Immigration Bill
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
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Stuart C. McDonald
I agree that we need to enforce the immigration rules and laws that we have put in place, but the problem is that the resources and manpower are not being put in to do that. We do not need new powers and rules; we simply need resources to enforce the rules that already exist. I suggest that some of the rules already go far too far.
New clause 16 is a modest response to clause 13, which creates wide powers for immigration officials to close premises for 48 hours before any court involvement is required in certain cases of suspected illegal working. These could have very significant consequences, including for perfectly innocent workers whose place of work is closed for up to two days. Provision for statutory compensation, which our amendment would introduce, is designed to ensure that notices are not issued in an oppressive manner by immigration officials.
New clause 17 is without doubt the more significant of the two new clauses. It would remove the right-to-rent provisions in the 2014 Act. We have signed other amendments in relation to right to rent, starting with the crucial amendment 35, which would remove the criminal sanctions and what we regard as Dickensian eviction processes from the Bill. Amendment 46 is designed to prevent those letting out rooms on essentially a charitable basis from being criminalised. Finally amendments 54 to 57 remove powers for the Secretary of State to legislate by way of regulations for new Scottish right-to-rent provisions, with immense effect on devolved Scottish housing law.
We also support changes proposed by Labour Members such as amendment 22, which seems designed to fix what we can only presume to be a drafting anomaly under which a landlord or landlady would be guilty of an offence for renting to a person with no right to rent, even during the period of 28 days when they could not evict that person. We also fully back their amendments 23 to 26, which would remove the obscene proposals that would see landlords and landladies turned into not only immigration officers but High Court judges, and would see summary evictions without judicial oversight.
I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin) will have more—much more—to say on these dreadful and draconian measures if given the opportunity, Madam Deputy Speaker. Our view is essentially the same as it was on Second Reading. Right to rent is not evidence-based, but in fact flies in the face of the evidence provided by the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, and indeed parts of the Government’s own pilot review. It is unfair to place these duties and now criminal sanctions on landlords, and it will lead to inadvertent discrimination or racism, with foreign nationals and even British citizens without documents at risk of being rejected from a tenancy whenever there is a safe and easy option of a British passport holder to rent to. It will push more families away from authorities and immigration control, making enforcement harder, not easier.
The one part of the Bill from which something useful might actually emerge is the first few clauses of part 1, and the provisions for a Director of Labour Market Enforcement, which we welcome. It is sad that its presence in an immigration Bill suggests that the new role might be seen as one primarily concerned with enforcing immigration laws, so we have joined our Labour colleagues in supporting amendment 18, which is designed to ensure that the functions of the director are exercised for the purpose of protecting the victims of labour market exploitation.
More fundamental is amendment 19, which seeks to remove the offence of illegal working. We share the widespread concerns that, like other offences, it will have little effect in terms of immigration control, but will have other significant adverse effects. In this case, the negative consequence is to undermine the decent work that the Government have been doing to tackle slavery and trafficking. The Bill will drive exploited, undocumented workers further underground, and leave them more at risk of exploitation, rather than less.
While on this issue, we know that James Ewins’ report on domestic workers is with the Government but as yet not available to Members. We question why that is the case, and when we will be able to see and debate it in order to inform what should happen with this Bill if it gets a Third Reading.
Finally, in relation to part 1 of the Act, amendment 33 seeks to ensure that employers who innocently and inadvertently employ a person without the right to work are not criminalised by the Bill. It does so by applying a threshold of “knowingly or recklessly” to the offence of employing an adult without permission to work, instead of merely requiring that they have “reasonable cause to believe” that the employee may be such a person. We are concerned that the current test might catch people who are not the intended target.
There are two further sets of amendments in this first grouping that I need to speak to. The first set relates to how a number of these provisions would be implemented in Scotland. Clauses 10, 11 and 16 all include what I am told are referred to as Henry VIII clauses—broad powers to legislate for Scotland, and indeed Northern Ireland and in one case Wales. Whereas provisions on licensed premises, private hire vehicles and right to rent are set out in significant detail in schedules to the Bill, and subject to full legislative scrutiny, that is not the case for Scotland. Instead, the Secretary of State is given the sweeping power to legislate in a similar way for Scotland by way of regulation. The power includes the ability to amend Acts of the Scottish Parliament, without any consideration of that Parliament’s view on the matter—and that is despite the fact that liquor licensing, private hire car licensing and housing are all devolved matters.
