 41, and that is what my amendment 7 seeks to do. Upholding the rule of law means ensuring that detention powers are subject to proper legal safeguards and that individuals are not denied their fundamental rights through legislative backtracking.
Dame Angela Eagle
The purpose of clause 41 is to clarify the existing powers of detention pending deportation set out in schedule 3(2) of the Immigration Act 1971. The clause ensures that the Secretary of State can detain individuals once they have been notified that deportation is being considered. It also aligns the power to detain with the power to take biometrics and to search for nationality documents. That is because the taking of biometric information and any other searches will ordinarily take place at the point that somebody is detained. The effect of clause 41 is to make clear that a person subject to deportation may be detained at any stage of the deportation process. It strengthens an existing power; it does not create a new power. It clarifies a power that has always existed and been used for this purpose.
Another effect of the clause is to confirm that the Secretary of State may take biometrics and search for those documents. Since clause 41 clarifies existing powers, the detention provisions it contains are regarded as always having had effect. It is extremely important for Members to understand what the clarification of the powers of detention means. If a person is subject to deportation on the basis that the deportation is conducive to the public good, they may be detained at any stage of the deportation process. It is extremely important that the Home Office should be able to detain those it is seeking to deport on that basis. Some of these foreign national offenders pose a high risk of harm to the public. Therefore, inability to detain them could have a direct impact on public safety.
The clause makes it clear that it is lawful to detain a person once they are notified that the Home Office is considering whether to make a deportation order against them, but that is not a new detention power; it has been misunderstood in some of the commentary from outside of this place. The clause clarifies an existing power to ensure there is no ambiguity about when someone subject to a conducive deportation can be detained. The accurate identification of such people is very important.
The clause also makes consequential amendments to existing powers to search detained persons—potential deportees—for documents that prove their identity or nationality, and to take their biometrics upon their being detained. Clause 41 sets out the power to detain pending deportation, as the Home Office has always understood it to operate. It is therefore right that the provision applies retrospectively. That deals with amendment 7, which is in the name of the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire and seeks to remove the retrospective element of the clause.
Clause 41 clarifies the existing statutory powers of detention. There are important public safety reasons why these powers need to be put beyond doubt. Clause 41 clarifies the powers as the Home Office has always understood them to operate. There will be no operational impact that we can assess, or increased use of the power, and no effect on people in relation to whom this power has been exercised. It is entirely right that these provisions should apply retrospectively in these circumstances.
Pete Wishart
I hear the Minister’s justification for the powers and why she feels they are necessary, but I do not hear any compelling reason for why they have to be introduced retrospectively. What on earth is that supposed to help with? She knows the range of concerns raised by a number of legal organisations. I wish she would address their concerns about the consequences of the clause.
Dame Angela Eagle
The clause seeks to put beyond any doubt that the Home Office has the power to detain, in conducive deportation cases, at the earliest point. It has been doing that for many years. The clarification in the clause applies retrospectively to ensure that those who have been detained in the past have not been detained unlawfully. We do not believe they have, but this puts it beyond doubt. To clarify, this is not an extension of deportation powers; it is putting beyond doubt in the Bill the understanding of how and when these powers can be used—at the earliest opportunity, if it is a conducive deportation. The powers, including to detain at the earliest opportunity, have always existed.
If the amendment moved by the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire were agreed to, it would cast doubt on many of the arrests and detentions ahead of deportations that have happened in the past, which I do not think the hon. Gentleman would want to do. To reassure the hon. Gentleman one final time, this is not an extension of deportation powers; it is a clarification of the way that they have always been understood to work. The clause puts beyond legal doubt that if somebody is being detained pending deportation, they can be detained lawfully at the earliest opportunity. That understanding has always been the case, but the clause puts it beyond any legal doubt.
Katie Lam
Clause 41 confirms that the Home Office may detain someone subject to deportation from the point at which the Home Office serves the notification that deportation is being considered, when that deportation is conducive to the public good. We support this provision to allow for detention before a deportation order is signed, but that only applies if the Secretary of State has notified the person in writing. Can I seek reassurance from the Minister that the requirement for a written notice will not build any delay into the process? We also support the provision in clause 42 to allow the Home Office to capture biometrics at the new, earlier point of detention.
Pete Wishart
I will not detain the Committee for long. I do not like clause 41 anyway—I think the extension of deportation powers is overwhelming and I do not believe they are required—but I do not like this retrospection one bit. I have not secured an adequate explanation from the Minister about why that is necessary. I would therefore like to put my amendment to a vote, Dame Siobhain.
The Chair
Thank you for clarifying, as that was going to be my next question. Does anybody else wish to contribute?
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Fifth sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsThursday 6th March 2025
(2 weeks, 4 days ago)
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Mike Tapp
I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He makes the powerful point that the French need to be engaged with diplomatically rather than being bashed on social media, which damages our relationship with them. The way forward here is to continue with that gentle diplomacy to bring about the changes in their laws that may well benefit the United Kingdom. We have already seen results on that front in Germany. The Germans have changed laws around the facilitation of the kit to be used for these crossings, so diplomacy is already yielding positive results, and I expect we will see more of that.
My second point is that this amendment is fantasy land from the Opposition. We inherited a justice system that was completely broken and on its knees, with just 2% of prison places still available. Do the Opposition propose sticking all these people in prison? If so, where are those prison places going to come from, given what we have inherited?
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for a second day, Mr Stuart. I rise to speak to amendment 5 in my name.
Of all the new criminalising clauses in the Bill, this is the one that concerns me most. It is the most invidious and cruel. As we have heard, the clause proposes a new criminal offence of endangering another during a sea crossing, with a proposed maximum sentence of six years’ imprisonment. The offence is defined as committing an act that creates a risk of death or serious physical or psychological injury to another person during a sea journey from France, Belgium or the Netherlands to the UK—in effect, all the sea journeys across the channel by, mainly, asylum seekers who are seeking refuge in the UK.
How that is supposed to be assessed is anyone’s guess. Any potential transgression of the clause could happen only in the most chaotic of circumstances—on a small boat where people will probably be struggling for their lives to try to get here. The only witnesses to any transgressions of this clause will be other traumatised souls who had the great misfortunate to be there at that time. The new offence is concerningly broad, and explicitly aimed at people on the move; it exclusively and directly targets those on the boats.
Which people may get caught up in this offence? The first category that comes to mind is those people who may have been offered rescue by the French but refused the opportunity of rescue. But why would they take that opportunity? These are people who have travelled thousands of miles to try to seek asylum in the United Kingdom. I am supposing that they make up the first category that the Minister has in mind with this offence.
However, it is also possible to prosecute individuals who, in moments of panic or self-preservation, inadvertently put others at risk. That means that someone who makes a sea crossing out of desperation could face a prison sentence simply because of the circumstances of their arrival, rather than any deliberate intent to cause harm. This law makes no attempt to take account of the high risk and chaotic nature of these journeys, where panic, misjudgment or even attempts to help others could inadvertently lead to criminal liability.
What makes the clause particularly invidious, and why we should think about it very carefully, is that it does not do even one thing to tackle what the Government say they are tackling: the gangs—the people who organise this foul trade and are responsible for putting people on the boats. It does nothing to target them. The only people who will be in the sights of this invidious, cruel clause will be ordinary asylum seekers.
The refugee convention is clear that refugees should not be penalised for how they enter a country to claim asylum. The clause runs a coach and horses through that obligation. It also breaches the Palermo protocol, which enables asylum seekers to claim asylum freely and honestly. The European convention on human rights memorandum states that
“parents who bring their children on the type of journeys that the Endangerment Offence captures will be excluded from prosecution in almost all circumstances”.
The key words are “almost all”: there could still be prosecutions, and the memorandum notes that that could lead to families breaking up.
There is another main target of the offence. It is designed to entrap and ensnare those who pilot the boats. Let us look at how far we have come with this new distinction and new category of people that the Government are now going after. It was in 2019 that the Government started bringing criminal charges against people identified as steering dinghies across the channel. Prior to this clause, those identified as piloting boats have usually been arrested and charged with the offence of facilitating a breach of immigration law under section 25 of the Immigration Act 1971.
The Nationality and Borders Act 2022 increased the maximum sentence for that offence to life imprisonment. In most cases, the second charge is dropped due to a lack of evidence—as I explained, the deeply chaotic circumstances where evidence could be acquired lead to a lack of evidence being presented in court proceedings. However, there have been some successful section 25 prosecutions. For example, they can happen when a person pleads guilty to an offence at the first opportunity before it is dropped.
Chris Murray
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stuart. I will make a couple of points about the amendments to the clause, and the clause overall.
I have always been frustrated that people from both left and right make the same mistake on immigration policy—we forget that immigrants and asylum seekers are people. That means that, just like any group of people, they vary: some are entirely innocent and exploited, and some seek to exploit others and are criminals. We need to make the distinction between those groups.
Amendment 5, tabled by the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire, makes some important points, and my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd East is right about the passion and compassion that drive the amendment. I absolutely recognise, support and understand that passion and compassion, but we must be clear-eyed about the reality of what is happening in the channel.
Yes, people are in great danger, and they are the most exploited, most vulnerable people, but they are not there by accident. They are not panicking because they have stumbled by accident into the boat. There is a large, extremely organised, extremely well-financed criminal enterprise putting them in that position and it does not care one bit whether they live or die. We need to be able to draw a distinction between the vulnerable people who are in that situation and the people who are putting them there.
Pete Wishart
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that we have to make that distinction between those who have organised, orchestrated and profited from such activities and those at the sharp end of it: the asylum seekers and immigrants themselves. We need to be laser-focused on the gangs, the people who put together and design this vile trade, not on the ordinary asylum seekers, whom these criminalisation clauses exclusively focus on.
Chris Murray
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, but I am afraid I completely disagree with him on what this Bill is doing. Being an asylum seeker is a self-declaration. It is anticipatory. Someone just declares themselves as one; the system later ascertains whether that is correct and whether they are a refugee. He mentioned earlier that the refugee convention does not penalise people for the mechanism by which they enter; he is quite correct, but that is not a blanket immunity from any criminal act committed in the process.
Pete Wishart
I am sorry to see that the Minister is still bravely struggling with a cold—the Committee has noticed. A variety of offences are available to the courts to make sure that anybody who endangers people at sea can be prosecuted. There is illegal arrival, there is facilitating the illegal entry of others, and there is what Ibrahima Bah was convicted of—gross negligence manslaughter. These offences are all currently available to the prosecutorial authorities. I do not know why the Minister feels she needs this new offence. It can only be because she has a particular target in mind against whom she wants to apply these rules. Can she confirm that?
Dame Angela Eagle
I will try to give the hon. Gentleman some insight. I was going to come on to this when addressing the clause itself, but it is in the Bill because we have perceived a change in behaviour in some areas.
There has been an increase in physical aggression towards other people, including migrants and third parties. There is a lot more violence on the beaches against French police. There is intimidating and controlling behaviour on the boats. People are preventing others from disembarking or calling for help when the boat gets into difficulty. There are physical acts that result in harm being caused to another person either while boarding a boat or while on a boat. People are being pushed off boats, including in shallow French territorial waters. The pilots sometimes decide to continue on to the UK even when there have been fatalities or serious harm on the boat. We are now seeing a range of behaviours that clause 18 will allow us to address.
I will address amendment 5, but the view of the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire is that no asylum seeker should be charged with this new criminal offence, which would render clause 18 unworkable and pointless, as 95% of people who come across on small boats claim asylum. How one behaved on the boat across will be in the purview of clause 18, whether it is dangling children over the side or forcing women and children to sit in the middle—often the middle of the boats come free and collapse, so the women and children are the first to die. Where women and children are forced to sit in the middle, they sometimes arrive in the UK with horrific burns because of the combination of fuel and seawater, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East said.
I simply do not agree with the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire that, just because someone will claim asylum when they get to the UK, none of their behaviour on the way over should have any bearing on what happens when they get here. Clause 18, which creates a new criminal offence under section 24 of the Immigration Act, will not criminalise everyone who makes these crossings. It would be pointless and completely unworkable if we sought to do that, as the Opposition amendments do. It is about addressing, discouraging and deterring the acts that cause or create a risk of serious injury or death to others, which we are now seeing from individuals travelling to the UK by small boats.
There have to be consequences for anyone who further jeopardises the safety and lives of others during these dangerous crossings. There are those who insist on continuing their journey when assistance is at hand, who refuse assistance, and often, when there have been fatalities, try to prevent others from being rescued. Clause 18 addresses specific acts that create or cause a risk of serious injury or death to others during a journey. We heard in oral evidence how these journeys are being made more dangerous by such acts, and clause 18 is a response to the increasing propensity of this kind of behaviour.
