Illegal Migration Bill: Economic Impact Assessment

Baroness Winterton of Doncaster Excerpts

Tuesday 27th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is a view expressed by some, mainly on the left, that the UK is somehow an outlier in pursuing a policy like Rwanda. I can tell him, having spoken to our European counterparts and Home Affairs and Interior Ministers in north Africa and beyond, that leaders across the world are looking to the UK not as an outlier but as a leader in this field. They are looking to the Rwanda policy as one of the most innovative and comprehensive approaches to a problem that everyone is facing. In an age of mass migration, with millions of people on the move, it is right that the UK leads. We will invest in border security, and that is the difference between us and the Labour party. [Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) does not want to invest in border security; we do. We will pursue the Rwanda policy, we will secure our borders, and other countries will follow our lead.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I call Scottish National party spokesperson.

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[Robert Jenrick]

I agree with my right hon. Friend. Border security is the first priority of any Government. We understand that, and that is why we are investing in it and ensuring that we can stop the boats. I am only surprised that the Opposition care so little about our national security.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I call the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee.

[Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

Two weeks ago, when the Home Secretary gave evidence at the Home Affairs Committee, I asked her when the impact assessment for the Illegal Migration Bill would be published. While I welcome the fact that it has been published today, or last night, it is after the Bill has completed all its stages in the House of Commons and is three quarters of the way through the House of Lords. That is wholly unsatisfactory for Parliament to undertake its role of scrutinising Government legislation. At that Select Committee sitting, the Home Secretary also said:

However, I would also say that to my mind it is pretty obvious what the economic impact of the Bill will be. We will stop spending £3 billion a year on our asylum cost. It is a Bill that will lead to the cessation of 45,000 people in hotels and £6 million a day. To my mind, those are savings that we cannot ignore.”

The Home Secretary told the Home Affairs Committee that those savings would happen. Can the Minister help me by pointing to where those savings are in the impact assessment? I am struggling to find those figures in the document that the Government have produced.

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[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

For the Minister’s information, Motherwell and Wishaw has been welcoming refugees for more than 100 years—Lithuanians, Vietnamese, Congolese and Syrians. Please do not make that mistake again.

The economic assessment says:

“By setting an annual cap this should reduce the inflow of people entering the UK and therefore reduce the cost associated with processing asylum claims”,

with secondary benefits—[Interruption.] I am sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker, I do not feel well.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

If it is okay with the hon. Lady, I will move on and I will come back to her if she wishes me to.

[Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend apologise for the delay in producing this impact assessment? Will he also explain to the House why the four countries of Scandinavia have been able to reduce the number of asylum applications from 239,000 in 2015 to 28,000 last year? Why have they been able to do that when we cannot? Why is our asylum process still taking longer than it ought to? The rate at which asylum applications are being dealt with is currently at its slowest ever.

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[Ms Marie Rimmer (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister claims he is ready to take tough financial decisions, such as not giving our NHS heroes a pay rise, leaving them struggling to pay ever-increasing mortgages and the cost of living caused by those on the Government Benches voting measures through and crashing our economy just a few months ago. The Rwanda scheme is set to cost even more billions than the already crashed asylum system, delivered by those on the Government Benches over there. So how can the Minister truly sit there and justify spending £169,000 to send one single asylum seeker to Rwanda? I accept that the Government are working with local authorities on housing in the private sector—deregulated housing in the private sector that cannot be given to any of our people. That is what he is doing. You cannot justify what is going on here. You’ve crashed it and you go on to—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. The hon. Lady is experienced enough to know that she does not address the Minister directly like that, but through the Chair.

[Robert Jenrick]

The hon. Lady is wrong on a number of counts. First, the impact assessment does not say that it costs £169,000 to send somebody to Rwanda. The figure is an indicative one based on the Syrian resettlement scheme, as I said in answer to a previous question. The partnership with Rwanda is rightly commercially sensitive, so she is wrong to draw the inference that she does. With respect to accommodating asylum seekers, we want to ensure we bring those costs down and we want the best possible relationships with local government to do just that. But the truth is that the driver of those costs is the sheer number of people crossing the channel every year. Unless we take decisive action, I am afraid that will continue to rise. That is why she should support us when the Bill returns to the Commons.

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[Robert Jenrick]

The difference is that the people to whom the hon. Gentleman has referred come here legally. We welcome people who come here legally—as visitors on tourist visas, as workers on work visas, as NHS workers on NHS and social care visas—but it is very different if people break into our country, flagrantly breaching our laws. No other country in the world would tolerate that, and neither should we.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

That brings us to the end of the urgent question.

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[Robert Jenrick]

Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Perhaps it would be helpful if I sent the hon. Lady a copy of the letter that I wrote to the Scottish Government recently, which debunks many of the points that they had raised with regard to the vessel in Leith. If there is still time, the hon. Lady could ask them to change their mind, because if they are willing to accommodate Ukrainians, surely, given how strongly they feel about asylum seekers, they would want to do the same in this instance.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I am not entirely sure—

[Alison Thewliss]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. Let me speak.

I am not entirely sure that anyone is asking me to do anything. It seems to me that we are slightly prolonging the exchanges on the urgent question, and I have to say that it is not for the Chair to adjudicate on two different points of view. I hope that if the hon. Lady wants to come back to this, there will not simply be a further exchange of views on what has already been said. A point of order should be directed at me, to ask me to do something, but the hon. Lady clearly wanted to put some points on the record. She has done that, the Minister has responded, and I think the House will now want to move on. I urge the hon. Lady, if she has something further to add, to ensure that it is relevant to the Chair. Otherwise, she might consider that she has put her points on the record.

[Alison Thewliss]

Further to the point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Thank you for what you have said, and I will be brief. The Minister implied, at the Dispatch Box, that Scotland does not take refugees. This is clearly a point of accuracy, because that comment was inaccurate, and I ask, Madam Deputy Speaker, whether the Minister could withdraw it.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Again, that is not a matter for the Chair. The hon. Lady has made her point. If the Minister felt that he had said anything inaccurate, or had inadvertently misled the House, he would be expected to correct the record at the first opportunity. I think we will leave it at that, because this has been quite a long extension of the previous exchanges.