Border Security and Asylum

Richard Foord Excerpts

Monday 22nd July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesman.

[Richard Foord (Honiton and Sidmouth) (LD)]

In 2018, the number of small boat arrivals stood at 299. In 2023, last year, the number had risen to more than 29,000. What happened in those intervening five years? One thing that happened was the closure of the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme, which was introduced by the coalition Government in 2014 and was designed to select some of the most vulnerable people from refugee camps in Jordan, near Syria. What we have seen since the closure of that scheme is people choosing instead to make for these shores rather than applying in refugee camps. Will the Home Secretary rule out the offshore processing of asylum seekers, or will she consider introducing a scheme similar to the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme, which could incentivise asylum seekers applying for asylum close to the war zones afflicting them?

[Yvette Cooper]

I welcome the hon. Member to his new post. He is right to talk about the importance of the UK doing its bit to help those who have fled persecution and conflict. It is why I strongly believe that the Homes for Ukraine programme was immensely important. Personally, it has been important to our family. It is important that the UK has done its bit, including in previous years around Hong Kong and Afghanistan. That must continue to be the case, but that help must operate alongside a properly functioning system, otherwise criminal gangs will continue to exploit the system whatever it is. At the moment, those criminal gangs are getting away with it.

Let me turn to the specific issue of offshore processing. In fact, the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Scheme was a form of offshore processing, just as the Homes for Ukraine scheme was. There are different ways to arrange these things. Our approach is always to look at what works. As long as it meets proper standards in terms of international law, we should be serious about what it is that works in order to tackle the complex problems that we face.

Arrests and Prison Capacity

Richard Foord Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

That is a completely inaccurate characterisation of the situation. The eight-day period provided for a contingency that was not required. I have read to the House an assurance from the relevant National Police Chiefs’ Council lead that arrests were not forgone or cancelled as a result of the contingency. More widely, as I have said, we have record police numbers and lower crime than 14 years ago, and I would have thought that we would all welcome that.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

The issue with prison capacity is partly a crisis of reoffending. Dartmoor prison was subject to an inspection last year, and was awarded only one out of four because of inadequate education and work opportunities. HMP Dartmoor holds a large number of people convicted of sexual offences, but the report says that there were no accredited programmes for rehabilitation. Sexual offences in Devon and Cornwall rose by 19% in the year to 2023. Does the Minister accept that the prison capacity crisis is partly about reoffending, and what is he doing about it?

[Chris Philp]

The Justice Secretary has assured me that Dartmoor is a well-run and well-regarded prison. One of the reasons why my colleagues in the Ministry of Justice, here on the Benches, are presiding over such a large increase in prison capacity is to ensure that prisoners are better rehabilitated in the prison estate. The hon. Gentleman rightly mentioned reoffending: preventing reoffending is critical. Much offending is connected with drug addiction—some estimates suggest nearly half—so getting more people into treatment is important, both in the courts system and in the prison estate. It is critical that, as people leave prison and re-enter the community, the drug treatment they received in prison continues in the community. We call it continuity of care, and it has increased quite dramatically recently—I would like it increase even more. That is one of the ways that we will reduce reoffending, which, as he said, is an important policy objective.

UK-Rwanda Partnership

Richard Foord Excerpts

Wednesday 6th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

I am not quite sure what the point of that question was, Mr Deputy Speaker. If the hon. Gentleman really wishes for me to do so, I can clarify the points I made that he refers to, but I suspect that he does not really want me to.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

In her personal statement this afternoon, the former Home Secretary, the right hon. and learned Member for Fareham (Suella Braverman), said that she had been unable to obtain the support of other Government Departments for her preferred method of dealing with applicants for asylum. She said:

“we must build Nightingale-style detention facilities to deliver the necessary capacity… The only way to do this…is with the support of the Ministry of Defence.”

Russia is on manoeuvres, more than 20,000 British troops are being deployed across northern Europe next year, and the Conservative Government are seeking to shrink the Army to 73,000. Does the Home Secretary, who was the Foreign Secretary last month, think that our armed forces should be training for war or for kettling asylum seekers into camps?