There have been shocking and tragic cases of women and children being forced and intimidated into life-threatening positions during journeys that are already dangerous enough, which is exactly the type of offending that clause 18 aims to target. The approach cannot simply be to say that whatever happens on the boat, stays on the boat. The new offence is another tool designed to curb the endangerment of life. It sits alongside other activity against gangs that intentionally place people in danger by selling these crossings as a viable route to the UK. This Government take fatalities and injuries at sea extremely seriously, and we are going further than ever to try to bring an end to them.
Pete Wishart
I thank the Minister for her full response to the amendments before the Committee. I totally agree with her on amendment 17, and I hope the Committee rejects it. It is a ridiculous and unworkable proposition that everybody who comes to our shores should be criminalised almost immediately upon arrival.
A couple of things have been said in this debate that I want to challenge and take head on, including the idea that everything is black and white, that people are either the exploited or the exploiters. Everybody accepts that there is a grey area. I think every member of this Committee believes that those who behave in a reprehensible, appalling and awful way, whether on the small boats or in getting people on to the small boats, should rightly face the full force of the law.
The Minister is right to highlight all those examples of the dangerous behaviour that happens during some of these journeys. None of us would want people to get away with that behaviour, but the Bill does not refer to such activity, and there is nothing in the guidance or the explanatory notes. Nothing in the Bill specifies this type of behaviour. As the Bill progresses, the Minister will have to make sure it mentions such behaviour.
The other challenge with the type of activity the Minister describes is how to get the evidence. This activity is happening in the most chaotic circumstances, on small boats coming across the channel. We know these things are reported, and we know that people are arrested and face the full force of the law, but the Minister still has to convince the Committee that a new offence is needed, and that certain categories of migrant will not be caught up.
Chris Murray
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that, if his amendment 5 were accepted, someone could orchestrate a boat crossing the channel, throw a child off—which this measure is trying to prevent—and then, when they arrive on the shores of the UK, just say, “I am an asylum seeker”? That would be an obstacle to any prosecution.
The only way we could get over that obstacle—even if the person were French—would be for them to go through the entire asylum process. They would be placed in a hotel in one of our constituencies and, given the huge backlog we have, it would be almost two years before we are able to prosecute them.
Pete Wishart
It must be how I am presenting this but, again, I am not being understood. I am sorry that I have not explained the intention clearly enough, but I have no intention of that scenario happening. [Interruption.] Can I say to the hon. Gentleman—and to the Whip, the hon. Member for Inverclyde and Renfrewshire West, who is trying to intervene from a sedentary position—that existing offences are in place to deal with the activity being described. I have cited the example of Ibrahima Bah, who was done for gross negligence manslaughter. Where that happens, of course people should face the full force of the law. And that happens, because we have existing laws in place.
I listened very carefully to the Minister’s description of the new types of activity that she feels clause 18 is necessary to address, but those activities have to be specified and defined. If she moved new clauses to address such activity, I am sure she would get a fair hearing—she would get a fair hearing from me—but, because clause 18 is so broad, other behaviour and activity will inadvertently be drawn into these offences. People who are possibly acting in self-protection, or who are trying to save people but inadvertently put others at risk, will be caught by this clause.
We need to apply common sense to what the Minister is trying to do, and we need to make sure common sense is reflected in the Bill because, at this stage, it is not.
Becky Gittins
I just want to tease out what the hon. Gentleman has said. Does he accept that, if this amendment passed, gang members facilitating crossings on small boats would escape prosecution?
Pete Wishart
Absolutely not. Again, I must be having great difficulty getting through, and I accept that that is my responsibility, but that is not what is intended in the least. A variety of laws deal with the activity that the Minister mentioned. We know that because 244 people were charged in the course of 2023, and since the Labour Government came to power, something like 86 people have been charged with offences. People are being charged and prosecuted for serious offences.
The Minister has identified new dangerous activity, and she is right to do so, but if we want legislation to deal with it, bring that legislation before the House. Do not bring in this broad-sweep legislation, under which natural, normal activity that may be designed to help and protect people could be caught up. The difficulty with this legislation is that it inadvertently draws in people who do not deserve to be. I know it is about targeting the pilots in the boats, but there has to be some recognition of what forces and coerces people into piloting the boats. There needs to be an understanding of their situation and why they are doing that, but the clause fails to take account of any of that.
Chris Murray
I take on board the hon. Gentleman’s point, and I can assure him that no one has higher respect than I do for the organisations that have supplied such evidence. I have been in conversations with them myself. The issue at hand here, however—I know this from having worked in the sector—is that they are not set up to stop the gangs or take through criminal prosecutions. That is not their objective. Their job is purely, and properly, to protect migrants. They will lean towards a broad definition, and that is why I think he has inadvertently fallen into a trap. In excluding everyone from the provisions, we avoid the traffickers, but it is not the job of those organisations to target them.
Pete Wishart
The hon. Gentleman is spot on. The job of those organisations is to be concerned for the welfare and conditions of people who come to our shores, and to ensure that they are supported on their journey through the asylum process. The organisations have identified that the Bill does little to target the gangs that the hon. Gentleman is referring to; in fact, they do little at all. They are all about ordinary asylum seekers. The new criminalisation clauses that we have debated over the past couple of days are all exclusively devoted to the activity of asylum seekers coming here, and none more so than this clause.
I hope that, as the Bill proceeds through its remaining stages—particularly when it goes through the other place, although that greatly concerns me for a number of reasons—we will be able to improve it, and get to a place where it reflects what the Minister said in her fine contribution.
Sarah Bool
I did not hear from the Minister a response on the Law Society’s concern about parents and guardians being criminalised, and I wonder whether I could hear some thoughts on that.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Sixth sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsThursday 6th March 2025
(2 weeks, 4 days ago)
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Matt Vickers (Stockton West) (Con)
We support clauses 19 to 26, but only in so far as they endorse powers that we think already exist to seize, extract and retain data from mobile devices. Clause 19 provides definitions of key terms in sections 20 and 21 relating to the provisions of those clauses to allow authorised officers to search for, seize and retain relevant articles. The definition of a “relevant article” is
“any thing which appears to an authorised officer to be a thing on which information that relates, or may relate, to the commission of an offence under section 25 or 25A of the Immigration Act 1971 is, or may be, stored in electronic form.”
Will the Minister provide some concrete examples of what the Government think such information might consist of?
Clause 20 gives relevant officers—either an immigration officer or a police constable—powers to search a relevant person, which is someone who has entered the UK without leave or in breach of a deportation order. Will the Minister explain why subsection (2) does not allow for any more than one search after the person in question has arrived in the UK? The clause gives officers the power to search for “relevant articles”, which are described in clause 19 as
“any thing which appears to an authorised officer to be a thing on which information that relates, or may relate, to the commission (whether in the past or future) of an offence under section 25 or 25A of the Immigration Act 1971”.
That is quite a narrow definition, as it covers just electronic devices. Will the Minister reassure the Committee that the necessary powers to search for non-electronic items exist elsewhere? In practice, we suspect the power will be used to gather information and evidence to identify smugglers for prosecution. We fully support that, but most mobile devices are destroyed during or prior to travelling across the channel. Will the Minister therefore explain whether she expects any of the evidence gathered using the powers in these clauses to be used to support decision making on immigration enforcement?
If the devices are seized, as the former director general of Border Force pointed out in his evidence, they may contain useful information about nationality, identity, age and travel history, and may provide valuable evidence when assessing asylum claims. Will the Minister explain how effective the new powers will be in supporting evidence gathering to remove those with no right to be here? Will information gathered using these powers be available to asylum screening teams? Will that evidence be used in decision making for immigration appeals? These clauses do not have extraterritorial reach, so can the Minister explain to what extent the Government envisage these additional powers will make a meaningful difference to smashing the gangs, when many of the perpetrators are located outside the UK?
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
These clauses create invasive new search, seizure and retention powers, along with the powers to access, copy and use information contained within an electronic device. The new powers can be applied to any person who arrives irregularly and has not yet been granted permission to enter or remain in the UK. They allow an immigration or police officer to fully search a person, including a search of that person’s mouth. I expect that the Minister will tell us exactly whether that particular qualification is required for these new powers.
This is not the plot and setting of some future dystopian film: it will be the UK sea border in the course of the next few months. These things will not be done to hardened criminals wandering the streets of the United Kingdom or those associated with violent crime. They are to be done to some of the most abandoned and traumatised people in the world. With these clauses we are starting, measuredly, to go into police state territory. They are essentially a hybrid form of stop-and-search powers, without the due qualifications and reassurances. I do not know if profiling will be a part of this—I will be interested in the Minister’s response—but it seems like only one profile will be included in all that, which is that of every asylum seeker. They may all be subject to these new powers.
For these powers to be exercised, there need only be reasonable grounds and suspicion that a relevant article appears to store some electronic information that relates or may relate to the future or past commission of a facilitation offence. That seems excessively broad. Practically any person who arrives irregularly to the UK may be subject to these powers. Any information received from these searches would be used for preventing, detecting, investigating or prosecuting facilitation offences. The property can be retained for as long as considered necessary to assess, examine or copy information for use in proceedings for an offence, before being returned or disposed of.
I trying to think why the Government want these clauses. I know they are going to tell us it is all about helping to disrupt organised crime and making sure they can find particular and specific information on electronic devices, but I think a lot of it has to do with the 2022 High Court ruling decreeing that the Home Office’s secret policy of blanket searching, seizing and returning mobile phones from individuals arriving by small boats was unlawful.
Just like the Tories before them, if any particular law that defends and protects people is seen or deemed to be a little bit unnecessary, the Government will just bring in a new one to override it completely, forgetting anything to do with the consequences and implications for people. These new offences clearly compromise a person’s right to a private and family life. Given the confidential, legally privileged, sensitive, private and personal nature of the messages, photographs, information, correspondence and data that may be on such mobile devices, we hold that that could only ever be the case. To be fair, the Government respect that and acknowledge it as fact, and the European convention on human rights memorandum suggests that the new powers could be distinguished and that phones will not be seized on a blanket basis when these powers come into force—well, thank goodness for that.
The memorandum says:
“The Home Office will issue non-statutory guidance about the use of the powers and training which will be required for authorised officers exercising those powers.”
We will have to see that happen pretty quickly, because we have no idea how any of these powers will be exercised. Again, I am entirely happy to take the Minister at her word on how the new law will be exercised as we go forward. However, there is no such guidance for parliamentary scrutiny during the passage of the Bill, so it remains entirely unclear how the Home Office proposes to use these wide and invasive new powers.
I am distinctly uncomfortable with the new powers, and I am disconcerted about how they may be applied and used. A number of agencies have serious misgivings about the type of individuals who will be subject to these new powers. The Minister has to explain just a little more how these powers will be used and what protections will be put in place, particularly for some of the most traumatised people whom we will be ever deal with in this country.
Jo White (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
I very much welcome this element of the Bill on electronic devices. While clause 22 will give officers powers to seize digital devices that are believed to be used for the purpose of people smuggling, clause 23 gives suitably trained and accredited criminal investigators the powers to access the information on mobile devices, phones and laptops that will build the evidence base, history, connections and understanding of the routes of the criminal gangs.
Seizing and extracting data from mobile devices is a powerful tool already used by our security services. There are already established Home Office guidelines on this, and these clauses extend those powers and will help enable intelligence-led profiling of irregular arrivals. That key change will lead to greater opportunities to disrupt the trade of these awful gangs.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Fourth sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsTuesday 4th March 2025
(2 weeks, 6 days ago)
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Dame Angela Eagle
The hon. Member asked why the Border Security Commander should be processing data collected from electronic devices. He will know that later in the Bill, there are some new powers that involve collecting, in an intelligence-led way, data from suspected organised immigration criminals. The point is to ensure that data is collected in a lawful manner, and that is why clause 11 allows the Border Security Commander to process data for law enforcement purposes. Some of that is about the counter terrorism-style powers, which we will discuss in relation to later clauses—I do not want to have that debate here—but it is really an enabling power to put beyond doubt the legality of the collection of such material.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 10 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clauses 11 and 12 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 13
Supplying articles for use in immigration crime
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
I beg to move amendment 3, in clause 13, page 7, line 12, at end insert—
‘(1A) For the purposes of subsection (1), P cannot commit an offence if P is an asylum seeker.’