I understand that Parliament has long been hostile to Henry VIII clauses, and rightly so. These clauses are particularly pernicious for the reasons given, and so should be rejected. That can be done by supporting amendments 47 to 53, which would remove the power to regulate for Scotland in this way, thereby requiring primary legislation and the full scrutiny that that entails. Alternatively, amendment 41 requires that any such regulations would require the consent of the Scottish Parliament, again enabling proper scrutiny. That is surely only right and proper in the circumstances.
Finally, on new clause 13 and amendment 32, this House witnessed a powerful Backbench Business debate back in September, led by the hon. Members for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield), for Bedford (Richard Fuller) and for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes), who I know will all want, if they can, to speak on the issue again today. On that day there were strong speeches on all sides of the House as it united to tell the Government that immigration detention without a fixed and certain time limit was no longer acceptable. We are the only country in the EU without a time limit so it is inexcusable for this country not to operate one. We on the SNP Benches would prefer that we move straight to a position where immigration bail is granted after 28 days, as set out in amendment 32. Alternatively, we will support new clause 13 to see progress towards that goal.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
My hon. Friend will be aware that the immigration detention inquiry panel heard evidence from a consultant psychiatrist that those who are detained for more than 30 days suffer significantly more mental health problems than those detained for fewer than 30 days. Does my hon. Friend agree that this evidence reinforces the need for new clause 32?
Stuart C. McDonald
I agree entirely. That is one of a huge number of reasons that were highlighted during the Backbench Business debate earlier this year.
Stuart C. McDonald
Like the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), we believe that the provisions on support are among the most draconian parts of the Bill; I agree with the Minister to the extent that the disagreement is one of principle.
In our view, provisions that seek to use the further deliberate infliction of destitution, including of children, as a tool of immigration policy must be thoroughly opposed. The provisions fly in the face of evidence, are counterproductive and show a grim lack of compassion. We support all amendments seeking to prevent, or at least limit, the damage. They include amendment 29, which would remove clause 37 and therefore most of the damaging changes, and amendments 30 and 31, which would preserve all rights of appeal against decisions to refuse support. Amendment 40, tabled by Scottish National party Members, would ensure that families with children who are minors received section 95 support until they left the country.
The Minister referred to the pilot carried out by the last Labour Government, and that is still relevant to what is being proposed today. Similar proposals were abandoned because of the results of the pilot. It is interesting to look at the comments about the project made by the Joint Committee on Human Rights:
“The section 9 pilot has caused considerable hardship and does not appear to have encouraged more refused asylum seeking families to leave the UK…We believe that using both the threats and the actuality of destitution and family separation is incompatible with the principles of common humanity and with international human rights law and that it has no place in a humane society. We recommend that section 9 be repealed at the earliest opportunity.”
We believe that the same should happen to the equivalent provisions in this Bill.
Sadly, the Government have in their sights not only children but those who arrived as children and are now young adults. Rather cruelly, young care leavers will be prime targets. That is why we have tabled amendments 42 to 45, which would ensure that young people leaving local authority care were able to access leaving care support under the Children Act 1989 without discrimination. Amendments 42 and 43 would remove the provisions, added by schedule 9, that would prevent local authorities from providing leaving care support under the 1989 Act to young people who were not asylum seekers and did not have leave to remain when they reached age 18.
Amendment 44 would enable local authorities to provide leaving care support under the 1989 Act to young people who did not have leave to remain and were not asylum seekers. Finally in this group, amendment 45 would provide for the Secretary of State to make funding available to local authorities, as the specialist agency responsible for care leavers, to meet the duties, set out in the 1989 Act, to the latter group of care leavers.
