Immigration (Bulgaria and Romania)

Philip Hollobone Excerpts

Monday 22nd April 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mark Pritchard]

Of course. I think that there would be consensus on that issue and I hope that there will be consensus on a lot of what is being shared by all of us today. Absolutely, but there is a huge legacy that this Government are having to tackle.

I would now like to narrow the debate to the particular, rather than the general, and deal with Bulgaria and Romania. On housing, I welcome the Government’s recent announcement, ahead of the transitional border controls on Bulgarian and Romanian migration being lifted on 31 December, that they will introduce sanctions for private sector landlords who house illegal immigrants, many of whom are kept in over-occupied, cramped and often squalid conditions. These are similar sanctions to those that we have just discussed vis-à-vis employers. Migration and immigration remain the biggest driver of housing growth—housing demand that puts pressure on many of the communities represented here today.

I also welcome the recent announcement by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister that the Department for Communities and Local Government will soon issue clearer guidance to local authorities and councils about ensuring that priority for housing is given to local people through an habitual residence test. However, my view is that that policy should be set out in binding legislation rather than as guidance, as should the policy of giving housing priority to our armed forces. There should be no opt-outs. According to the Government, only half of all councils currently set local residency tests. That needs to change. The reality is that some councils, especially in some urban areas, may be tempted, for political reasons, not to implement that policy.

The Prime Minister, in his recent speech in Ipswich, was also right to say that Britain should not be a “soft touch” for “benefit tourists”. I am glad that my right hon. Friends the Health Secretary and the Home Secretary have expressed a similar view. That needs to be the case, whatever people’s nationality. This is not isolated only to European migrants, but our focus today is on Bulgaria and Romania, and a BBC poll, issued at five past midnight today, suggests that no more than 4% of Bulgarians and 1% of Romanians might consider coming to the UK in 2014. Given that 150,000 Bulgarians and Romanians are already here, under the permitted work scheme and via other routes, I suspect that the “Newsnight” poll is somewhat timid in its estimate, but even if those percentages are accurate, that would mean 350,000 people from each working-age population, from each of the countries, arriving in the UK. I refer the hon. Member for Rhondda to one of the headlines in tomorrow morning’s papers if he does not believe that to be the case. [Interruption.] He does not know which one yet.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his speech. I also praise him for his reference to the BBC “Newsnight” poll. The BBC is spinning that that suggests that very few people will be coming to our shores from Romania and Bulgaria, but in fact it probably means the opposite, because, of the 73 million people who live in the A8 accession countries, 1.1 million have come to our shores, which is a rate of 1.5%.

[Mark Pritchard]

My hon. Friend makes a very helpful contribution to the debate, as he always does. I am grateful for his analysis, which he has obviously done over the last few hours since the poll came out. I come back to the point that it is a significant amount. Whether it is 1%, 1.5% or 4%, it is a significant amount of people for communities to absorb and public services to serve.

We hear that Germany is toughening up its rules, finding ways around EU strictures. Coupled with Spain’s high unemployment rate and comparatively low benefits, that makes the UK an increasingly attractive option for many where poverty is still widespread and the minimum wage is one third of what it is in the UK. I do not question the integrity of the BBC poll, but I do question its interpretation.

EU migration affects schools as well. I am sure that colleagues know examples of how demand for school places has meant that some parents cannot send their children to their school of choice because of the influx of EU migrants. Some families have had to place siblings in different schools as a result. Of course, that can also happen because of other, unrelated demographic changes, but it is certainly the case that a lot of this is happening because of demands from immigration.

There is also the impact from teachers and classroom assistants giving special attention to children who do not speak English. That can be disruptive to the rest of the classroom. It is disruptive to school life and a distraction for other pupils. There is also the cost to local education authorities and school budgets of translation and interpretation.

Similarly, EU migration has an impact on local GP services, acute hospital trusts and wider primary care demand, which is why the Government are right to try to recoup millions from other European economic area Governments when their citizens use the NHS. It should have been happening for years, but it has not been. Hospitals might be required, through statute, to do their bit, perhaps with financial incentives for trusts to co-operate with the Government on the legal status of the patients they look after. Surely NHS trust boards should have a duty to ensure that those they treat, save in emergencies, are those who have the first right to be treated. That is not lacking compassion, but recognising that the NHS, even with record funding under the Conservative-led Government, has finite and scarce resources—it is the national health service, not the international health service. Britain must remain an open and tolerant society, but we cannot be the hospital for the world. Health tourism must end, and health trusts, not only the Government, have a major role to play in delivering fairness in treatment.