This amendment would specify that the offence created by clause 13 (“Supplying articles for use in immigration crime”) cannot apply to asylum seekers.
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Clause stand part.
Amendment 4, in clause 14, page 8, line 11, at end insert—
‘(2A) For the purposes of subsection (1), P cannot commit an offence if P is an asylum seeker.’
This amendment would specify that the offence created by clause 14 (“Handling articles for use in immigration crime”) cannot apply to asylum seekers.
Clauses 14 and 15 stand part.
Pete Wishart
It is an absolute pleasure to serve under your chairing this afternoon, Mr Stuart. I welcome you to the Committee.
Clauses 13 to 18 are where we start to get into the serious business of the Bill, and where some of its most concerning and controversial aspects are revealed. Nowhere is that more certain than in clauses 13 and 14.
The Government tell us that their whole intention and focus is exclusively on smashing the gangs, disrupting their business and bringing to justice as many of the people associated with and involved in this vile trade as possible. In everything we do in the Committee and in the House, the community must ensure that the Government are supported in that ambition and intention. That is one thing that unites the whole House, and we wish the Government every success in disrupting the gangs, smashing their business operations and bringing them to justice.
As we look at clauses 13 and 14, the first thing we have to do is assess and judge whether they assist in that process. I think we have to come to the conclusion that they do not, and they could make the situation a lot worse. They will certainly make the conditions of those who seek to come to our shores—some of the most wretched people in the world—much harder and more intolerable.
Jo White (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
Does the hon. Member hold the view that an asylum seeker cannot be above the law when it comes to participating in smuggling gangs?
Pete Wishart
I do not think anyone would assert, contend or propose that. Everybody is subject to the laws. Clauses 13 and 14 are designed to create new ways to criminalise people. I have listened carefully to the Government’s rhetoric, and I believe the focus and ambit of these new laws is to smash the gangs and disrupt their business, but they will not do that. The only people who will be ensnared, entrapped and put on the wrong side of these laws are asylum seekers. I say candidly to the hon. Lady that we are creating new ways to further criminalise the most wretched people in the world, and that is a grotesque ambition for this Government.
I tried to find out from the senior law officers who gave evidence how many members of gangs would be apprehended and brought to justice as a result of these new clauses. The law officers could not tell me. I do not blame them for that; they probably did not know. I suspect it would be really difficult even to make some sort of guess about how many criminals would be brought to justice as a result.
I also asked what would be the ratio of ordinary asylum seekers to gang members—the ones who secure this vile trade—but the law officers could not tell me. However, I know and suspect, as I am sure they do, that nearly everybody who falls foul of the clauses will be an asylum seeker. I suspect they know—I do, and probably everybody else does—that very few gang members will be brought in front of any of our judiciary as a result of the provisions.
Chris Murray
There is an issue around taxonomy and categorisation here. Anyone is entitled to claim asylum. It is a universal human right. Anyone from any nationality and background, whatever their criminal history, is entitled to make a claim to be an asylum seeker. It is possible to be a member of a criminal gang and plan on claiming asylum. From my 15 years of working in the asylum and immigration service, I know it is an undeniable point of fact that some people exploit that to delay or get around the system, and we must act on such abuse.
Does the hon. Member agree that we have to be careful in our classifications? There is a distinction between an asylum seeker who has a genuine claim to refugee status but who might not be eligible, and someone exploiting the system.
The Chair
Before the hon. Member responds, that was far too long, Mr Murray. Please try to keep interventions short. Of course everyone is welcome to speak in the debate.
Pete Wishart
Thank you, Mr Stuart. That is a reasonable point; I think the hon. Gentleman is on to something. Of course some gang members will pretend to be asylum seekers, but it is up to the fine people who came in front of our Committee to determine and ascertain the truth. We should not create further ways to criminalise people that focus almost exclusively on asylum seekers. We must find ways to differentiate; we cannot have blanket, broadly defined clauses that include everybody.
The hon. Member for Edinburgh East and Musselburgh has a fine history and record of working with asylum seekers and refugees. He has seen the briefings, as I and all Committee Members have. He will therefore know that practically every charity and organisation that works with, and tries to improve the lives of, asylum seekers and refugees tells us that ordinary asylum seekers—those fleeing conflict, oppression and extreme poverty—will be the ones caught up in these new measures.
My amendments are very straightforward. Let us exclude asylum seekers from the provisions of clauses 13 and 14. I want to do that for a number of reasons, but the one the Minister might be most attracted to is that doing so will actually help the Border Security Commander. It will allow him exclusively to focus, laser-like, on the Bill’s main target: the gangs that ply this evil trade. Let us forget about the riff-raff and the chaff. Let us focus our attention on those who arrange and organise this vile trade across the channel, and go for them.
Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree with what Rob Jones, the director general of operations at the National Crime Agency, said in his oral testimony last Thursday? He said:
“We are not looking to pursue asylum seekers who are not involved in serious and organised crime. That is not what we do. This is about tackling serious and organised crime and being as effective as we can be in doing that.”––[Official Report, Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Public Bill Committee, 27 February 2025; c. 35, Q35.]
If we read the tea leaves, it is almost as if the hon. Gentleman is saying that there is an intent to pursue asylum seekers. Moreover, the NCA’s remit is already to be laser-focused and go after those gangs, as he recommends.
Pete Wishart
Rather lengthy interventions are a feature of this Committee, but I am happy to go with that if everyone else is. The hon. Gentleman is right to refer to the National Crime Agency. I listened carefully to what Mr Jones had to say to the Committee, and I have no doubt about his intention. I do not think he really wants to ensnare asylum seekers; I do not think that is his focus. But he has these two badly drafted and broadly defined clauses as the net that will scoop everything up. As the hon. Member for Edinburgh East and Musselburgh said, everybody will be in that net, and it will be a matter of trying to sieve them.
Why not start with the presumption that we will go for the gangs exclusively and leave aside those who come our shores to apply legitimately for asylum in the United Kingdom? Let us not waste time criminalising such people. The main problem, as I have said, is that the clauses are so broad in scope. They are not just a fishing net; they are a trawling net, trying to lift out everybody who comes across the channel.
The clauses cover not only direct acts of people smuggling, but incidental activities that may not involve any criminal intent. In combination with other clauses, they would make it a crime to supply or receive almost any item that one suspects could be used to facilitate illegal travel to the UK. The proposed legislation criminalises collecting or even viewing information that could be useful in making irregular journeys, if there is reasonable suspicion that it could assist others in migration. Although the Government couch a lot of this in humanitarian language, the provisions will not prevent deaths and harm at sea. Instead, they will criminalise people on the move who have no alternative route to the UK.
Let us look at the provisions in a little bit more detail. Supplying, offering to supply and handling articles for use in immigration crime will now get someone a maximum sentence of 14 years’ imprisonment. Although there are some limited humanitarian exemptions—for example, offering food and drink—the provisions considerably broaden the potential prosecution of migrant assistance and support. Importantly, with all the proposed new offences, there appears to be no explicit defence for those who are on the move.
Then there are the provisions about collecting information for use in immigration crime. Such information includes arranging departure points, dates and times; in other words, information that it would be necessary to gather if someone attempted to make such a journey themselves. The Bill makes it clear that evidence could include someone’s internet history and downloads. The Government contest this, but even looking up a weather map could put someone on the foul side of these clauses. I expect the Government will tell me, “No, of course that won’t happen,” but nothing in the clauses that we are debating states that that activity is exempt.
Becky Gittins (Clwyd East) (Lab)
It is a privilege to serve under your chairship, Mr Stuart. Did the hon. Member feel that the Crown Prosecution Service gave that assurance at our evidence session last week? The witness categorically stated that such circumstances would not pass the criminal test or the public interest test. Does the hon. Member think it is important that we do not make such inferences when we discuss the Bill, so that we can see clearly how our criminal justice system applies these things?
Pete Wishart
That is a helpful and useful intervention, and the hon. Lady is right that the CPS did say that. I listened again very carefully to what was said, because concerns about these provisions have been raised repeatedly. I am sure that the CPS is serious about that, but I challenge the hon. Lady to look at the provisions and tell me how such a scenario could not be caught. The Bill is badly drafted because it provides the conditions to allow such a perception to develop. I know the Government do not want to arrest people who are looking at weather maps. I am certain that is not their intention at all, but when we examine the Bill we can see that it will allow that very thing to happen.
The Minister refers to the provision in section 25 of the Illegal Immigration Act 1972 or 1973—
Pete Wishart
1971—there we go. Section 25 of that Act offers the protection of allowing for a reasonable explanation of why people are caught up in such activity. That is useful when it comes to this Bill, but why do we have to rely on something like that? We are creating a new Bill, which does something specific and unhelpful for some of the poorest and most wretched people who exist on our globe. We have a responsibility for those people under our international obligations and conventions, and this new legislation does nothing to assist them.
The collection of data from people’s phones is facilitated by the Bill, which creates new broad powers to enable the search and seizure of electronic devices. I will come back to the main point I made on Second Reading. We did not get much time to elaborate on this, but I think it is pertinent to the clauses that we are debating, and the Committee must consider it properly.
The gangs have a monopoly and an exclusive right to the irregular migration market. There is no other way for asylum seekers to get to the UK. It just is not possible. There are safe routes available for a small number of countries, but for the vast majority of potential asylum seekers in war-torn regions, areas and countries around the world, the only way to claim asylum in the United Kingdom is to put themselves at the mercy of the gangs, and to go on a small boat to get across the channel.
Business is booming. I do not know if anyone saw the shots today from the camps in France—I think it was on Sky News. What a hell on earth they are! What a disgrace that is for us, who are part of the problem. We cannot get the situation resolved, and we are keeping some of the poorest people in such circumstances. Shame on us, and shame on everyone in the international community who allows such conditions to develop and thrive. Business is booming for the illegal gangs.
I will tell you something else, Mr Stuart. It will only get better for the gangs when the Government cut the international aid budget. What do they think will happen? Do they think that conditions in those areas will get better? Of course they will not. That will lead to so many more people making the journey to the UK, and it will be down to the Government.
Pete Wishart
I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman has noticed, but for the last three years we have had a refugee crisis from Ukraine—and there is such a distinction between how we have responded to Ukraine and how we have responded to everybody else. We put forward legal routes to allow Ukrainians to come to our country. My local authority, Perth and Kinross council, has the largest number of refugees from Ukraine in the whole of Scotland except the city of Edinburgh. I am immensely proud of the generosity of spirit of the people I represent who are taking part in that scheme.
Is it not so different when we allow schemes like that? That is what we are asking the Minister for. We will have a depopulation crisis towards the middle of the century, and immigrants might be at a premium by 2060 or 2070. Why have we not been inventive and creative? Why are we not looking to do things other than leave that mess—that disgrace—on the shores of France, as we have done to date?
I am sure the Minister will tell us that there is the defence of “reasonable excuse”. I accept that, and I know that it applies to each of these new offences—in other words, if a person has a reasonable excuse for engaging in the relevant conduct, they will not be guilty of the offence. I know that that is exactly what she will tell me, and she is already indicating that that is the case. But the burden lies on the defence to adduce sufficient evidence of a reasonable excuse, and if they have done so, it is for the prosecution to prove the contrary beyond reasonable doubt.
To be fair, the Bill sets out a non-exhaustive list of circumstances in which the defence of reasonable excuse would apply. Under clause 13, for example, a person will have a reasonable excuse if
“their action was for the purposes of carrying out a rescue of a person from danger or serious harm”.
They will also have a reasonable excuse if they were acting on behalf of an organisation that aims to assist asylum seekers and does not charge for its services. All that is purely a matter of judgment, and there does not seem to be a specific threshold for conviction. The maximum sentences for each of the new offences is pretty stiff and those for offences in clauses 13 and 14 in particular are disproportionately high. To put it in context, the offence of possession of articles used in terrorism has a maximum sentence of 15 years’ imprisonment, but someone could get 14 years for falling foul of the provisions in clauses 13 and 14.
The Bill is likely to have an impact on the prison population—I think I heard the hon. Member for Stockton West address some issues about the prison population with the Minister.
Tom Hayes
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Mr Stuart, as I should have said earlier. Is the hon. Gentleman saying that the proposed sentence for the facilitation of small boat smuggling and criminal activity is too high? Did I hear that correctly? Please do correct me if I am wrong.
Pete Wishart
The hon. Gentleman is wrong, and he did not hear me correctly. I am talking about the new offences in clauses 13 and 14, falling foul of which could result in a maximum of 14 years’ imprisonment. He might contend that that might get some gang member, but I am suggesting otherwise. I suspect that practically nobody from gangs involved in this vile trade will be caught up in these offences, but ordinary asylum seekers will be.
