MOD Bicester and Illegal Migrants

Debate between Chris Philp and John Hayes

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

I am repeating what has been publicly reported today, but I will of course take account of your advice, Madam Deputy Speaker.

In case after case, we have seen women and girls attacked by illegal small boat migrants. The data, I am afraid, is very clear: two of the three most predominant nationalities are Afghan and Eritrean. The data that my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) referred to—data produced using freedom of information requests to the Ministry of Justice—shows that Afghan males are 22 times more likely than average to commit sex assaults, and for Eritrean men, the number is similar. That, of course, is why just a few weeks ago, the Government felt it necessary to produce a leaflet asking these illegal migrants to kindly not rape women and girls. The Government themselves know it is a problem, which is why they produced those leaflets. It is why mothers and grandmothers in Piddington are so concerned about the safety of their daughters and granddaughters. It is why parents in Crowborough are so concerned as well, because these threats are real, these crimes have happened, and these convictions have taken place.

The data is clear. What my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings says is true: these men come from cultures that are alien to ours, where women are not respected. This is an immigration crisis, a border security crisis, a public safety crisis, and a crisis for women and girls. The Government are allowing 92% of small boat migrants to stay; only 8% have been deported. Yes, there are slightly fewer asylum hotels, but only because the Government are moving the illegal immigrants into flats instead—they are up by 12% since the election.

To save places such as Piddington, Crowborough, Linton-on-Ouse and Wethersfield and towns and villages up and down the country, the solution is not, as the Prime Minister said, to distribute illegal immigrants equitably across the country. It is instead to deport people who enter our country illegally, and to do so within a week of their arrival. If we did so, we would need no accommodation anywhere, whether in flats, hotels or military sites, because we would not be accommodating illegal immigrants at all. It would also deter the crossings. If the people who are leaving France—which, by the way, is a safe country; nobody needs to flee war in France—knew that they would be rapidly deported, either to their country of origin or to a safe third country such as Rwanda, the crossings would soon stop. When Australia did something similar in September 2013, its illegal maritime crossings, which had been running at levels similar to ours, stopped within about three months. It is a solution, if only the Government would grasp it.

To do that, though, it is necessary to leave the ECHR. What started in 1950 as a very well-intentioned piece of human rights legislation has subsequently been stretched and distorted beyond all recognition. Clauses that were originally intended to prevent the horrors of the second world war are now expansively interpreted to mean that rapists cannot be sent back to their country of origin because of their supposed family rights. Under article 3, which is unqualified and cannot be amended in domestic legislation, a Zimbabwean rapist was not sent back to Zimbabwe because he might face hostility there. An Iraqi drug dealer was not sent back to Iraq because he had apparently become too westernised. What started off as a sensible set of protections has been stretched beyond recognition—beyond anything common sense would recognise—and it is preventing successive Governments, the last Government as much as this one, from deporting people who cannot be here. That is why there are 21,000 serious foreign criminals still in this country. It is why the Home Office knows of 412,000 people with no right to be here who cannot be deported.

Leaving the ECHR is a necessary, but not sufficient, step. We need to do it in order to control our borders, but on its own, it is not enough. We would also have to amend domestic legislation—for example, to ban asylum claims by illegal immigrants, abolish the immigration tribunal and immigration legal aid, restrict judicial review of immigration matters to all but the narrowest grounds, and end modern slavery claims being used as a basis to oppose deportation. All of these measures would need to be taken as well as leaving the ECHR, but without leaving the ECHR none of those measures is possible.

[Sir John Hayes]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Chris Philp]

I am just going to just finish. I know that Ministers are trying hard with their Bill, but they are essentially tinkering at the edges. That was tried by the last Government and to be honest it did not work, because these legal structures prevent robust action to defend our borders.

Before concluding, I will just say that were we to leave the ECHR, which I fervently believe we must do to save places like Piddington, to protect our women and girls and to protect our borders, we would not be returning to the dark ages. Rights existed in this country long before the 1998 Human Rights Act and long before the 1950 convention was entered into. Common-law jurisdictions such as Australia, New Zealand and Canada have perfectly respectable human rights records without needing to rely on the ECHR. Indeed, this Parliament can legislate to protect human rights in whatever manner it sees fit.

What is true is that we cannot protect our borders and we cannot deport illegal immigrants and foreign criminals while we are inside the ECHR. If we are serious about border protection and protecting Piddington, Crowborough and other similar places up and down this country, we need to take that necessary step. We must leave the ECHR, reform our domestic laws and restore border control to this country.