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[Keith Vaz]

Not really, because I finished being Minister for Europe in 2001, and enlargement took place in 2004, so I do not know what report he is referring to. As the hon. Gentleman will find out when he serves in government and then ceases to be in government, Ministers are not prepared to share their reports with former Ministers, unfortunately—perhaps we should ensure that that changes.

[Mr Hollobone]

May I gently correct the right hon. Gentleman? I am following his speech closely. The 50,000 people a year estimate he mentioned from Migration Watch is in fact a central estimate. The range Migration Watch gives is between 30,000 and 70,000 per year.

[Keith Vaz]

That is extremely helpful. That is the figure I have.

Let me move on to the next report that was commissioned: the report by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research to this Government. The report contains no estimates, and when that was put to the Home Secretary on 18 December, when she appeared before the Home Affairs Committee, she said she was “looking at the issue”. On 23 January, she said that, given the uncertainties, it was not “practicable to draw” any “conclusions on future numbers”. However, on the BBC on 13 January, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government said there would be an “influx” of Romanians and Bulgarians, increasing pressure in terms of existing housing shortages. Only last Thursday, when the Home Secretary appeared before the Select Committee, she could provide us with no further information. On 20 February, the Deputy Prime Minister said on his weekly LBC show that there were “guesstimates”. He added that he would not “lend too much credence to estimates which may well go on to prove to be inaccurate”.

At the heart of this is the need for us to have clear estimates and predictions, and we can, because we all acknowledge that this is an issue, so we might as well get the estimates and the research done. I hope the Minister will say he will do that when he responds to the hon. Member for The Wrekin later in the debate, and certainly before he comes to the Select Committee.

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[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

It is a huge pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Walker. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mark Pritchard) on securing the debate and on his excellent remarks. It is a huge privilege to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames). The one fault of his speech was that it was too short. He has led this House by supreme example through his chairmanship of the cross-party group on balanced migration.

Like my right hon. Friend, I believe that the population of our country should not be allowed to go above 70 million. We are presently at 62 million, and unless we get a grip on immigration we will end up with a population of more than 70 million in the 2030s or 2040s. If we think that Britain is full now, with all the transport, housing, schooling and health difficulties that we face, it will be far worse in 2035 or 2040 unless we tackle the issue now.

I want to make a plea on behalf of all of us who have raised the issue of immigration over many years. It was not until the start of large-scale immigration from the European Union that those of us concerned about immigration were not accused of being racist whenever the word “immigration” was used. For all of us who are concerned about immigration, it has never been about the colour of somebody’s skin or about the culture or country they come from; it has always been just about the numbers. Our country is one of the most crowded in the world, and we simply cannot cope with another large-scale wave of immigration into this country, especially from countries with which we have very little in common, such as Romania and Bulgaria.

Let me put my cards on the table straight away. I do not believe that Britain should any longer be a member of the European Union. We tied ourselves to the wrong club with a crisis of confidence in the 1960s and 1970s. Why on earth would we want to shackle ourselves to a trading bloc whose share of world trade was 30% in the 1980s, but is rapidly heading towards 15% in the 2020s? I do not believe in an ever-closer union.

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[Mr George Howarth (in the Chair)]

Mr Hollobone had the floor, but before I bring him back, as it were, it might be worth mentioning, for the convenience of those present, that we will conclude this debate, with time added on for the Divisions, at around 7.55 pm, give or take a minute or two. I hope that that is helpful.

[Mr Hollobone]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth. I think that a few Members thought that they had escaped with the ringing of the bell—saved by the bell. My right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex has escaped—he has heard me speak before—but, sadly, other hon. Members will have to endure part two.

I was telling hon. Members that I am no longer in favour of Britain’s being a member of the European Union. We are tying ourselves to a sclerotic trade bloc. We have to pay an annual membership fee of more than £10 billion and we have to open our borders to all and sundry. I do not believe that my constituents would be in favour of any of those three main conditions of our being a member of the EU. I do not take my constituents’ views for granted and I am delighted that the Conservative party has pledged a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU, should we form the Government after the next election. Should I be back, I intend to hold the Conservative Government at that time to account on their election pledge. If my constituents vote to leave the EU, I will certainly join them. If they vote to remain in the EU, that is their choice and I am delighted that they will have that choice.