Lastly on the prison population, there is a notable lack of robust evidence that lengthier custodial sentences achieve a deterrent effect or a reduction in reoffending. That is explicitly not acknowledged in the impact assessment for the Bill, which states:
“There is limited understanding of the behavioural impact of this intervention, so the deterrence effect on dangerous behaviour may not be realised as intended.”
I do not know whether the Minister believes that the new laws she is creating will make the slightest bit of difference to those who are in areas of conflict or fleeing oppression. I am not entirely sure that asylum seekers sitting down on the beach, or in the deserts of Sudan, in Afghanistan or in Iran, are the least bit cognisant of the developing, hardening and draconian laws of this country, put in place in Committees like this one. I suspect that they do not know about them—and, if they did know about them, they would not care less. Their sole and exclusive priority is saving their family’s and their children’s lives, and getting the hell out of that place.
That is the irritation; those asylum seekers could not care less about the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill that is being debated here today. They want out, and they will do anything possible to rescue their family. Imagine that, after all that journey, after sitting in these boats, after being in the hands of the people smugglers and those gang members, they arrive in the good old United Kingdom, only to be apprehended on the basis of clauses 13 and 14 of the Bill.
Chris Murray
I apologise for my longer interventions, Mr Stuart; I will try to bundle them all into this speech.
One of the most important things that we heard during evidence was from Dr Walsh from the Migration Observatory. He said that demand for cross-channel crossings is essentially inelastic. Even if the price of a crossing doubles, there will still be demand for it; people rise to meet that price. That tells us that deterrence and disruption of the demand alone will never be enough to tackle the horrors that we are seeing in the channel at the moment. We must also disrupt the supply of ability to cross the channel. That is an important part of the Bill, and these clauses go right to the heart of it.
On the point about criminalising all asylum seekers, ahead of oral evidence, I read carefully the submissions we have had from organisations I have worked with in the past. I found the testimony of the Crown Prosecution Service very convincing. It stated clearly that in addition to the primary legislation, the CPS will produce guidance that will set out both the public interest threshold and evidential test that it would seek in order for a case to go to prosecution. It was very clear that the kind of hypothetical examples set out by the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire would not meet that threshold.
On the point about decriminalising all asylum seekers, to clarify the point I was trying to make in my interventions, during a crossing anyone can declare themselves an asylum seeker. That then breaks down into different categories: someone who is genuinely eligible for asylum in the UK and will, when they go through the process, get refugee status; someone who is genuinely seeking asylum, but will not meet the threshold when they go through the process and will not get such status; and someone who knows that they are ineligible, or might be eligible on some counts, but is engaged in the criminal act of facilitating illegal entry into the UK and putting those other people’s lives in danger. At that moment, it is not possible to distinguish between those people; the asylum process is there to do that.
Were we to accept the premise of the hon. Gentleman’s amendment, it would be a wrecking amendment. I know it is not intended that way, but it would in reality be a wrecking amendment to any kind of intervention on a crossing at sea.
Pete Wishart
The hon. Gentleman neglects to mention one thing. He is correctly summarising what is happening with the amendments, but it is already illegal to arrive into the UK illegally—that is what is happening. That is why so many people have been arrested and are now being processed and sent back. It is illegal to come to the UK just now if you have no means to support yourself when you are here. All the Bill is doing is finding new ways to criminalise people. I do not know what the point of the new clauses is, when all that is already happening.
Chris Murray
The hon. Gentleman is making an important point, but I do not accept that the proposal is creating new criminal offences for all asylum seekers or for all people; it is creating new criminal offences for those engaged in the exploitation of people and the trafficking or smuggling of them across the channel in great danger. We cannot allow that to continue if we care about those people’s lives at all.
In the constituency of every single MP in this room, there will be a cannabis factory where a probably under-age Vietnamese child is working at cultivating cannabis. If they arrived in the past two years, they came across in one of those boats. Significant, serious organised crime networks are exploiting the vulnerability of those people in order to facilitate such crossings. This proposal is how we stop them doing it, and that affects every one of our communities.
I am aware that I am testing people’s patience, but I want to make two final points. The first is about the criminalisation of organisations that help asylum seekers. That is an important point, and the distinction has to be clear. I did have concerns about this measure being in the Bill, but the evidence sessions completely reassured me. The testimony of the CPS was that asking about the weather in Dover when in Calais, and those kinds of things, would not be facilitating immigration crime. The testimony that the National Crime Agency is using these measures to tackle serious and organised crime makes it clear what the purpose of the clauses is.
The hon. Member for Kent—
Pete Wishart
I wish I could say that I was reassured by the Minister’s response. There were things she said that encouraged me and that I think she was genuine and sincere about. She, and everybody who has contributed today and who we have heard from over the past couple of weeks, is right that we do not want to arrest asylum seekers. That is the last thing we want to do, and I accept that that is the case in practically everything that anybody has said. However, more asylum seekers will be arrested because of these clauses. More will be facing justice, whatever way it applies, right across the United Kingdom because of these new offences.
What we have forgotten is that it is already illegal to enter the UK irregularly. In 2020, 6,477 people were arrested because they arrived in the UK irregularly. With clauses 13 and 14 we are not addressing the illegality of issues such as people coming to the United Kingdom; we are finding new ways of ensuring that those people will be subject to court proceedings—to being on the wrong side of UK law—and that is the thing that concerns us most.
Many people have referred to agencies that gave us support today. I listened to the NCA’s evidence, and some of it was very interesting and compelling. I accept that it wants to target the gang members and those involved in this violent trade, and that is what we should be helping it to do. Obviously, asylum seekers will get caught up in all that, but let us enable the NCA to focus exclusively on trying to apprehend the gang members and secure justice rather than trying to find new ways to criminalise people coming to the UK,.
Dame Angela Eagle
Will the hon. Gentleman not take my word that the offences will be intelligence-led? They are not targeting all asylum seekers, but they certainly would target someone coming over on a boat who may claim asylum, who has been involved in an organised immigration gang, and who has been organising the supplies for it.
Pete Wishart
I obviously accept the Minister’s word when it comes to all this, but we need to look at what is in the Bill. There are measures that we do not like and that we do not think will help to achieve the major objective, which is to disrupt the gangs’ business model and ensure that they are brought to justice. That just does not happen with these new clauses. The measure to which amendment 3 refers does not offend me in the same way that the subject of amendment 4 does. I will withdraw the amendment, but I reserve the right to push the next amendment to a vote. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 13 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Amendment 4 negatived.
Clauses 14 and 15 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 16
Collecting information for use in immigration crime
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Third sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsTuesday 4th March 2025
(2 weeks, 6 days ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 View all Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Public Bill Committee Amendments as at 4 March 2025 - (4 Mar 2025)
Matt Vickers
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 1 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 2 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 3
Functions of the Commander
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
I beg to move amendment 1, in clause 3, page 2, line 29, at end insert—
“(1A) In exercising the Commander’s functions, the Commander must have full regard to the provisions of—
(a) the Human Rights Act 1998; and
(b) the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings.”
This amendment would confirm that the Commander must have full regard to the Human Rights Act and the European Convention on Action against Trafficking.
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 12, in clause 3, page 2, line 36, at end insert—
“(2A) The strategic priority document issued under subsection (2) must support the Home Office’s UK Border Strategy.”
This amendment would require that the Border Security Commander’s strategic priority document supports the UK Border Strategy.
Amendment 13, in clause 3, page 2, line 36, at end insert—
“(2A) The Home Secretary may give direction to Border Force, Immigration Enforcement, Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) and the National Crime Agency to support the Border Security Commander in the delivery of the Border Security Commander’s objectives and strategic priorities.
(2B) The Home Secretary’s powers under subsection (2A) must not be used to interfere with the democratic mandate of the PCC within a force area, nor seek to interfere with the office of constable or operational independence of the chief constable or the operational independence of the National Crime Agency, unless the Home Secretary is satisfied on the advice of HMICFRS that not to do so would result in a police force of the National Crime Agency failing or national security being compromised.”
This amendment would enable the Home Secretary to direct other agencies to support the Border Security Commander’s objectives and strategic priorities.
Amendment 11, in clause 3, page 2, line 41, leave out subsection (b).
This amendment would remove the requirement for the Border Security Commander to obtain the consent of the Secretary of State before issuing the strategic priority document.
New clause 7—Duty to meet the director of Europol—
“The Border Commander must meet the director of Europol, or their delegate, no less than once every three months.”
This new clause would require the Border Commander to meet with the Executive Director of Europol every three months.
New clause 21—Functions of the Commander in relation to sea crossings to United Kingdom—
“(1) In exercising the Commander’s functions in relation to sea crossings to the United Kingdom, the Commander must have regard to the objectives of—
(a) preventing the boarding of vessels, with the aim of entering the United Kingdom, by persons who require leave to enter the United Kingdom but are seeking to enter the United Kingdom—
(i) without leave to enter, or
(ii) with leave to enter that was obtained by means which included deception by any person;
(b) ensuring that a decision is taken on a claim by a person under subsection (1)(a) within six months of the person’s arrival in the United Kingdom; and
(c) making arrangements with a safe third country for the removal of a person who enters the United Kingdom without leave, or with leave that was obtained by deception.
(2) The Commander must include, in the strategic priority document issued under section 3(2), an assessment of—
(a) the most effective methods for deterring illegal entry into the United Kingdom;
(b) the most effective methods for reducing the number of sea crossings made by individuals without leave to enter the United Kingdom; and
(c) the most effective methods for arranging the removal, to the person’s own country or a safe third country, of a person who enters the United Kingdom illegally.
(3) For the purposes of this section—
(a) ‘sea crossings’ are journeys from dry land in France, Belgium or the Netherlands for the purpose of reaching dry land in the United Kingdom; and
(b) illegal entry to the United Kingdom is defined in accordance with section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971 (illegal entry and similar offences).”
This new clause sets out objectives and strategic priorities for the Border Security Commander in relation to sea crossings and arrangements with a safe third country for the removal of people who enter the UK illegally.
Pete Wishart
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. It is a good 10 years since I have had the pleasure and privilege of being on a Public Bill Committee—or Standing Committee, as we used to call them back in the day—and I hope that it will be as much fun as I remember. Ten years ago, I was the home affairs spokesperson, and I saw a number of Bills quite like this one: good old-fashioned “stop them coming and boot them out” Bills. There has been a succession of them over the years from various Governments. The Minister knows that I hold her in great respect and affection, and I wish her particularly well with the Bill.
Dame Angela Eagle
I hold the hon. Gentleman in similar affection. We are pretty long in the tooth—we are the two people who are the most long in the tooth on this Bill Committee—and I look forward to listening to his arguments.
Pete Wishart
I am grateful to the Minister for that. I would hate to think of our combined number of years in this House, but certainly we have almost spanned half a century.
The first 12 clauses are totally dedicated to putting the Border Security Commander into statute, and the first three list his functions, and outline and define some of his responsibilities. The Bill states that the Border Security Commander must be appointed by the Home Secretary and will be obliged to prepare annual reports. A board will be appointed
“to assist the Commander in the exercise of the Commander’s functions.”
I do not know about other hon. Members, but the last time I looked there already was a Border Security Commander, who is doing the job as outlined in the Bill effectively, pretty much as the Home Secretary has been directing him, without needing to have been put into statute. If my mind does not deceive me, I remember Martin Hewitt being appointed as the commander and doing all these things, but here he is, 12 clauses of a Bill better off, and secure in the knowledge that he is now in statute.
All that makes me think of the BBC Scotland series “The Chief”, which as Scottish members of the Committee will know is the fantastic new spin-off of “Scot Squad”. It features the mythical and fantastic character Chief Commissioner Miekelson. He is a complex character. A bit self-aggrandising, he is always getting himself on the wrong side of various issues around the culture wars, which he is pretty uncomfortable with; he always manages to upset or offend somebody. I am sure that he is the exact opposite of Commander Hewitt, who I believe is modest, nice and easy to get on with—I have not had the pleasure of meeting him so far. However, they have a couple of things in common, which I want to explore as we look at the functions of the commander.
It strikes me that Commander Miekelson would love to be in statute; 12 clauses of a Bill—he would look at this as some great calling card. They face similar threats: for Commander Miekelson, it is the bams who make his life a misery and whom he needs a whole load of new powers to deter; for Commander Hewitt, it is the illegals. As we go through the Bill, let us wish Commander Hewitt and Chief Commissioner Miekelson all the best as they tackle these threats.