[James Cleverly]

Again, I am not at all sure how that question has anything to do with the proposals that we have put forward, but the hon. Gentleman will know that this party of Government will always support strong defence of this nation, unlike the Opposition parties.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Foord Excerpts

Monday 27th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

T10.   Given the revelation in recent weeks that the Home Secretary’s predecessor struck a deal with the Prime Minister before she took up the post, and given that it is well known that the Home Secretary was very much enjoying his role as Foreign Secretary, will he tell the House what deal he might have struck with the Prime Minister before taking on this role?

[James Cleverly]

A fantastic question, well worth asking. The contract that all Ministers have is with the British people, to work hard on their behalf and to focus relentlessly on their priorities. That is something that every Government Minister takes seriously, and something totally lacking in the narrative coming from the Opposition Benches, including the Liberal Democrat Benches.

Illegal Migration

Richard Foord Excerpts

Tuesday 24th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The Home Office has a long-standing policy of not naming the hotels wherever possible, but I can say that a hotel in his constituency is part of the first tranche of closures. If he has not already been notified, he should be notified by the Home Office very soon.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

The Liberal Democrats submitted a freedom of information request to the Home Office to ask about the cost of the Bibby Stockholm. We asked about the cost to taxpayers of buying the barge, as well as the estimated cost of running it over the next 12 months. The cost is estimated at £20 million a year, which is well over £300,000 a week. Why has the Home Office refused to put this information in the public domain? And why has it declared that to do so would not be in the public interest?

[Robert Jenrick]

The hon. Gentleman is essentially a humanitarian nimby. He comes to the House to say that we should be a welcoming nation and invite more people here, but he does not want to face up to the consequences of where those people should be housed. Behind his question is a view that I think is quite offensive to the British public, which is that it is okay to house British oil and gas workers on this barge, but not illegal migrants. I very much doubt his constituents would agree with him.

Police Stations

Richard Foord Excerpts

Monday 10th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Theresa Villiers]

I am very much aware of the concern felt in many parts of London about the tri-borough policing model, and I think it is important to review it.

I turn back to the idea that new bases for police officers could be found. There is still real uncertainty about where these would be and what they would involve. The suggestion remains that a new base for police officers could be in a corner of a library or the backroom in a high street shop, but providing a base for police officers is not a straightforward matter. Officers have access to highly sensitive personal data, and they hold evidence from cases for which it is vital that they keep rigorous and reliable records of custody. Moreover, some police equipment is potentially harmful, such as tasers, and it would be dangerous if this kind of kit fell into the wrong hands. Special storage facilities would need to be built in new alternative accommodation. They could not just set up a few lockers in a local library. Flogging off existing police stations could end up being a false economy if multiple new premises for ward teams in different areas need to be bought and fitted up to replace them.

I also want to highlight the sense of confidence that the presence of a police station gives people—a sense that would be entirely lost in the areas where police stations are currently under threat. For example, the East London Advertiser reported that people felt that police station closures in Tower Hamlets meant that the area felt less safe. Complete loss of the remaining police presence in Chipping Barnet town centre would inevitably leave my constituents feeling more insecure. Serious concerns have been reported to me about crime, thefts and antisocial behaviour in Barnet High Street, including what appears to have been a serious assault that took place recently outside McDonald’s. The sale of the police station and its complete closure would make it harder to grapple with the existing crime issues in the local area.

These worrying local crime problems were discussed recently at a meeting I attended of the High Barnet police community action panel, under the chairmanship of my constituent Mahender Khari. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to him, and to everyone who chairs or takes part in police action panels in my constituency. They do a vital job. That includes Councillor Jennifer Grocock, who has done excellent and innovative work on making neighbourhood police teams more visible by involving them in Barnet Council’s community safety hubs, which were pioneered by the previous Conservative administration in Barnet.

