Human Rights in Hong Kong

Debate between Tim Loughton and Janet Daby

Tuesday 23rd January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the future of human rights in Hong Kong.

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. It is another week, and yet another debate on China and its abuses—of its citizens and beyond its territorial borders. In this Chamber and the main Chamber, we have discussed the abuses against the Tibetans, the Uyghurs and other people within the confines of China and beyond. Today I want to discuss the situation of dwindling human rights in Hong Kong.

Fortuitously, it is particularly topical to debate this motion today, during the pantomime of the trial of Jimmy Lai that continues in Hong Kong. Also today, as we speak, the Chinese Government face their universal periodic review at the United Nations. I will say more about that later.

The implementation in 2020 of the notorious national security law has led to the drastic erosion of the freedoms of the people of Hong Kong that were once greatly enjoyed under the Sino-British joint declaration. Beijing’s introduction of that draconian law is a direct attack on the “one country, two systems” framework that we have a particularly strong interest as well as a duty and obligation to make sure is being upheld. The future of human rights in Hong Kong is bleak. I want to thank Hong Kong Watch, the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation and the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, not just for the various briefings they have provided for the debate but for their ongoing sterling work in this area to highlight the injustices being done to the once democracy-loving people in Hong Kong.

[Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Member for his introduction and for securing such an important debate. He mentioned Jimmy Lai; the trial began last December, and China is treating him as a Chinese citizen even though he has dual nationality. Does the hon. Member believe that the Government should follow Labour’s idea, and appoint a special envoy for arbitrary detention for British and dual nationals held abroad? If not, what does he suggest?

[Tim Loughton]

I will come to Jimmy Lai. I was not aware of any policy statement that the Labour party may have made, but the particular point about Jimmy Lai is that he is not a dual national: he is a British citizen. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) and I, with others, have espoused that argument in this Chamber on numerous occasions and have got absolutely nowhere with Ministers, until recently with the new Foreign Secretary, from whom, I am glad to say, we have at last had the admission that Jimmy Lai is a British citizen—end of story. As such, he is entitled to all the consulate and other protections to which any other British citizen being persecuted against all natural tenets of law is entitled. I will come back to the Jimmy Lai trial.

There is no greater symptom or expression of the oppression that is going on in Hong Kong than the mass exodus of its citizens on a daily basis. Since the introduction of the national security law in 2020, Hong Kong residents have felt the strangulation of their freedoms. As a consequence, many have chosen to leave what has been their home for decades and generations, to escape persecution under that draconian law.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Debate between Tim Loughton and Janet Daby

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 22nd March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

I welcome the Bill, although not without reservation. The ridiculous caricature that we just heard from the hon. Member for Leicester East (Claudia Webbe) and from other Opposition Members helps absolutely nobody.

I very much welcome the offer to meet the Minister on my issue of family reunion. I welcome the flexibility that he and other Ministers have shown on the We Belong campaign by young people who have been in this country for many years and whose wish to become officially British will at last be speeded up. I do not welcome the litany of constant carping from Opposition Members, who have not offered a single practical solution to the serious problems that we are facing, particularly in the channel. They have had every opportunity to do so and they have failed on every occasion.

I support Lords amendment 7—I said that my support for the Bill was not without reservation—and I think there is merit in the six-month campaign. There is a waste of talent that is left in limbo in this country that we could put to good use. I also welcome Lords amendment 12—the genocide amendment—and the good work done on it by Lord Alton. As somebody who has been sanctioned by China for my support of the recognition of genocide, I would be expected to support that.

I will concentrate on Lords amendment 10—the so-called Dubs amendment. I have form in this area, and I am afraid that the family reunion scheme needs to be much better. The Minister said that there is already generous provision in our rules for refugee family reunion, and 40,000 people have benefited from that, but only since 2015 or over seven years. The Home Secretary did say some time ago that she wanted to see a generous equivalent replacement for Dublin III as we came beyond Brexit. I want to hold her to that promise, but I fear what is contained in the Bill does not hold water.

