Refugees (Family Reunion) (No.2) Bill

Debate between Robert Neill and David Warburton

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 16th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[David Warburton]

That is a very good point. I appreciate the hon. Lady’s intervention. Cost is not really a material matter in this. It is really about what factors will influence behaviour, and so what the result of a policy change will be.

[Robert Neill]

My hon. Friend is making a very powerful speech, a great deal of which I agree with. I recognise that the Government have done a great deal in many areas. One of the policy changes in the Bill is really quite modest: it is to make it easier for those who have fled in fear, as he said, to get around the very difficult and onerous requirements to provide documentation in order to access legal aid or exceptional case provisions. As I am sure he will know from his interest in the field, the British Red Cross found that some 74% of all family reunion cases were missing one or more documents. He will also know that someone who is genuinely fleeing in fear frequently does not have time to go through a checklist of documents they might need later. Is not that one of the reasons why this Bill, in a very modest way, improves things in the direction that he has argued for in the past?

[David Warburton]

There is a lot to be said for what my hon. Friend says. As he knows, exceptional compassionate circumstances do exist, and the Home Office guidance allows for those things. He is absolutely right that there are issues about this, such as timing. There are the practicalities and the logistics of the situation, which can very often mean that it is not as easy as it may seem.