With regard to immigration from Romania and Bulgaria, this country cannot cope with a further wave of mass immigration. I do not believe in an ever-closer union in Europe or in the free movement of labour. Yes, we need skilled labour, whether from the EU or from around the world, but we should control that with a work permit or visa system. With our membership of the EU, effectively our borders are open to skilled and unskilled labour from across the EU. There are consequences and serious knock-on effects of large numbers of people coming to our country.

The right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) made a valid point in saying that Her Majesty’s Government needs to provide a sensible estimate of the numbers that might come from Romania and Bulgaria. It is sensible to start by seeing how many came to our shores from the A8 accession countries—the first wave of immigration from eastern Europe. We now have just over 1.1 million eastern Europeans from those A8 countries, which have a combined population of just under 73 million. That is a rate of 1.5%. That is a known—a fact—and it is indisputable. If we apply that same rate to the entry of Romania, with 21 million people, and Bulgaria with 7 million, the 155,000 from those two countries presently resident in the UK would climb to some 425,000. That means that we can, on average, expect three times more Romanians and Bulgarians than are currently resident in this country.

Those estimates tie in nicely with those from Migration Watch, a hugely respected, independent migration think-tank, which has estimated that the influx from Romania and Bulgaria will be between 30,000 a year, at the bottom end, to 70,000 a year at the top end, with a central estimate of 50,000 a year.

[Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)]

I pay tribute to the excellent work that my hon. Friend has done on this issue over the past few years. Is not the problem that some of our policy makers do not understand the impact of these large demographic changes on a small number of geographical areas? My hon. Friend knows that in my constituency 34,000 national insurance numbers were issued in eight years, in a city of 150,000 people. Some 41% of primary school children in my constituency do not have English as a first language. This is the reality of mass migration from the European Union.

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[Mr Hollobone]

I am most grateful for my hon. Friend’s helpful intervention. I praise the work that he does on behalf of his constituents in Peterborough. He has the courage to speak out on these often controversial issues on their behalf. Rightly, he does not mince his words. The situation in his constituency is intolerable. How have we let this happen? We will never have any sensible degree of integration if large numbers of immigrant communities are all in one place. One difficulty with such a large number of people all arriving at the same time is that they do not disperse across the country, but tend to congregate in concentrations, Peterborough being one. Any sensible management of public services, whether schools, hospitals or other local service provision, is difficult under those intolerable pressures.

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

My hon. Friend is attacking this from the wrong end. It is no good saying, “What happened in 1066? What happened in 2004?”, because what happened then should never have happened. We have to say to the Minister, “You are responsible. You must fix a limit and say, ‘That is the maximum that is allowed, and that is all.’” It does not matter how the rules are fiddled or used to make that happen, but happen it must.

[Mr Hollobone]

I do not think that my hon. Friend and I disagree. I was trying to say that the British public expect, as a minimum from their Government, some sensible estimate of the numbers coming from Romania and Bulgaria. Why would a country open its borders to two foreign countries when it has no idea how many people will come to our shores from those countries? All I am asking, as a starting point, is why do we not use what happened last time to work out our estimate? If we do that, we eventually end up with well over 400,000 Romanians and Bulgarians in this country. I hope I am wrong—I hope those numbers are a huge exaggeration—but the Government are not saying whether I am wrong or right; the Government have no view, and they refuse to take one. The British public expect rather more than that from Her Majesty’s Government.

I agree with my hon. Friend that we have to try to fix the problem, although I do not think it is a problem that can be fixed. We should say, “No, we are not going to have immigration from Romania and Bulgaria.” When the transitional controls end, we should say, “Sorry, we are not going to allow immigration from these two countries.” For those who want to remain in the EU but renegotiate our terms of membership, that would send a firm signal of intent that this country means business.

At the moment, I do not believe that the other EU countries believe we are serious in trying to renegotiate our membership. I feel renegotiation of our membership is doomed to failure. I do not believe the other EU countries will take us seriously—they are going to shuffle about for years and years to put off the day when any new treaty could be signed. We may well be in the same bind in five, six, seven or 10 years’ time. I think we should leave the EU, but for those who want to stay, a firm signal of intent that we mean business in renegotiating our membership would say to the Romanians and the Bulgarians, “We are sorry, but Britain is full and we will not take immigration from your two countries.”