Our amendments 39 and 36 bring us back to what I said about the first group of amendments relating to the broad powers, which we seek to rein in, proposed for immigration officers. Despite what the Minister says, those include powers for detainee custody officers, prison officers and prison custody officers to strip search detained persons for anything that could be evidence of their nationality—a very broadly defined power. The Minister points out that Government amendments 3 and 4 propose changing the name of the search from “strip search” to “full search”, but they do not in any essential way change the extent of the powers, which, to all intents and purposes as far as I still understand them, are basically strip search powers. For that reason, provision on the gender of the persons present during the search is made in clause 25(8). Our amendment 36 would remove the proposed power for custody officers to strip search detainees for documents that “might” establish a person’s nationality or indicate
“the place from which the person travelled to the UK or to which a person is proposing to go.”
Going further, we seek to tighten schedule 2(2) of the Immigration Act 1971. This power ostensibly deals with individuals on arrival in the UK for the purposes of determining whether they have or should be given leave to enter or remain. It has been used by the Home Office as justification for conducting speculative, in-country spot-checks involving “consensual interviews”. Amendment 39 would expressly limit this power to examination at the point of entry. The Minister argues that our amendment makes the power too tightly drawn, but in our view it is far better for intrusive powers to be tightly drawn than drawn broadly and arbitrarily.
The other atrocious provisions that amendments in this group seek to attack are those which provide that people should leave the UK even before their appeal against a Home Office decision has been heard. Amendment 27, which has support from Labour as well as SNP Members, would remove the offending clause 34, which extends powers of certification introduced by the Immigration Act 2014 to mean no longer just “deport first, appeal later” for those convicted, but “remove first, appeal later” for all. To us, these provisions are madness. They will mean people having to give up jobs, studies and family life while appeals are ongoing. Families could be separated for lengthy and unknown periods until their appeal is finally determined.
All this comes against a background of constant criticism of Home Office decision making, including in a recent ombudsman’s report. We should bear in mind that in 2014-15 42% of managed migration appeals and 42% of entry clearance appeals were successful. In 2013-14, the figures were 49% and 48%. Thousands of people could have to leave for several months because the Home Office got it wrong. The danger is that appeals will not be pursued or will be pursued inadequately given the costs of pursuing an appeal as a privately paying client from overseas.
Joanna Cherry
My hon. Friend will be aware that Home Office statistics state that only 24% of appellants removed under the current “deport first, appeal later” provisions go through with their appeals. Does he agree that this suggests that extending those provisions will make it much harder—in fact, probably impossible—for the majority of these appeals to go ahead? Is it not inherently unfair to hold appeals with the appellants unable to make their own case in person?
Stuart C. McDonald
I am grateful for that intervention and entirely agree with my hon. and learned Friend.
The Government seem to be attempting to cut net migration not just by limiting the class of people who can come under the rules but by making it nearly impossible for people to exercise their legitimate rights to stay. This is scraping the barrel of immigration control measures, and I will want to test the House’s opinion on that.
We regard as utterly unnecessary the part 7 provisions on the English language. Our amendment 34 would ensure that part 7 will not come into force in Scotland without the consent of the Scottish Parliament. We have faith that our public authorities, whether reserved or devolved, can determine that a worker has the necessary skills for the job, including speaking fluent English, and that normal complaints procedures would deal with any problems, as with any other complaint about competence. Part 7 creates unnecessary bureaucracy and is a clear example of immigration theatre and tokenism.
A number of other Members have made brave attempts to bring a silver lining to the cloud provided by this grim Bill. New clauses 11 and 1 seek to expand the range of people qualifying for refugee family reunion. I have asked questions, written letters and spoken in this Chamber on this point on several occasions, so I am very happy to provide my backing for such attempts. In the face of the most dreadful refugee crisis since the second world war, surely this is a sensible option that we can all support. Broader family reunion means that people we know should logically be sheltered in the United Kingdom do get to come here. This is the logical place for them because they have family support here and so will have help with accommodation and integration, for example. They will often even pay for their own flight. With little trouble for the Government or the taxpayer, we can extend a hand of friendship to more of those fleeing dreadful war and persecution.
Three amendments in the name of the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) similarly seek to bring some light from the darkness. Amendment 2 would introduce permission to work for those seeking asylum who have been waiting six months for a decision. My colleagues and I recognise that this is a positive step forward, and it has our backing. We also thoroughly welcome new clause 14 as a step forward in overcoming the unduly onerous financial thresholds attached to family visas, which the Children’s Commissioner for England recently reported had created thousands of what she called “Skype families”—British children able to communicate with a parent only over the internet. New clause 15 would improve rules relating to adult dependent relatives by removing unnecessary criteria, and it again has our full support.