Chris Murray
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that although Commissioner Miekelson is a fictional character, the role was created by statute—by the SNP Scottish Government when they created Police Scotland?
Pete Wishart
Police Scotland has a chief constable who is in charge, but in “Scot Squad”, Commissioner Miekelson is a chief commissioner. It is only right that we point out these distinctions; there is a significant difference between that mythical, fictional character and the reality of the role of chief constable, which is very efficiently and effectively looked after by the current inhabitant of that post.
I know you want me to get on to the particular amendment, Dr Murrison, so thank you for your forbearance and patience. My amendment confirms that the,
“Commander must have full regard to…the Human Rights Act 1998; and…the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking”.
The Minister is likely to tell me that none of that is necessary as human rights compliance is already implicit with Government operations. However, without these explicit legal mandates and safeguards, all of that can be overlooked. If the Minister is asking us to agree to 12 clauses at the outset of a Committee for an important Bill, relating to a job that is already being done, surely we can agree that one of these functions should be about the observance of our very important international obligations under the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings.
I do not think anybody is opposed to the border commander; I know there are a few jokes about his comparison to Chief Miekelson, but all of us agree that the Minister is establishing a necessary and useful role. I do not think, even though she was trying to chide her Conservative colleagues, that there was much disagreement from anybody on whether this is a useful role that could help bring together quite a lot of the structure and infrastructure that is responsible for operating our border security. There is a discussion about a lot of his tasks being administrative. There is nothing wrong with that, but for something as important as this, everybody would like to think that where there is administration, it will be effective and put in place in a way that we could look at it.
However, we need further clarity on the roles, functions and responsibilities of the border commander. Clause 3 is supposed to be the place where we find all of those things, but the one thing that the clause does not do is outline fully, perfectly, roundly and coherently what the actual functions of the border commander will be. Even if we look very carefully in all the different subsections, it does not say much about what he is expected to do. It lists a number of administrative responsibilities he will have, which is fair and fine, but all of us discussing the role of the border commander in the Committee would like to understand what he will be doing—what are his jobs, what are his functions, what responsibilities will he have, how will these things be discharged, and how will he be open to the type of scrutiny that we, as Members of this House, require?
There are provisions that seem to speak about the functions without actually identifying any of them. The only place where we can find objectives in clause 3 is subsection (1), but they are only objectives to which the commander must have regard. That is important. It just says he must “have regard” to the particular responsibilities that are outlined in the subsections. Subsections (7) to (9) are particularly interesting because they seem to suggest that people smuggling and human trafficking to the UK are to be regard as threats to border security. That seems fair enough; most of the Bill is about the perceived threat—disrupting networks and tackling the gangs that operate their vile trade across the channel.
Here is the thing: the people who board these boats are subject to the constraints imposed by these gangs and are at their mercy. They are controlled and reliant. Those people are totally and utterly ignored in the subsections in clause 3. Their realities—their need and right to seek safety, reunite with family and escape situations of extreme deprivation—are ignored, even though they have everything to do with the responsibilities and functions of the commander. As a matter of principle, then, it is vital that the Bill should be amended so that the Border Security Commander has regard to objectives concerned with respecting human life and dignity, and that must include specific shared obligations to provide asylum to people fleeing persecution and to enable victims of human trafficking to have security and safety from their enslavement.
There are concerns that, if border enforcement strategies do not include these protections for vulnerable individuals and victims of modern slavery, trafficking victims will enter further cycles of exploitation. In prioritising enforcement over protection, as the Bill does almost exclusively, we risk wrongfully criminalising victims of trafficking and failing to identify those in need of urgent intervention—or, worst of all, sending them back to their exploiters. If we stand by our commitments under the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings, the Bill should ensure that the commander respects those obligations too.
As we have discussed, the commander is a civil servant. I have taken no great view on that, and I listened carefully to the exchanges about the civil service role, but I have a couple of concerns in relation to my amendment 1 that I would like the Minister to address. The civil service code does not give a clear, enforceable duty to respect the UK’s obligations under international law. I am pretty certain that the Minister will tell me that there is a general obligation to comply with the law and our international obligations, as that is expected and anticipated in everything that the Government do through all their responsibilities and actions.
However, I refer the Minister to the recent case in the High Court. That was, of course, R (on the application of FDA) v. Minister for the Cabinet Office and others. I think the Government actually won that court case, which meant that any of the civil servants who were involved in compiling regulations had to abide by the legislative context but did not have to oblige and comply with the international obligations. At best, it is unclear, so I ask the Minister to clarify: will the Border Security Commander, who will be a civil servant, always be obliged—totally and utterly—to fully respect all our international obligations, particularly those around the HRA and the ECAT?
Without those specific obligations in the Bill, the Border Security Commander will be presumed always to prioritise enforcement over vital legal protection, potentially leading to human rights violations. Although the commander is required to comply with instructions set by the Home Secretary, which again I think everybody would accept is right and appropriate, they are not explicitly required to comply with the UK’s human rights obligations. For me, that is totally wrong, and it completely skews the whole modus operandi of our Border Security Commander and features of the Bill. I will come back to that as the Bill progresses.
We need to see this change to the Bill. We have 12 clauses and various subsections dedicated to the role and the functions of the commander. Let us have one—just one—that says that he must be prepared and obliged always to act in line with all of our obligations on international responsibility, being a good international actor, being a place that is recognised for exemplary human rights requirements and being signed up to the HRA and to ECAT. Let us put that in the Bill.
Matt Vickers
I have not come across Chief Commissioner Miekelson before, but I will endeavour to catch up on Netflix or iPlayer.
Dame Angela Eagle
I think Chief Miekelson will be on all our lists now. I spend the small amount of time I have in life to twiddle my thumbs looking for new detective dramas, and it seems I have overlooked one. I have been too into Scandi noir, when I should have been into Scottish noir. I will talk to the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire after the sitting to see whether he can give me a little more detail, so that I can follow up for my own enjoyment.
This group contains various provisions relating to the Border Security Commander, including amendments 11 to 13 and new clause 21 from the official Opposition, and new clause 7, which the hon. Member for Mid Dunbartonshire spoke to. It also contains amendment 1, with which the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire opened our proceedings on this group. In our earlier exchange, he and I reflected on how long in the tooth we both are. So experienced is he that he anticipated what my answer to his amendment would be, and his comments show that he has a coherent and experienced view of the way in which human rights law works. If we had to list in every single bit of primary legislation the treaties we had solemnly entered into, and the international agreements that we had, in many cases, helped to formulate and that we had then put into effect in our own law, we would have an even messier statute book than we have at the moment.
Amendment 1 seeks to ensure that the commander has full regard to the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings while carrying out all his functions. Both pieces of international agreement and law were freely entered into by predecessor Governments, and we take them extremely seriously as a law-abiding Government who believe in the rule of law. The Border Security Commander will be a public authority within the meaning of section 6 of the Human Rights Act, and must act compatibly with the Act. That is absolutely the case. It is not explicitly written into the Bill, as the hon. Gentleman’s amendment would require, but that does not mean that all the requirements in the two agreements that amendment 1 mentions will not be adhered to.
Pete Wishart
Before I put my question to the Minister, I will just say to the Committee that “The Chief” is available on iPlayer, if they want to enjoy the eight episodes that will come their way.
Pete Wishart
Perhaps not—I am sure you would have a few words to say about that, Dr Murrison.
I did anticipate the Minister’s response, but I do not think there is anything wrong with ensuring that our commitments to international operations and to the whole force of human rights across the world—things we agree on—are in the Bill. We saw with the previous Government how easily international obligations and the international rule of law can be set aside and torn up. We are asking for these things to be in the Bill to give us security and a guarantee that the border commander will pay attention to them. If the commander is not compelled to do that by statute, there will be no obligation whatsoever.
Dame Angela Eagle
The hon. Gentleman can be assured that everything the commander does must be compatible with our obligations under the Human Rights Act and the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings. Those things are implicit with every public office holder in the UK, in all the contexts in which they work. The fact that those things are implicit, and not explicitly in the Bill, does not undermine the commitment of any Government who want to act within the rule of law. One of the first things our current Prime Minister said when he walked through the door at Downing Street was that we would be a Government who respected the rule of law and the Human Rights Act.
Dame Angela Eagle
My hon. Friend is exactly right. Under section 6 of the Human Rights Act, all office holders implicitly have to follow the rules of the European convention on human rights. One issue, if we decide to move away from the current approach and start to include an explicit provision in particular Bills—as the amendment in the name of the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire would—is that it might look like the implicit duty to adhere to these agreements does not apply if it is not stated explicitly. That would actually lead to a lessening of protections, if judges looking at what Parliament was legislating for decided that we must take account of section 6 of the Human Rights Act only if we put that in a Bill. We would end up in a worse situation.
I ask the hon. Member to accept that the structure in the Bill is the one we have used so far. I understand why he is sceptical, after the behaviour of the last Government, but I hope he accepts, given the Prime Minister’s pronouncements right from the beginning of this Government taking office, that we are not planning on undermining the Human Rights Act or its provisions.
Pete Wishart
I do not like having to correct the hon. Member for Edinburgh East and Musselburgh, who is usually very diligent on these matters, but the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015 is fully compliant with human rights legislation. That fact is included in the Act, as it is in practically every Act passed by the Scottish Parliament.
Chris Murray
On that point, the 2015 Act does refer to the Council of Europe protections and its definitions are taken from there. But there is not a clause that says that due regard has to be given—
Chris Murray
But in an implicit way, just as this Bill is. There is nothing on the face of the Act, in the way the hon. Member is proposing for this Bill.
Dame Angela Eagle
I think, Dr Murrison, you would probably not be very pleased with me if I started to talk about existential challenges at the heart of Conservative thinking, much as I would like to do so. I hope that I have given some reasons why new clause 21 should not stand part of the Bill.
Pete Wishart
I thank the Minister for her full response to some of my concerns about compliance with international obligations. Something that she did not respond to, and that I am really keen to secure her views on, is the FDA v. the Cabinet Office High Court case during the Rwanda litigation, which the Government obviously won. It seemed to suggest that any civil servant would not be bound by international obligations. Where does that leave the Border Security Commander?
Dame Angela Eagle
The Prime Minister made it clear right at the beginning of his time in office that the Government will be bound by the international obligations that we have signed up to. I hope that gives the hon. Gentleman—[Interruption.] Well, he is a sceptical man, as I would expect, but I have said what I have said about that. Is he suggesting that we should change the law as a result of the High Court?
Pete Wishart
My concern is that the judgment in that court case significantly changed our approach to international obligations and the rule of law. All I am interested in knowing is whether the Minister has any concerns, given such a significant and dramatic shift in the way successive Governments have approached these issues. Will that have any bearing on the operation of the Border Security Command?
Dame Angela Eagle
As I said earlier, the Border Security Commander and the Border Security Command will work within the confines of international obligations and human rights law.
Mike Tapp
I apologise for my lack of timely bobbing earlier, Dr Murrison. I draw attention to the Home Secretary’s statement at the very top of the Bill:
“In my view the provisions of the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill are compatible with the Convention rights.”
That adds to what the Minister has said: that those in public office have an obligation to abide by the law. If they were not to do so, there would of course be legal challenge.
Pete Wishart
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Dame Angela Eagle
Clauses 3 and 9, taken together, outline the functions of the Border Security Commander and the directions given to the commander by the Secretary of State. Clause 3 ensures that the commander has the ability to bring partners together to provide an authoritative source of information on priority and emerging threats to border security. Through the strategic priority-setting process, the commander, working collaboratively with partners and with consent from the Secretary of State, will have the authority to issue strategic priorities on border security, to which partners must have regard. That creates a new mechanism to ensure that there is a whole of Government understanding and a collective response to border security threats.
The provisions of clause 3 recognise the varied responsibilities of partners, and deliberately ensure that the duty does not prevent partner authorities from exercising their existing constituted mandates or from setting their own wider priorities. The UK intelligence community are exempted from definition as partner authorities, in order to ensure that they can carry out their functions without constitutional conflict. However, UKIC will continue to work closely with the Border Security Command on border security matters, and arrangements are being developed, and will be agreed by the Home Secretary and Foreign Secretary, to ensure that that takes place. Such arrangements are required by clause 5.
