Immigration Bill

Debate between Rehman Chishti and Richard Arkless

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Richard Arkless]

I think it is incredibly dangerous and one of the things that has struck me since I became an MP, with the many constituents who come to my surgeries, is the mess the immigration system is in. Things take too long, decisions are often bad, and in my experience it is vulnerable people who are trying to better their lives who are paying the consequences for this, which I find completely unacceptable.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

On the point about the delegation to Pakistan, of course people in Pakistan and here in the UK want a fairer system of immigration. We have to ensure the rules are fair so that genuine students can come and study, but does the hon. Gentleman agree that what we saw previously, with 600 bogus colleges, and people coming here when they should not have and when they did not want to be students, was wrong? The system we are putting in place will address that, so that genuine students from Pakistan can come here and study.

[Richard Arkless]

Forgive me for being cynical, but the number given earlier in the debate was 900 and now it is 600. That underlines the fact that there is misinformation; there is no evidence base for this Bill. There is no evidence base for the assertion of 900 or 600. What is the right figure? We need to know the facts.

The opportunities for prejudice and discrimination will be rife as a result of this Bill. It places a duty on banks and building societies to carry out regular checks on the immigration status of individuals and to notify the Home Office when a person becomes disqualified from holding a current account. I have a degree of sympathy with that proposal, on the face of it. A failed immigration applicant should not have access to banking or other services, but I worry about the unintended consequences, not least for our own citizens from other cultures or for perfectly legitimate immigrants. How many failed immigration applicants actually have a stash of cash that would need to be frozen? Would freezing such assets serve any purpose, save that of scoring obvious political points? These provisions could result in serious intrusion into the lives of all our citizens if they were applied in the wrong circumstances.

The Bill also contains the power to seize and detain vehicles driven by illegal immigrants. It provides for the prosecution and imprisonment and/or fining of those who drive if they are illegal immigrants, even if they are in possession of a valid driving licence from another state. Again, on the face of it, that might appear sensible, but I have to ask: do we really have a problem with lots of failed immigration applicants clogging up our streets and creating traffic jams with their cars, or is this just another point-scoring exercise?

How these provisions are to be regulated and enforced should be a matter for rigorous debate in this place. It is clear that the Bill is fixated on reducing the net migration figures, and in so doing—as has been admitted by Conservative Members—reducing the attractiveness of the UK as a place where skilled migration is welcomed. The Home Secretary’s dangerously aggressive speech to her party’s conference was a class act in striking more fear where it does not belong. The Bill will extend that fear to those who might not even have done anything wrong. How many UK citizens with foreign-sounding names will have their lives disrupted and become disfranchised as a result of these measures before we realise that this has been a mistake? I believe that the nut that this sledgehammer of a Bill has been designed to smash will pale into insignificance beside the can of worms that the provisions will open.