There are very good reasons for saying no, not least crime levels. There is currently a crime wave of bag snatchers and pickpockets on London underground. I am a special constable with the British Transport police, so I know what I am talking about. Eight out of 10 pickpockets on the London underground are Romanian, and I would welcome an intervention from the Romanian ambassador to say, “We recognise that you have a problem here in London with crime levels from our nationals. We are going to try to help address that situation for you.”

Of course, London is a huge magnet. With 7.5 million residents, it is the largest city in western Europe, compared with 3.5 million in Berlin, 3.25 million in Madrid, 2.5 million in Rome and 2 million in Paris. London is one of the world’s most cosmopolitan cities, and with English as our native language, London is a magnet for millions of people throughout the EU. Romanians or Bulgarians looking for some of their fellow countrymen in the EU are most likely to find them here in London. London is a magnet that attracts people from those two countries.

The very least that Her Majesty’s Government should do is ensure that all European nationals who intend to come to our country and stay for more than three months have to have a residency card. Her Majesty’s Government are allowed to do that under the rules—this point has been put to the Immigration Minister previously, not least in the excellent private Member’s Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson), and I have also raised it with him directly on the Floor of the House—and other countries do it, not least Spain. That means those countries have a far better handle on the numbers of other EU nationals coming across their borders, and it would give us a far better handle on where EU nationals are coming from and where they are living in this country. It would also help us with issues such as benefit entitlement, access to services in the national health service, and school places.

[Mark Pritchard]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful case. Will he set out the difference between a residency card and an identity card? The Conservative party, along with others, objected to an identity card, which is a complex area with many political challenges and pitfalls.

[Mr Hollobone]

A residency card is not an identity card in that sense, but there would be a requirement for EU nationals coming to live here for more than three months to have one. The card would basically be a trail of documentation that tells us who those people are, where they have come from and where they are living in this country. At the moment, Her Majesty’s Government, as far as I can tell, have no idea which EU countries are sending the most people here and where they are living.

We also need to get a far better handle on EU nationals coming here with young children, because there is pressure on school places in both Kettering and Peterborough, probably in The Wrekin and certainly in our big cities. Unless we get a better handle on the type of people coming here and their economic requirements, our local councils and other services will not be able to provide the public services appropriate for their needs.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

My wife’s job is to find schools for children from the new arrival community. The question is not just about arriving; it is also about leaving. Is the hon. Gentleman aware, and does he agree, that the attraction for many new arrivals, who live pretty poor lives here, is that it is far better here than in their own countries, particularly for the Roma community because of the blatantly racist behaviour of other members of the European Community towards their own Roma communities?

[Mr Hollobone]

Yes. The hon. Gentleman makes a good point, and I congratulate his wife on the work she does.

That leads to another difficulty, because hon. Members have spoken about the habitual residency test. People can now come to this country from another EU country, claim to be self-employed and automatically get themselves on the benefit entitlement list. The idea that EU nationals are excluded from benefits until they have made a certain level of contributions over a certain period of time is simply not the case. The Roma community from Bulgaria and Romania has accessed that loophole, which makes British people extremely cross, as does giving child benefit to families whose children remain in their country of origin. That problem will be exacerbated when Romania and Bulgaria join.

If we are to stay in the European Union, which I do not favour, the very least that should be done on benefit entitlement is to introduce a reciprocal arrangement so that people who come to this country from another EU nation state are entitled to claim only the level of benefit they would have obtained in their country of origin. That would act as a big disincentive to benefit tourists, who come to us because of our relatively generous benefits system. One of the reasons why such immigration from EU nation states has become more of a problem as the EU has expanded is that the EU has been expanding into countries that are far, far poorer than our own. National income levels in Romania and Bulgaria are only about a fifth of the United Kingdom’s level, so there is a huge economic incentive, especially for young people, to come to this country.

[Mr Ward]

I want to correct that point, because people do not receive full entitlement to all benefits as soon as they arrive. They are obviously not entitled to income-related benefits until they have an income record, although what the hon. Gentleman says about child benefit is true. The growing number of Roma in particular who are now accessing the increasing number of food banks in Bradford is testament to the fact that they do not have full entitlement to all benefits when they arrive.