Paris Terrorist Attacks
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
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Mrs May
My right hon. Friend makes a very important point. It is quite clear from those who attacked in Paris and those who have attacked elsewhere that their poisonous ideology is against the way in which the west conducts its life—the sort of lives that we lead and the sort of structures that we have in the west and elsewhere in other parts of the world. He is absolutely right that it is not the case that if we take no action, they will take no action against us. It is clear that they have evil intent and, sadly, as we saw on Friday, they have put that evil intent into practice.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
I welcome the tone of the Home Secretary’s statement and thank her for advance notice of it. I also wish to associate myself and my party with the comments of others about the gratitude that we all feel to those who keep us safe, whether it be the police or the intelligence services. I also wish to add the condolences of Members on these Benches to those of the rest of the House.
I reiterate the comments that Scotland’s First Minister made at the weekend. Our thoughts, prayers and solidarity are with the people of Paris and France after this “unspeakably awful” and deeply shocking event. It is only right that we should review matters in the light of such events, and we should be in a position to give people the assurances that they require about their safety. However, it is important that we do not turn on each other. I welcome what the Home Secretary has already said about the Muslim community, who are a highly valued and integral part of Scottish and United Kingdom society. Will the Home Secretary assure me that she will stand alongside the Scottish Government in preventing these events from destroying or affecting that feeling of unity?
I also applaud the fact that the Home Secretary seems determined not to make a knee-jerk or ill-considered response to these atrocities and is approaching matters in her usual measured fashion. This morning, we heard the Prime Minister hint at the possibility of speeding up the passage of the draft Investigatory Powers Bill following this atrocity. I hear what the Home Secretary has said about that already, but will she confirm that there will be no curtailment of the necessary time already allocated for pre-legislative scrutiny of the Bill, and will she stand by her previous assurances to this House that adequate parliamentary time will be allocated for its passage?
As regards refugees fleeing the barbaric war in Syria, will the Home Secretary confirm that the Home Office already has in place robust and thorough screening processes and that she will remain resolved to protect and give refuge to these people? Finally and briefly, she mentioned increased security at a number of airports. Will she confirm that all airports with external flights are subject to such measures?
Mrs May
I thank the hon. and learned Lady for joining the condemnation of the attacks that took place last Friday, as she did earlier. She is right to say that we should stand united across the United Kingdom in condemnation of those attacks and that we should be united one community with another. None of us wants to see any sort of backlash against any part of the community in the United Kingdom as a result of the attacks. It is important that we give the reassurance that we are one nation, the United Kingdom, standing together against the terrible barbarity of these terrorists.
On the subject of the draft Investigatory Powers Bill, as I said in my statement, as we consider terrorism legislation, we review at every stage what is necessary as well as the timing. The Bill is significant and it is right that it should be given proper parliamentary scrutiny.
There are processes in place for the screening of refugees, and the process is twofold. The UNHCR, which refers refugees to the Home Office for resettlement here in the UK, undertakes screening that includes taking biometrics, interviews and looking at documentation. A further level of screening is undertaken by the Home Office that involves further biometrics and looking at security checks for the individuals concerned.
Oral Answers to Questions
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
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Mrs May
Obviously, records of where the Syrian refugees are resettled will be maintained. If I understand my hon. Friend’s question, it was about Syrian refugees who may wish to access information about others who may have come to the country. As she will have noticed, the Minister is here and will have heard that, and he will consider the point she has made.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
On behalf of the Scottish National party, may I associate myself with the comments of the Home Secretary in relation to the terrible events in Paris on Friday night? With the first 100 Syrian refugees due to arrive in Scotland for resettlement this week, does the Home Secretary agree that it is imperative to make it clear to the public that these refugees are fleeing the same evil forces as were behind the attacks in Paris? Will she work with the Scottish Government and local authorities throughout the country to make sure that communities are supported to understand that and to make the vulnerable refugees feel as welcome as possible?