Clause 9 builds on that by ensuring that the Secretary of State can hold the Border Security Commander to account for the delivery of improved border security outcomes. As an elected official, the Secretary of State is accountable to the Cabinet and to Parliament, and can assure that the actions of the commander are being carried out in the interests of the British public.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 3 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 4
Duty to prepare annual reports
Pete Wishart
I beg to move amendment 2, in clause 4, page 3, line 37, at end insert—
“(c) set out how the Commander has fulfilled the Commander’s duties under section 3(1A) of this Act to have full regard to the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings.”
This amendment is linked to and consequential upon Amendment 1, and would require the Commander to include in the annual report information about how they have paid due regard to the Human Rights Act and the European Convention on Action against Trafficking.
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 14, in clause 4, page 3, line 37, at end insert—
“(c) state the number of persons who have, since the later of the passing of this Act or the last annual report, been—
(i) charged with offences under sections 13, 14, 18, and 43 of this Act; or
(ii) convicted of offences under sections 13, 14, 18, and 43 of this Act;
(iii) identified as entering the United Kingdom via sea crossing without leave to remain;
(iv) detained pending deportation or a decision on deportation;
(v) deported to a country of which the person is a national or citizen; or
(vi) deported to a country or territory to which there is reason to believe that the person will be admitted.”
This amendment would place a duty on the Border Security Commander to include, in their annual report, figures on immigration crime, sea crossings, detentions and deportations.
Clause stand part.
Pete Wishart
I will not detain the Committee for long. Amendment 2 covers the same sort of terrain as my amendment 1, which sought to ensure that the Border Security Commander takes cognisance of international obligations, most notably in relation to human rights and the provisions of the European convention on action against trafficking. Amendment 2 would require the commander, when making the annual report, to make reference to his compliance, in the work that he has done, with the Human Rights Act and with ECAT. That is all I am asking. There is no good reason why that cannot be included as part of the commander’s annual accounting to the House of Commons. That would give us an opportunity to understand how part of his work has been in ensuring that those obligations have been met, and I think it would be a worthy inclusion in his annual report. I commend the amendment to the Committee.
Matt Vickers
Clause 4 would give the Border Security Commander a duty to prepare annual reports, which must state how the commander has carried out their functions in that financial year and set out the commander’s view on the performance of the border security system that year, with particular reference to the commander’s strategic priorities. That all seems very vague, and a case of the Border Security Commander being allowed to mark their own homework.
Can the Minister explain what success would look like for the Border Security Commander? What are the measurable key performance indicators that the Home Secretary will consider? That is important because the Secretary of State, as set out in clause 2, can dismiss the commander. What would constitute poor enough performance for that to happen, and what would be a success?
To try to inject some objectivity and accountability into the process of annual reports, we have tabled amendment 14. We would like the Border Security Commander to report on the number of persons who have, since the later of the passing of the Bill or the last annual report, been charged or convicted of offences under clause 13, “Supplying articles for use in immigration crime”; clause 14, “Handling articles for use in immigration crime”; clause 18, “Endangering another during sea crossing to United Kingdom”; or clause 43, “Articles for use in serious crime”. We want to know how effective the new offences will be in practice for achieving the Government’s aim of stopping illegal immigration.
The Government’s own impact assessment admits that very few people will go to prison as a result of the measures in the Bill. On the proposals to strengthen and improve the function of serious crime prevention orders, it says:
“It is estimated that between zero and three prison places, with a central estimate of one prison place will be required per year once the steady state is reached.”
On introducing an interim serious crime prevention order, it says:
“It is estimated that between 0 and 1.54 prison places, with a central estimate of 0.2 prison place will be required per year once the steady state is reached.”
On serious and organised crime articles, it says:
“It is estimated that between four and six prison places, with a central estimate of five prison places will be required per year once the steady state is reached.”
On new offences to criminalise the making, adapting, importing, supplying, offering to supply and possession of articles for use in serious crime, it says:
“It is estimated that between four and six prison places, with a central estimate of five prison places will be required per year once the steady state is reached.”
It is important to report on the new offences relating to immigration crime, which the Government think will not send a meaningful number of people to prison, and also on the new offence of endangering lives at sea, for which the impact assessment includes no estimate. Can the Minister confirm how many people the Government expect each year to be arrested, convicted and imprisoned under the new offence of endangering lives at sea?
Dame Angela Eagle
Amendment 2, tabled by the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire, would require the Border Security Commander to clearly outline how they have paid due regard to the Human Rights Act and the European convention on action against trafficking by including that information in the annual report that is laid before Parliament. As discussed when we debated amendment 1, the Border Security Commander will be a public authority within the meaning of section 6 of the Human Rights Act, and must act in compatibility with the human rights legislation. The commander will be aware of the risks in relation to trafficking and modern slavery through their work, and will continue to comply with the obligations, as part of the Government, under the European convention on action against trafficking in human beings. Therefore, it is unnecessary to detail explicitly that that should be in the report. That does not mean that it will not be, as the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire recognised when he withdrew amendment 1. He has made his point powerfully.
Amendment 14 would create a requirement for the Border Security Commander to include in the annual report a range of statistics relating to the new offences created by the Bill, and wider relevant statistics in relation to irregular entrants who have arrived via a sea crossing, and to deportations. The amendment proposes that the annual report must state how the commander has carried out the functions of their office in the financial year, and set out the commander’s views on the performance of the border security system, with particular reference to the strategic priorities that have been set.
The clause envisages that the report will be laid before Parliament and published. That will provide public and parliamentary accountability for the work of the Border Security Commander across all threats, although the strategic priorities may change over time as the threats against which the commander will need to report evolve.
Amendment 14 in the name of the hon. Member for Stockton West is quite prescriptive about what should be in the report, and includes a range of statistics. In the UK, we have quarterly publication of immigration statistics, which are organised by the Home Office and under the code of practice of the independent UK Statistics Authority. Statistics are regularly made available about what is going on in this area. The hon. Gentleman wants such statistics to be published, under statute, in the annual report that the commander puts before Parliament but, with all due respect, I think it is important that the commander is able to write his report himself without primary legislation directing him what to put in it, especially given that those statistics are regularly made available and are well looked at and reported upon. What the hon. Gentleman is suggesting is cumbersome and would not assist in ensuring that we have parliamentary and public accountability for the commander’s performance.
The hon. Gentleman also quoted from the assessments of the number of prison places that would be created by the new crimes that we will talk about when we debate subsequent clauses. I am not sure what he does not understand about serious crime prevention orders or interim serious crime prevention orders. The idea of some of the new powers—the counter terror-style powers, which we will talk about in due course—is that they will prevent crossings and crimes from happening in the first place. They will allow the police and the National Crime Agency to intervene much earlier and to stop crime happening. In those circumstances, there may be a lesser sentence rather than a prison sentence, but lives would be saved and exploitation would be prevented. That is the nature of counter terror-style powers.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman will accept that the annual report will allow public and parliamentary accountability for the work of Border Security Command and that he will not press his amendment, as it would create too inflexible an annual report for the commander, with too much outside interference through primary legislation.
Pete Wishart
I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment proposed: 14, in page 3, line 37, at end insert—
“(c) state the number of persons who have, since the later of the passing of this Act or the last annual report, been—
(i) charged with offences under sections 13, 14, 18, and 43 of this Act; or
(ii) convicted of offences under sections 13, 14, 18, and 43 of this Act;
(iii) identified as entering the United Kingdom via sea crossing without leave to remain;
(iv) detained pending deportation or a decision on deportation;
(v) deported to a country of which the person is a national or citizen; or
(vi) deported to a country or territory to which there is reason to believe that the person will be admitted.”.—(Matt Vickers.)
This amendment would place a duty on the Border Security Commander to include, in their annual report, figures on immigration crime, sea crossings, detentions and deportations.
Question put, That the amendment be made.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (First sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsThursday 27th February 2025
(3 weeks, 4 days ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 View all Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Public Bill Committee Amendments as at 27 February 2025 - (27 Feb 2025)
Mike Tapp (Dover and Deal) (Lab)
Q
Enver Solomon: I think those measures are legitimate. As I said, it is important to take steps to disrupt the activity of gangs that are causing huge harms to the lives of individual men, women and children, who are often extremely vulnerable. Attempts such as the powers you referred to are important and have a role to play—I am not disputing that. What I am saying is that they need to be used proportionately and to be clearly targeted at the individuals behind the criminal gangs and the trade of the criminal gangs.
Our concern is that, by broadening criminal powers in the Bill and specifically by introducing new offences, individuals will be caught up in that process. People who are coming across in very flimsy and dangerous vessels will end up being criminalised through no fault of their own. We are also concerned that using further laws—as has been seen across a whole range of different areas of public policy—is a blunt instrument to try to change the behaviour of people.
People will not stop getting into flimsy dinghies and coming across the channel or the Mediterranean because of new offences that they might face. They will probably know very little about the nature of those offences. They will know very little about the new rules that mean, if you get refugee protection, you will no longer be able to go on and gain British citizenship. We know that from our experience: they will know nothing about that, so it will not change behaviour or provide the deterrence that I think it is hoped it will provide.
That is why you need to use these powers in a very targeted, proportionate way that deals with the prosecution of the criminal behaviour but does not result in, in effect, punching down on those vulnerable people who are getting into the boats because they want to seek safety. It will not change their behaviour. That is our experience from having worked with refugees and people seeking asylum over many decades.
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
Q
Enver Solomon: I would say not. I will come to clause 18 in a second, but I encourage the Committee to look at clauses 13 and 14. In our submission, we proposed that they should be amended to ensure the focus of the new offence is on people smugglers and not on those seeking protection in the UK. We also said that clause 15 should be amended to include other items that are important for reducing the risk that people face when attempting to cross the channel, and that the Government should consult widely to ensure the list is as extensive as is necessary.
On endangering others, given that, as Committee members will know, many of the boats now used are barely seaworthy and overcrowded, and that the numbers crammed into them are increasing, clause 18 could cover many more people than those whom the offence is apparently targeted at—that is, the people smugglers. On Second Reading, the Home Secretary gave some useful examples of the types of behaviour that could result in people being prosecuted, including physical aggression, intimidation, the rejection of rescue attempts and so on. We think the wording should be amended to reflect specific actions to ensure that the offence is very clearly focused.
We argue overall that these new offences are an extremely blunt instrument to change behaviours, and they will not have the desired effect of changing behaviours and stopping people getting into very dangerous, flimsy vessels.
Daniel O'Malley: To add to what Enver says, yes, it is a blunt instrument. We operate a refugee support service across the whole of Scotland, and when people come to our services they do not talk about the deterrence or anything like that; they talk about what they see once they get here. The environment that is created around people seeking asylum and refugees does not deter them from coming here, but once they are here, they feel that there is a threat to their protection and that their status here is under threat.
The language in these deterrents does not deter anybody from coming here; it just causes a hostile environment. That was the situation created by the previous Bills under the previous Government. We hope that will not be continued with the new Bill and other changes the Home Office is making. At the end of the day, when people come to our services and talk about stuff like this, they talk about how it makes them feel when they are in the country, not about how it deters them from coming here.
Chris Murray
Q
Enver Solomon: In short, what happened with the system meltdown that I referred to is that processing did pretty much come to a standstill. You had a huge and ever-growing backlog, and people were stuck in limbo indefinitely in the system. The number of people in hotels—asylum contingency accommodation, as it is called—reached record numbers. Hotels were being stood up in communities without proper prior assessments with relevant agencies of the potential needs—health, the NHS, and tensions vis-à-vis the police.
We work in Rotherham, where a hotel was brutally attacked and refugees were almost burned alive in the summer. My staff were in contact with people in the hotel who were live streaming what was happening. They thought that they were going to get burned alive. That hotel in Rotherham should never have been opened. It was always going to be a flashpoint. It was located in an incredibly isolated area, there were not appropriate support services, the local services were not properly engaged with in advance and there was no appropriate planning and preparation. That story, I am afraid, was repeated across the country because of the dysfunction and the system meltdown that the previous pieces of legislation resulted in. It is absolutely critical that we learn the lessons from that and do not repeat those mistakes.
There is no need to use asylum hotels. As I understand it, there are roughly 70,000 individual places within the asylum dispersal system today. If we had timely decisions being made in a matter of months, people moving through the system, a growing backlog in the appeal system dealt with by ensuring the decisions are right first time, and people having good access to appropriate legal information and advice from representation, which is a huge problem, you would begin gradually to fix the system.
It will take time to fix the system and create efficiencies, but it is absolutely vital that plans to move away from the use of hotels are taken forward rapidly, and that the current contracts in place with the three private providers to provide dispersal accommodation are radically reformed, because they just create community tensions. They are pivoted towards placing people in parts of the country where accommodation is usually cheap and where there are going to be growing tensions, often without support in place for people in those communities.