The Dubs amendment would expand family reunion so that unaccompanied children in Europe can easily join family members in the UK, such as their grandparents, aunts, uncles and siblings. At the moment, however, the UK’s refugee family reunion rules only cover children trying to reunite with their parents in the UK as long as a parent has refugee status or humanitarian protection, and the child was born before their parents fled the country of origin. This rule is limited so that it excludes most unaccompanied children and prevents them from uniting with family.

For some children, these are their closest surviving relatives. They may be aunts and uncles because they have lost their parents in a place of war. Refugees may have lost their parents before they left their country or on their journey to sanctuary, and siblings in this country may be the only link they have. We have seen the horrendous pictures from Lesbos of the camps there containing many unaccompanied children, where there are fires, predators and other dangers, and those are the young people we really should be concentrating on rescuing. In refusing one case, the Home Office said:

“You currently live in a shelter for unaccompanied minors… I note you have provided no evidence why this arrangement cannot continue”.

That is not a permanent solution.

The Government have also argued that there is discretion to allow family reunion outside the rules in certain circumstances, but it is not right that children who had a clear official route to safety and family reunion under the EU’s Dublin III regulation are now reliant on Government discretion. This discretion is rarely exercised, and the very few cases actually granted outside the rules are mainly done so only on appeal, which requires legal assistance. At best, children are left waiting months alone and separated from family, and at worst, they are prevented from safely joining loved ones at all.

I call on the Government to make good on the promises given by the Home Secretary as we moved out of the Dublin III regulation post Brexit. There has been a long hiatus, but we need to put that right and that is why I support Lords amendment 10 in doing that.

[Janet Daby]

I am grateful to be able to speak in this debate. Many amendments were passed in the other place, but for the sake of time, I will focus on Lords amendments 4, 9, 10 and 13.

I am pleased that Lords amendment 4 deletes clause 9, which I have spoken about before. Clause 9 is one of the most chilling parts of the Bill. I have had countless people write to me about this since the Government brought this Bill to Parliament. It would allow the Secretary of State to deprive a person of their British citizenship without notice, and it is right that the Lords chose to remove the clause entirely from the Bill.

Lords amendment 9 would stop overseas asylum processing. We have seen that this type of system is ineffective, inhumane and too expensive. As we have already heard from the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock), and other Opposition Members, in Australia the offshore processing cost is estimated to be Aus $1 billion a year to deal with 300 migrants. I would like to add my voice to this by saying that I do not think it is in our country’s best interest to have overseas asylum processing.

On Lords amendment 10, Britain has a proud history of offering sanctuary to vulnerable unaccompanied children, but the Government ended the Dubs scheme and have not replaced it. I was proud that, last year, Lewisham Council was the first borough in the UK to be formally recognised for its work by becoming a borough of sanctuary. I encourage all boroughs to be boroughs of sanctuary, and I also thank all families across our countries for offering Ukrainian families a home.

In contrast, the Government are ignoring the treacherous journeys that these desperate people are making. Without safe, legal routes for family reunion, unaccompanied children are making the most dangerous journeys. The Government would be better targeting the traffickers, rather than the victims, if they want to stop people making these treacherous journeys. This amendment is therefore vital because it imposes a duty on the Government to allow unaccompanied children to be admitted to the UK.

I will end on Lords amendment 13. In the other place, Labour rightly voiced concerns that clause 39 would criminalise everyone who arrives in the UK to claim asylum. The clause will have wider implications for all asylum seekers, not only people making irregular channel crossings. It is time the Government recognised that they need to treat refugees humanely, not as a problem they need to solve by criminalising them.

Can the Minister therefore answer me this? If a Ukrainian family enters the UK without a visa in the hope of being granted asylum, will the Government’s proposal mean they are guilty of a criminal offence punishable by up to four years in prison? If so, it is ridiculous that we could be imprisoning people for fleeing a war started by Vladimir Putin—or any other war or natural disaster, for that matter.