Mrs May
I thank the hon. and learned Lady for her remarks. It is one of the reasons why I was very clear yesterday when I did a television interview and set out the security arrangements that we have in place in relation to refugees, so that people can set aside concerns and understand that there are proper security arrangements. These individuals have been fleeing evil of various sorts, including the very evil that led to the attacks in Paris on Friday, and we wish them to be welcomed and to be able to reach sanctuary here and get the assistance that they need for their particular concerns, medical or otherwise. So it is right that the whole House should send out a message that we welcome and open our arms to those who have fled for their lives from the terrible evil of what is taking place in Syria.
Mrs May
I am happy to join my hon. Friend in welcoming the offer that has been made by Dartington Hall in respect not just of accommodation, but of support for refugees. That has been mirrored by organisations around the country. It is right that the Under-Secretary of State for Refugees has been working with charities, faith groups and other organisations to make sure not only that all the offers of help are listed and looked at, but that we can turn them into practical help for Syrian refugees, depending on what support is appropriate in the circumstances of the refugees that come to any particular region, such as my hon. Friend’s constituency.
Mr Speaker
The hon. and learned Lady is welcome to have a second bite of the cherry, on the assumption that the bite is small.
Joanna Cherry
I am very grateful, Mr Speaker. We are all aware that the Syrian refugees who are coming to the United Kingdom are particularly vulnerable individuals. They will need time and privacy to settle and integrate into the communities that they go to. Will the Home Secretary tell us what work the Home Office is doing to support local communities to give the refugees the time and privacy to integrate?
Mrs May
I am happy to tell the hon. and learned Lady that a considerable amount of work is being done by the Home Office, primarily with the local authorities that are receiving the Syrian refugees, to discuss the sort of support that is available to them. That links in to the last question I answered from my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston): it will often be possible for charities and other organisations to provide support and help for refugees in settling into life in whichever part of the United Kingdom they come to.
Draft Investigatory Powers Bill
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
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Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
I thank the Home Secretary for her statement, its tone and the care taken to address many of the concerns raised. I also thank her for the conversations I have had with her and her Ministers in advance of the publication of the draft Bill and for having confirmed to me that a Member of the Scottish National party will serve on the Joint Committee that will scrutinise it. I would be grateful if she could confirm that she will continue her open-door policy.
We have our political differences, and I am sure there will be some over the content of the draft Bill—as the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg) said, the devil is in the detail, so we will have to scrutinise it carefully—but I think we all agree that we have a responsibility to protect the rights of our fellow citizens while being realistic about the threats we face. We live in dangerous times, with threats of asymmetric conflict and an accelerating pace of technological change that unfortunately is often first embraced by those who mean us harm. It is only right when we discuss these issues that we put on the record our appreciation of those charged with keeping us safe—the police and the intelligence services—but we should also thank campaigning groups such as Liberty, Justice and Amnesty that remind us daily why it is important to protect our civil liberties, which were won and protected at the cost of the lives of the many people we will be remembering this Remembrance Sunday.
As David Anderson said in his report, the law in this area needs a thorough overhaul. We need a modern and comprehensive law that can cope with the challenges of modern technology while taking account of human rights and civil liberties, particularly the right to privacy. Only time and careful scrutiny will tell whether the draft Bill fulfils the aims he underlined, but I would be interested to hear if the Home Secretary thinks that the Bill meets his key recommendations.
Other countries are watching what we do, and it is important we get it right. SNP Members believe that access to private communications must always be necessary, targeted and proportionate, and I would be grateful if the Home Secretary could confirm that she agrees with us. Safeguards are crucial, and there is a debate about the oversight of access to communications, particularly about who authorises warrants. In common with many Members on both sides of the House, we hold that judicial oversight and authorisation might largely be the answer to the concerns, but we are concerned that a hybrid system—involving both political and judicial authorisation—might add an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy and lead to error and delay in urgent situations. Can she give us any comfort in that regard?
Several hon. Members rose—
Joanna Cherry
I am nearly finished.
I welcome the Home Secretary’s indication that protection of all parliamentarians’ communications will be put on a statutory footing, but will that protection extend to people communicating with parliamentarians, such as our constituents, whistleblowers and campaigners, and will there be not just oversight by the Prime Minister, but judicial oversight?