Mubeen Bhutta: I did not fully catch your question, Chris—I apologise.
Chris Murray
Q
Dr Peter Walsh: The Dublin system provided a mechanism for asylum seekers to be transferred between EU member states and prioritised the idea that people should have their claim processed in the first state in which they arrived. There are other things that the decision can be based on—one might be having family members in the country; that could also be the basis for a transfer.
There is emerging evidence from when researchers have spoken with migrants in and around Calais. They ask them, “Why have you taken this dangerous journey to the UK?” They talk about family, the English language and perceptions of the UK as being safer. Often they have experienced harsh treatment at the hands of the French police. Increasingly, they specifically mention Dublin.
What we can infer from that is that these people have an outstanding or rejected claim—or claims, potentially in a number of EU member states, even though there are rules and processes to prevent that. They have exhausted what they view as the opportunity to receive a successful asylum claim in the EU. That leaves the UK. They understand that because the UK is no longer a part of Dublin, we are effectively not able to return them to the continent. That is fairly recent evidence we have found.
On the smuggling networks and how they work, one of the big challenges is that they operate transnationally, so they are beyond the jurisdiction of any single authority. That, by its very nature, makes enforcement more difficult because it requires quite close international co-operation, so the UK would be co-operating with agencies that operate under different legal frameworks, professional standards and norms and maybe even speak a different language. That challenge applies with particular force to the senior figures, who are often operating not only beyond the UK’s and EU’s jurisdictions but in countries where there is very limited international law enforcement co-operation with both the UK and the EU. I am thinking of countries such as Afghanistan, Syria and Iran.
More generally, the smuggling gangs have become more professionalised. They are very well resourced and are highly adaptable. There is a sense that law enforcement is constantly having to play catch-up. The gangs are decentralised, and there are quite small groups of, say, eight to 12 individuals, spread out across the continent, who are responsible for logistics—for example, storing equipment like motors and engines in Germany that are imported to Turkey from China and then transported in trucks to France. Those networks stretch out across the continent. That is why it is so hard for law enforcement to fight them.
Pete Wishart
Q
Unless we tackle the demand, surely there will not be anything we can effectively do to tackle the illegal gangs, particularly if we are going to be cutting international aid budgets, which will exacerbate the problem and drive more people into the hands of the gangs. Ms Bantleman, you have written to the Government urging them to amend the good character guidance to ensure compliance with the UK’s international obligations. Could you expand on that and elaborate on what you are intending from the Government? You are right to remind the Government of the range of their commitments and international obligations. I will come to you first, Dr Walsh.
Dr Peter Walsh: It is true that there is a real lack of evidence on what the likely impact of specific policies to disrupt smuggling networks will be, but the policies could assist in disrupting smuggling activities. If you invest more resources in enforcement and agencies have greater power of seizure, search, arrest and investigation, then you would expect that more smugglers would be brought to justice. The bigger question for me is: will that reduce people travelling in small boats? There is the separate question of whether this will eliminate the market for smuggling.
What we do know is that a lot of people are willing to pay a lot of money for the services that smugglers provide. If the effect of the policies is to disrupt smuggling operations, that could conceivably raise the cost of smuggling—a cost that would be passed on to migrants. It may be the case that some are priced out at the margins, but I suspect that demand is fairly inelastic. Even with an increase in price, people will still be willing to pay.
Another challenge is the people most directly involved in smuggling operations on the ground—the people who are tasked with getting the migrants to shore, the boats into the water and the migrants into the boats. It does not require substantial skill, training or investment to do that job. You can apprehend those individuals, and that requires substantial resource, but they can quickly be replaced. That is why it has been described as being like whack-a-mole. I think that is one of the real challenges.
Zoe Bantleman: I would like to add to that point, before I address the second question. I completely agree with what Peter says about how the most fundamental challenge in breaking the business model of smugglers is that, simply, smuggling will exist for as long as there is demand. There will be demand for it as long as there are people seeking safety. For as long as we fail to have accessible, safe, complementary routes for people to arrive here, and for as long as carriers are too fearful to allow people on to safe trains, ferries and planes to the UK, people will feel that they have no choice but to risk their lives, their savings and their families’ savings on dangerous journeys.
The focus of the Bill is not on tackling trafficking or the traffickers, or on protecting the victims of trafficking; it casts its net much wider. It is really about tackling those who assist others in arriving here, as well as those who arrive here themselves.
That leads me on to the second point, which is in relation to the good character guidance. There was a recent change, on the day of Second Reading, that also resulted in a change to the good character guidance, which is a statutory requirement that individuals must meet in order to become British citizens. The guidance says that anyone who enters irregularly—it actually uses the word “illegal”, which I have substituted with “irregularly”—shall “normally” not have their application for British citizenship accepted, no matter how much time has passed.
Fundamentally, article 31 of the refugee convention says that individuals should be immune from penalties. It is a protective clause. It is aimed at ensuring that exactly the kind of person who does not have the time or is not able to acquire the appropriate documentation, who has a very short-term stopover in another country on the way to the UK, and who is allowed to choose their country of safety can come here and is immune from penalties. There is also an obligation under the refugee convention to facilitate the naturalisation of refugees.
We also mentioned many other conventions, including the convention on the elimination of discrimination against women, and the convention on the rights of the child. Children have a right to obtain citizenship, so stateless children should not be barred from obtaining British citizenship. In addition, they should not be held accountable for things that were outside their control. Children placed on small boats may have had no control or understanding of their journey to the UK, so arriving here in a way outside their control, in a way that the Government consider to be illegal but is not illegal under international law, is not a reason for them to be barred from citizenship. That is the substance of what we have said.
The Chair
This may be the last question, unless anybody else has indicated that they wish to ask one.
Chris Murray
Q
Dame Rachel de Souza: Down in Kent, because needs must, hotels were set up, so I visited the hotels that children were in. The situation was wholly inappropriate. Many children were languishing there for months, without English teaching. Kent county council was doing its best. Some of the best provision that I saw for children who were just arriving was put on by Kent, which had managed to get school going and get interpreters in, but it was overwhelmed.
What I will say, to pay tribute to local authorities around the country, is that whenever there was a very young child or a disabled child, they would step up and help. But it was hard to get the national transfer scheme going and the children were confused by it as well. The Hghland council offered a range of places to some of the children, and they were like, “Where is the highlands and what are we going to do there?” It felt discombobulated at best. It was really tricky.
Of course, let us not forget that a lot of those children were older teenagers, and a lot of the provision that they were going to was not care, but a room in a house with all sorts of other people—teenagers and older people. They were left to fend for themselves, which was incredibly disorientating. We have a problem with 16 and 17-year-olds in the care system. There was a massive stretch on social care. Every director of children’s social care who I spoke to said that it is a massive stretch on their budgets, and that they do not know what to do with those children.
I think we could be more innovative. Again, there is massive good will out there in the country. We should be looking at specialist foster care, and not sticking 17-year-olds in rooms in houses on their own. There are so many things we could be doing to try to make this better, such as settling children in communities with proper language teaching.
The No.1 thing that children tell me that they want, given that they are here, is to learn—to be educated—so that they can function well. For me, particularly with some of the children who I have seen, they do not in any way mirror the stuff that we read in the media about freeloading—coming here for whatever. Most of them are really serious cases, and given that they are here, they want to try to learn and be good productive members of our communities. There is much that we can do.
Pete Wishart
Q
We are keeping parts of NABA, so that will be a feature of the Bill. There are concerns about modern slavery and the impact on children with that. Are there any amendments that we could bring to the Bill that would help to deal with that and meet some of those concerns, so that we can get to a much better place with how we deal with children in our asylum system?
Dame Rachel de Souza: Obviously, both of those issues are concerns of mine—age assessment and the modern slavery provisions not being allowed to be applied. On age assessment, it is important that we know how old children are. I have seen 14-year-olds in hostels with 25-year-olds, which is totally inappropriate. I have seen girls who say that they are not 18 be age assessed as 18 and put in adult institutions with adult men. We do not want people masquerading as children to be put in with younger children. We need to do everything we can to determine age.
The technology around scientific age assessment is going to be difficult, not least because when you are dealing with an international population—as Lord Winston talked about—it is really difficult to be precise. Being precise matters. When children arrive in Kent, they get their new clothes, then if they are sick, they are put into a shipping container until they are not sick any more. They maybe then have to sleep a bit on a bench, and then they are age assessed. That age assessment is the most important thing about the rest of their journey here. If that goes wrong, that is it; if you get that wrong, they are an adult. It is a really important and tricky thing, and it is often not supported.
There are things we can do—I always look for solutions. Maybe we ought to be saying, “This is obviously a child. This is obviously an adult.” But there is a group where there are questions and perhaps we should be thinking about housing people in that group and spending a bit more time to work out how old they are and try to get the evidence, rather than making these cut-and-dry decisions that will change people’s lives. As I said, I found a 14-year-old boy in Luton who was there for years with 25-year-olds and was really upset.
On the modern slavery provisions, all I would say—I hope this is helpful—is that I have seen with my own eyes a 16-year-old Eritrean girl arriving at Kent with an older man who was her boyfriend. She obviously said, “It’s fine—I’m 16. We can come in.” She had lost her parents. It was obviously going to be trafficking. We need parts of the Bill to pick that up. That is real, so we need to be really careful about these things.
Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill (Second sitting)
Pete Wishart ExcerptsThursday 27th February 2025
(3 weeks, 4 days ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 View all Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill 2024-26 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Public Bill Committee Amendments as at 27 February 2025 - (27 Feb 2025)
Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)
Q
Mr Jones, I am struck by your confidence that you are going to end this. I think you made a comparison with illegal drugs. You are probably right to make that comparison—they are both demand-led and operated by illegal gangs—but we have not been particularly successful with illegal drugs over the course of the past decade.
Lastly, Ms Dineley, you said something about pilots of the boats. I hope your intelligence is telling you exactly the people who are piloting the boats. It is not the gang members or people associated with this crime. It is ordinary asylum seekers who cannot afford the fare or are forced into piloting these boats. I hope that when approaching the new powers in the clauses you will be proportionate, you will know what is going on and will not endlessly prosecute innocent people who are just asylum seekers fleeing oppression and warfare.
Rob Jones: We are not looking to pursue asylum seekers who are not involved in serious and organised crime. That is not what we do. This is about tackling serious and organised crime and being as effective as we can be in doing that. There are examples of people involved in piloting boats who are connected to the organised crime groups.
Pete Wishart
Q
Rob Jones: People have been convicted of those offences, so that has passed an evidential test. Our role is undermining a specific element of the business model. It is not like drugs trafficking. Drugs trafficking has been established since the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. It is a lot older, a lot more established and involves billions of pounds and tens of thousands of people internationally, if not more. The small boats threat is different from that. It is the highest harm manifestation of organised immigration crime. I have not said that I will stop organised immigration crime. I said that we will tackle the small boats business model and then continue to tackle the OIC threat, as we have been doing since 2015.
Sarah Dineley: In relation to asylum seekers piloting boats, under the Immigration Act 1971 we have two offences: sections 24 and 25—section 25 being the facilitating offence. Our guidance is very clear on when we charge the section 25 facilitation offence. It is very clear from our guidance that it is not just about having a hand on the tiller; it is about being part of a management chain and being part of the organisation of that crossing.
You mentioned people who are coerced into taking the tiller. We would look under section 24—arriving illegally—on whether an offence of duress would be sustained. That would form part of our considerations on whether evidentially it is made out and, secondly, whether it is in the public interest to prosecute that person. We do look at the whole set of circumstances, and our guidance sets out in very clear terms what is required, both in terms of the evidential test and the public interest test—that balancing exercise. We also have specific guidance in relation to how we treat refugees and asylum seekers. Again, that plays into the charging decision equation, as I will put it, and the balancing exercise.
Jim Pearce: I am not sure what I could add to my colleagues’ comments.
Pete Wishart
Q
Jim Pearce: I am not sure I am going to be able to answer that question, but I can tell you that for 12 months since November 2023 the police were involved with just under 2,000 inland clandestine incidents. What I mean by that are, for example, relevant persons who have been found in the back of an HGV who walk into police stations declaring asylum or those who have been left at petrol stations and are then picked up by police patrols and brought in. There were 2,000 incidents and nearly 3,000 persons. Obviously, they are not all being arrested for organised immigration crime offences, because they have not necessarily committed them, and my colleague here has spoken about the aggravating factors that sit within section 24, which are the key points to prove. As I say, that is probably all I could offer you at this time.