[Mr Hollobone]

That is right, but my constituents would say, “Why should someone from another EU nation state arrive in this country and claim anything unless they have some kind of contribution record over a sensible period of time?” That is what makes people so cross.

My hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin was right to highlight the fact that we have a national health service, not an international health service. I very much hope that, in the list of legislation in the Queen’s Speech, there will be a Bill—it would be fairly simple—to require GPs and NHS trusts to ensure that documentation is checked when someone presents themselves for treatment. We are not saying, “Do not treat other EU nationals or nationals from outside of the EU.” Of course we should treat them; we are just saying, “That treatment needs to be paid for, either by their own Governments or by their own insurance scheme.” That is the issue. We cannot go on treating the world, as my hon. Friend rightly said.

It is not often mentioned that we are not only talking about Romania and Bulgaria; we are also talking about other nations in eastern Europe that can access Romanian and Bulgarian passports through grandparent rights. Hundreds of thousands of Moldovans are signing up to get Romanian passports so that they can take advantage of the end of transitional controls at the end of 2013. We can bet that those people will also be coming towards London.

The issue is serious and I congratulate all those who signed the e-petition and helped secure this debate in Parliament. We cannot, in my view and that of my constituents, carry on like this. In the words of the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles):

“The fact is, 43% of the new households which want a home, is accounted for by immigration.”

That is before we open our doors to Romanians and Bulgarians. Constituencies such as mine are seeing green fields being built over, schools full to the brim and health services stretched to the limit. Our country is full and we will not put up with it for too much longer.

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[Stephen Barclay]

Mr Howarth, you bring me on to the crux of the point. We already have a concentration of HMOs in Wisbech and the fens. That situation will only become more acute when Bulgarian and Romanian people come into those areas. We know that there is already a concentration within certain communities that are ill equipped to deal with it. I welcome what the Minister is doing to try to prevent people from coming in and to persuade, in relation to the pull factors, those who are coming in with, perhaps, a misguided view. I would love him to be 100% successful, but we know that despite his best efforts there will be an inflow of people from those countries and we are still not taking action on the problem that is here now, so let us get on with it. Let us attack it now in order to ease the pressure when those from Bulgaria and Romania come in.

I come now to my second point. Many people from Bulgaria and Romania will come in with vehicles that are registered in their country. Under the law, they have six months in which they can drive on our roads before the vehicles have to be registered. The House may not be aware of how many people were prosecuted last year for not registering their vehicle after six months. It was zero—not one. The Government seem to be under the impression—I note this for the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee—that every single person from eastern Europe who came in under the previous accession registered their vehicle after six months and not one of them continued to drive on the roads without doing that. Surgery cases that frequently come before me suggest that that might not be the case in my constituency, and logic would suggest that it is not the case. My point is this. There are constraints on what we can do under EU law and what we can renegotiate, but in terms of Bulgarians and Romanians coming into the country, we can at least show their neighbours, the British people, that the laws have been applied equally to them, because if my constituents have to MOT, license and insure their car but they see a rickety vehicle that does not look roadworthy and that they strongly suspect is not registered and they see a Government who never take action to prosecute someone for that, that feeds into the sense of grievance that all are not being treated equally. That is an issue that the Government need to tackle ahead of further migration from Bulgaria and Romania. It is not a big point, but I make it for illustrative purposes.

[Mr Hollobone]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on raising that point. I think that actually it is a big point and it is one that I have raised myself on the Floor of the House. We are potentially talking about tens of thousands of vehicles on our roads illegally. The purpose of the rules is to ensure that a vehicle is taxed, insured and roadworthy so that the driver can be prosecuted for any speeding or parking offences. All the rest of us have to comply with them. It is quite clear that tens of thousands of EU nationals are getting away with it.

[Stephen Barclay]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. I have raised the point repeatedly with Ministers; I certainly was not trying to belittle it. The point that I was trying to make was that where we have legal powers already, to what extent are we using them? Are we using them to the full? My hon. Friend is right: the estimate that I saw suggested that there are about 15,000 illegal vehicles currently on the road. That has implications if they are in an accident; are they traceable? There is a lost economy issue. Our garages would be getting business from MOT-ing them. The insurers would be generating revenue from them. I make the point for illustrative purposes: it raises a wider point about unfairness within a community, which is not conducive to cohesion.