I am also worried about the impact of police station closures on the viability of our high streets. We all know that town centres have suffered in recent years for a range of reasons, particularly the big shift to online retail. It has become harder and harder to get footfall to high streets, and I fear that losing police stations could lead to a further hollowing out of our struggling town centres, adding to the list of vacant buildings.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

I thank the right hon. Member for her speech and for giving way. Last November, Devon and Cornwall police launched an online poll using SurveyMonkey, and invited the public in Devon and Cornwall to vote to reopen three front desks out of a list of 44. I was pleased to help promote that poll and to attend the reopening of Tiverton police station—and I hope to attend that of Honiton later this year—but does she think that we should not have to fill in SurveyMonkey polls to get to speak to a human being?

[Theresa Villiers]

The hon. Member makes the important point that much of what we are talking about is the ability of the police to maintain appropriate contacts with members of the public. That distance from members of the public is one of the problems that the Met is grappling with, and I think it is useful to hear his point of view about police stations and police services elsewhere in the country.

During this difficult era for high streets, we should try to enhance the visible presence of public services, not scale it back. That is another good reason to maintain the police station estate, both in Barnet and in other towns and cities. In her report on the Met, Baroness Casey highlighted that station closures are likely to have affected efficiency, with police spending more time travelling, and longer police response times. Recent research by Elisa Facchetti, published by the Centre for Economic Policy Research, pointed to a correlation between reduction in police stations and poorer crime clear-up rates. That suggests that the capacity to collect the evidence needed to solve crimes might be impeded by police having to travel increased distances, although I acknowledge that many other variables could be relevant, and it is difficult to establish a clear causative link.

Four important recent developments make this debate very timely, and mean that the Mayor of London should reverse his closure programme. First, the Government have delivered on the Conservative manifesto pledge to recruit 20,000 additional police officers. That means that the Met now has more uniformed officers than at any time in its history—and we need somewhere to put them. That radically changes the situation we faced in 2017, when the Mayor wielded the axe against Barnet police station and others.

Secondly, Baroness Casey’s damning report on the Met cited the closure of 124 police stations as one of the reasons behind what she describes as “eroded frontline policing”. She concluded that the combined impact of various efficiency measures, including police station closures, had led to

“a more dispersed and hands-off training experience for new recruits and existing personnel, which gives them less sense of belonging to the Met…greater distances for Response officers and Neighbourhood Policing teams to travel”,

and

“fewer points of accessible contact for the public”.

At a time when culture and conduct at the Met have come under huge scrutiny, we should not persist in making disposals from the police station estate—disposals that are calculated to make officers less connected to one another, more isolated and more distant from the communities they serve.

Migration and Economic Development Partnership

Richard Foord Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Suella Braverman]

Both Rwanda and the United Kingdom have made it clear that the scheme is uncapped. Indeed, when I visited Rwanda a few months ago, I visited some of the new accommodation that has been constructed for the precise purpose of supporting people who will be relocated to Rwanda. With respect, I disagree with the hon. Lady. There is potential in our agreement with Rwanda. We have confidence in its lawfulness, and we hope to deliver it as soon as possible.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

The Court of Appeal has ruled that the Government cannot send refugees to Rwanda. The scheme would cost taxpayers tens of thousands of extra pounds per refugee, yet the Government still seem to want to spend extra millions to challenge the ruling in the Supreme Court. Have the Government thought instead about simply paying for the Arsenal football team’s Visit Rwanda sponsorship deal, which would cost less and achieve more than this gimmick of a scheme?

[Suella Braverman]

What disappoints me is that the hon. Gentleman is failing to grapple with the challenge and the costs that we are incurring right now: £6 million a day on hotel accommodation and £3 billion a year on our asylum system. That cannot go on, which is why the Prime Minister and I have pledged to do whatever it takes to stop the boats, bear down on our asylum backlog and deliver our legislation and our partnership with Rwanda.