Sarah Dineley: Perhaps I could put things into some sort of numerical context. Last year, we had 37,000 arrivals in the UK through small boats crossings alone, and, in the period from April to September last year, there were only 250 prosecutions.
Pete Wishart
And were they gang members?
Sarah Dineley: I cannot break that down, but that would include gang members. That is the total number of prosecutions.
Kenneth Stevenson (Airdrie and Shotts) (Lab)
Q
Rob Jones: In relation to the powers in clauses 13 to 16?
Jade Botterill (Ossett and Denby Dale) (Lab)
Q
Tony Smith: I do not think any of it was good value for money for the taxpayer, was it? The history and record speak for themselves. But we need to think about why it did not work and look at the reasoning behind why it took three years to try to get the process going. An awful lot of work was done in Rwanda and the Home Office to try to make it happen, but it was subject to continual legal challenge. Legal challenges were made in Europe, in the domestic courts and by judicial review. On a number of occasions, flights were lined up that did not happen, and a lot of money was therefore wasted in the process.
I am not a big fan of the Illegal Migration Act. Some of it was cumbersome, because it put all the eggs in the Rwanda basket. Rwanda was a limited programme—obviously, we could not send everybody to Rwanda—but under NABA, you had the option to triage and put some people into the Rwanda basket: those hard country removals, where you could not remove them anywhere else. You had that option, but you could still do what you are doing now and process people from places like Turkey and Albania, put them through the asylum system and return them to source.
Losing that triage option is going to be a big drawback, and it is going to cost a lot more money in the long run. The intake will continue to come, and you will then have to rack up the associated asylum, accommodation and settlement costs that run along with that.
Karl Williams: I would ask: “Value compared with what?” There is one argument around the counterfactual of if you had a deterrent, but I would also refer to the Office for Budget Responsibility’s analysis last summer on the fiscal impact of migration. It 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. We know from analysis from Denmark, the Netherlands and other European countries that asylum seekers’ lifetime fiscal costs tend to be steeper than that, but even on the basis of the OBR analysis, even if everyone ends up in work, if 35,000 people cross a year, which is roughly where we were last year, at that sort of cost range, it will probably be £50 billion or £60 billion of lifetime costs. Compare that with £700 million—it depends on what timescale you are looking at.
Pete Wishart
Q
If I am unfairly characterising your view, you can correct me, but your view is that they should not get into the UK, that they should be stopped either in the sea or the minute they arrive in the UK, and that at that point they should be booted out somewhere—if not Rwanda, some other country—or just put back to country of source. Is that roughly your view? You can just shake your head or nod.
Tony Smith indicated assent.
Pete Wishart
Q
Tony Smith: I do have sympathy with them. I do sympathise. Many of us, I suspect, would do the same. My issue is that they have travelled through a great many countries to make it to the UK. We used to have the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees resettlement programme, when we had control of our borders. I was a big fan of that; I went to Canada and studied it for three years. We were actually searching the world and working with the UNHCR to identify the most vulnerable people and set a cap on the numbers that we could take. That was going on in Canada, Australia and the UK.
If you look at the UNHCR website and see the numbers of people who are going through that programme now, they are not getting resettled. The reason why not is that the business model has been taken over by the smugglers. That is why we are getting large numbers of young men who can afford to cross multiple borders and pay smugglers to get here. I would like to see a return to the system where we have control of those irregular routes. Then we could start looking, as Karl said, at reintroducing UNHCR resettlement programmes, going to the UNHCR and taking a certain quota into the UK in a managed way.
Alp Mehmet: Out of Gaza, there are going to be potentially 2 million people who would like some comfort, so they would like to move to somewhere a bit more convivial than Gaza is at the moment. But, if I may ask the question, why is it assumed that—because people like us advocate control and discouraging people, a lot of the time, from risking their lives, not just in crossing the channel but in living rough as they do—discouraging them from coming is in some way inhuman, insensitive and unkind?
Pete Wishart
Q
Alp Mehmet: We do, and even in my day as an immigration officer 50 years ago, that was exactly what we did. Tony rose to run the show, but I would argue that we had far more leeway in the ’70s as very junior, humble individual immigration officers. We were properly trained, we were monitored, we did things entirely within the law and we dealt with people humanely. It does not mean that that will not happen because we are saying, “No, you shouldn’t jump into a dinghy and make your way over here.”
Jo White (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
Q
Alp Mehmet: Tony, you start, and then I will catch up with the question, because I did not quite hear.
Tony Smith: We may well say the same thing. The question was about the fact that the Rwanda plan did not deter anybody because we still had 84,000 people arrive. I think the reason for that was that it was never, in fact, implemented. The intelligence coming across from Calais was that the smugglers and migrants never believed that it was going to happen. Once it became clearer that the Safety of Rwanda Act had passed, and that it might well become a reality, there was intelligence to suggest that some people were thinking twice about getting into dinghies, and there was some displacement into Ireland as a result. Of course, we will never know now, because we never actually implemented it.
We had a change of Government, and the new Government made it very clear that they were going to abolish the Rwanda plan, so we are where we are, but I would have liked an opportunity to see what would happen if we had started at least some removals. We had flights ready to go. I would have liked to see the impact that starting some removals would have had on the incoming population. We will never know now, I am afraid. Clearly, we hardly removed anybody to Rwanda in the end—I accept that—but I would have liked us to at least try, to see if it had an impact.
Alp Mehmet: It was never going to be the solution. It was not going to be the way to stop those people jumping into boats and coming across, but it was going to help. There needed to be other changes. I appreciate that we are not going to resile from the European convention on human rights any time soon, but while it is there, it is very difficult to be certain that people will be dissuaded. Some will be, some would have been, and we know that some were already being deterred. It was a pity, I am afraid, that the Rwanda deal went.
Dame Angela Eagle
Q
David Coleman: I do not know how important the Illegal Migration Act was in increasing the number of the backlog, to be perfectly honest. In the past, it has been the same height without the Illegal Migration Act. About 15 or 20 years ago, it was also 90,000 per year, and that was way before any of the past legislation was enacted.
Pete Wishart
Q
David Coleman: This is a formidable tutorial group to try to give such an answer to. If I could say with any kind of confidence what was going to happen by the middle of the century, I would deserve a Nobel prize.
Pete Wishart
Q
David Coleman: I can do my best. The present situation, as you are obviously suggesting, is rather dire from the point of view of domestic demography, such as the fact that the so-called total fertility is down to 1.44 and may fall further. Therefore, it presages considerable population ageing and decline should it continue.
At the risk of being technical and boring, I would point out that total fertility is a snapshot. It is only a calculation of, on average, how many babies the average woman—if you can imagine an average woman—will produce over a lifetime, if the same levels of age-specific fertility were to continue, which refers to the same levels of birth rate at the ages 15 to 19, 20 to 24, and so on. If that continues at the present level, in the long run you will get 1.44 babies. This is a very volatile measure; it goes up and it goes down. Back in 2010, it was 1.94, which is really very healthy and probably as high as you could possibly get.
Pete Wishart
Q
David Coleman: Yes, or 2.1. That is true, although there is a risk of starting another hare. I suggest that some degree of population ageing and population decline is tolerable, particularly when we are faced with a world whose habitable area is shrinking and productivity is declining, thanks to the inevitable level of global climate change. The last thing we want, it seems to me, anywhere, is population growth. Population stabilisation and population decline, as long as it is modest and eventually comes to an end, is to be welcomed. I have said that with colleagues on a number of occasions.
I do agree that the present level of fertility is very unsatisfactory; it would be much healthier if it were higher. One gets into perilous waters trying to persuade people to have more children. The important thing is to identify those obstacles that stand in the way of the family size that people keep on saying they want to have. Despite all the problems at the present time, opinion polls suggest that people still want to have, on average, almost two babies or even more than two babies, but they cannot, for all sorts of reasons. In this country, some of those reasons are very obvious. One is the atrocious cost of housing. House prices are now at nine times the level of the average income, compared with three or four times, which was normal in the past.
The Chair
Sorry, we have four minutes left and I have three people to get in.
David Coleman: Forgive me; I ran away with myself. I am so sorry.
Chris Murray
Q
Professor Brian Bell: Well, four went voluntarily, but if the policy had been implemented in full, there were never any guarantees. We certainly would not have been able to send 100,000 a year to Rwanda; Rwanda was never going to accept that. The cost was astounding, given the likely deterrence effect. It illustrates a problem in the Home Office at the time: there was little rational thinking about what the costs and benefits of different policies were. My personal view is that getting asylum claims dealt with more quickly would have been a much more effective use of public resources. That is in the interests of not only the British public but asylum seekers, as most of their claims are accepted. If we could have got them through the system faster, got them approved if they were approved, got them into work and integrating within their communities and, if they were rejected, actually deported them, that would have been a much better use of public resources.
Pete Wishart
Q
Professor Brian Bell: I think the numbers will be quite small. In some senses, a good piece of legislation makes a criminal offence so serious, and a penalty so severe, that no one commits the crime. There is a risk that you think you have failed because no one is convicted, but actually if you deterred the behaviour then it succeeded. The reality is that if there are any convictions, it will be almost entirely asylum seekers who are convicted. I do not see how the gangs will be convicted because, as I understand it, they are not on the boats.
Pete Wishart
Q
Professor Brian Bell: That is the implication of the legislation. I am not a lawyer, so I should be careful here, but I understand that there is a defence in the legislation that would allow you to claim that you were essentially forced into doing it, under sort of human slavery conditions.
Pete Wishart
Not according to the current numbers: 205 is a lot of people being convicted for being compelled to drive a boat—
Jo White
Q
Dame Angela Eagle: Well, the Border Security Commander is very happy with the powers that he has—he has been appointed. Again, we will talk about this in some detail, but it is important that we get co-ordination across different areas of activity. I think you will have heard what the NCA witness said about how he wants somebody else to do the co-ordination while he does the basic work. Everybody is working together very well across the people who have to have regard. The Border Security Commander is bringing together a range of very important players in this area to strategise and co-ordinate, and he has not told me—I meet him regularly—that he needs any more powers.
Pete Wishart
Q
The other thing is that it will have very little impact on people making the decision to come to the United Kingdom. They are fleeing oppression, poverty and war, and they do not care about the laws of the United Kingdom—what Angela Eagle is doing in a migration Bill is not going to deter them from coming here. So what are we going to do to get on top of this issue? Should we not be thinking, as we go through this Bill process, about fresh, new ideas to tackle it?
Dame Angela Eagle: Well, we have just come out of a period of fresh new ideas and gimmicks—
Pete Wishart
Yes, but that is gone.
Dame Angela Eagle: And very expensive they turned out to be. We have inherited such a mess, with huge backlogs and very long waits for appeals, that we have to try to clear up. We have an asylum system that essentially broke down—I think one of our witnesses was talking about it being “in meltdown” earlier today.
We are going to do the day job and start to get that system working. I think that having fast, fair and effective immigration decisions is a very important part of all of this, as is removing those whose claims fail so that we can actually get to the stage where people know that, if they come to this country and they do not have a reasonable chance of being accepted as an asylum seeker, they will be returned. I think that is what the deterrent is.
Seema Malhotra: If I may add one point, it is absolutely valid and right to say that this Bill is one part of trying to tackle both the criminal gangs and the demand. Certainly, the other side of the work that the Home Secretary has been leading on—in terms of agreements with other countries for returns, as well as the reasons why people are coming and what more could be put in place as a deterrent—is work that was also talked about in evidence today; international diplomacy is also an important part of the overall framework. That is going on in parallel, and it is important to be working upstream through diplomacy and agreements with other countries too.
Kenneth Stevenson
Q
I then heard that there were no magical solutions and that war was not easy to win—so we are in a “war” with migrants. We then spoke about unkindness to asylum seekers. I think that the most important words that I heard today were proactive, pre-emptive and disruptive— that is what the Government are trying to be. Do you agree that that has to start with the gangs who are starting this and are pulling—or pushing—people across?
Dame Angela Eagle: Yes. There are many genuine asylum seekers, many of whom are granted asylum when they are finally processed, who have come in that way. There are also people who are trafficked, who are in debt bondage, who go into sex work in nail bars, say from Vietnam, or who end up—as the police chief told us—growing cannabis in hidden farms in all our communities or being involved in serious crime. Some of them are victims of modern slavery, and some of them are the perpetrators of all that kind of evil.