Police Uplift Programme

Richard Foord Excerpts

Wednesday 26th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

The announcement rings hollow for our constituents and serving police officers alike. I recently met with police officers at Honiton police station and it was plain that they receive way more priority calls than they have officers to deal with them. Earlier this month, we discovered that over 45,000 burglaries reported last year went unattended in England and Wales. Will the Minister get behind a Liberal Democrat Bill to create a statutory duty on police officers and police forces to attend and properly investigate every domestic burglary?

[Chris Philp]

I congratulate the excellent police and crime commissioner for Devon and Cornwall, Alison Hernandez, for delivering record officer numbers. There are 3,716 police officers in Devon and Cornwall, which is nearly 100 more than there were in March 2010.

In relation to domestic burglaries, I am afraid the Liberal Democrat party is a little behind the curve, because last autumn the Home Secretary launched an initiative to ensure every residential burglary got a police visit, which is something I am sure everyone in the House would support.

Illegal Migration Bill

Richard Foord Excerpts

Tuesday 7th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Suella Braverman]

Fundamentally, these are human-itarian measures that we are bringing forward with precisely the goal my hon. Friend sets out. We need to stop people dying in the channel. We need to stop people being exploited by criminal gangs. We need to stop the criminality. That is why I encourage everybody to get behind the Bill.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

As of September last year, the backlog of asylum applications stood at 115,000 and might include some economic migrants. The average waiting time for an initial decision is 20 months. Does the Home Secretary recognise the moral hazard here: economic migrants coming here in small boats have no incentive to guard against the risk of entering those boats, because others have been protected by her Government against the consequences of being returned when they get here, which damages the protections for genuine asylum seekers?

[Suella Braverman]

The vast majority of people arriving via small boats have chosen to make that journey of their own free will. They have paid money, and they are largely young, healthy men. There is no good reason in many instances for them to claim asylum, and they should not be abusing our asylum rules to do so.

Plymouth Shootings

Richard Foord Excerpts

Tuesday 21st February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

I thank my hon. Friend for her question. Obviously, Devon and Cornwall is a large geographical area. I understand that more resources are now being deployed into firearms licensing by Devon and Cornwall police, partly following this awful incident, but partly because there are quite large backlogs in Devon and Cornwall specifically for firearms licensing. However, notwithstanding the rurality of Devon and Cornwall, or indeed many other parts of the country, we cannot have different or lower standards anywhere. I know that that was not what my hon. Friend was suggesting, but we need to make sure that standards are high everywhere across the country.

In relation to the resource question more generally, there is an intention to consult shortly on the police funding formula. One of the inputs into that consultation will be rurality, so that adequate resources are given to more rural forces to reflect the additional costs that they very often face.

[Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)]

The inquest concluded that the shootings in Plymouth resulted from a “catastrophic failure”. The responsibility lies entirely with the murderer—I do not want to repeat his name—but the firearms licensing department was not given the resources that it needed. The police and crime commissioner in Devon and Cornwall has admitted as much, and has said that

“I have made significant funding available to improve the Devon and Cornwall Police’s firearms licensing department”

—this, obviously, since the inquest. What conversations has the Minister had with the police and crime commissioner in Devon and Cornwall about those findings, and what additional changes would he like to see in the oversight of Devon and Cornwall police?

[Chris Philp]

I have had extensive discussions on the question of firearms licensing, both inside the Home Office and with policing, including PCCs. As I said in answer to the previous question, following this awful incident, extra resources have now been dedicated to firearms licensing inside Devon and Cornwall, and of course, police forces up and down the country will have record numbers of police officers by the end of next month.

As for changes to practice, I would like to receive the third of those three reports—the first being the Scottish Affairs Committee report, the second being the IOPC report, and the third being the anticipated coroner’s prevention of future deaths report—and respond to their recommendations in the round within 60 days, as I have committed to already. I would expect a number of changes to be proposed in response to those recommendations, applying not just to Devon and Cornwall but to policing more widely. As I also said earlier, the IOPC has already made specific recommendations directed at Devon and Cornwall. Devon and Cornwall police have assured the IOPC that those proposed changes have been implemented, but I am minded to ask HMIC to check up specifically on that shortly.