Finally, and briefly but importantly, the Bill concerns not only issues of national security but the investigation of serious crime, and accordingly it will impinge on areas devolved to the Scottish Parliament. Will the Home Secretary confirm that she is aware of this and that a legislative consent motion will be required in due course, and that she has engaged, and will continue to engage, with the Scottish Government?
Mrs May
On the hon. and learned Lady’s point about an open door, I have already spoke to Michael Matheson about the Bill, and my officials have been, and will continue to be, in touch with Scottish Government officials. I am well aware that it impinges on matters devolved to the Scottish Government—the operation of Police Scotland and the signature of warrantry relating to law enforcement powers—and we will work with them. There is a question about whether a legislative consent motion is necessary, but officials are working through that and considering whether it would be appropriate.
I recognise that the Scottish Government have raised the timing of warrantry. We have every confidence that the process will not add greater bureaucracy, but will add the necessary independent judicial authorisation. In emergency warrant cases, the Secretary of State will be able to authorise a warrant immediately, but that will be followed by a speedy review by the judge to ensure there is still authorisation.
The hon. and learned Lady asked if David Anderson’s recommendations, particularly about the Bill’s being comprehensive, had been met. I genuinely believe that this is a clearer and more comprehensible and comprehensive Bill, although given its length, some Members might wonder how I can say that. It is an important Bill that will set out much more clearly the different powers available to the authorities. She asked about necessity and proportionality. Of course, warrants will still be judged on whether they are necessary and proportionate—that will still be the test applied by the Secretary of State to any warrants signed. On the issue of liberty versus security, some people think it is a zero-sum game—that if we increase one, we reduce the other—but I am clear that we cannot enjoy our liberty until we have our security.
Wilson Doctrine
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 4 months ago)
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Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
May I begin by echoing the tribute paid to those Members who have harried the Government on this issue in recent years? It is important to remind ourselves of why we are having this debate. It is because four recent events have called into question the nature and scope of the Wilson doctrine and, indeed, whether it is in any way meaningful.
First, the submissions made on behalf of the Government to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal in the case brought by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) appeared to attempt to undermine the Wilson doctrine and to suggest that it was impossible to have it in the modern age, given the existence of the mass trawling of data.
Secondly, the content of last week’s IPT ruling seemed to be to the effect that the Wilson doctrine has no legal force and is just an ambiguous political statement. We are looking for clarification of that ambiguity.
Thirdly—this is very important from the perspective of Scottish MPs and, indeed, MPs from other areas with devolved Administrations—during the IPT hearing, official and hitherto undisclosed guidance that entered the public domain appeared to show that a change of policy regarding the scope of the Wilson doctrine had occurred around about 2014.
Fourthly, we are having this debate because of the Home Secretary’s comments last July, during a debate on the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Bill, in response to a question from the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson), who is now the deputy leader of the Labour party. It seems to me that many of us agree that that was the first time the Wilson doctrine had been described on the Floor of the House in caveated terms. The right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) has rightly drawn to our attention the fact that while we may not all disagree about what the Wilson doctrine should actually say, we need to know what the Government think it says.
In July 2014, the Home Secretary talked about certain rules and protocols that would enable interference with parliamentarians’ communications, but she did not say what they were. Instead of explicitly notifying Parliament that the Wilson doctrine was being in any way redefined, the Home Secretary simply presented her comments as a restatement of the original doctrine. However, as other Members have said, previous Prime Ministers, from Harold Wilson in 1966 to Gordon Brown in 2007, had not stated the doctrine with any such caveats. It is interesting and important to remember that, in paragraph 11 of the judgment, the IPT said it was satisfied that what the Home Secretary was referring to in Parliament in July 2014 was the contents of the official guidance to the security services, which we know had changed.
We are having this debate because it is not acceptable for the Executive unilaterally to abandon or modify such a doctrine without explicitly saying that that is what they are doing and informing Parliament. The removal of the protection given by the doctrine or its modification should not occur without any consultation or democratic scrutiny. The Chamber requires from the Government straight answers on their view of the nature and scope of the Wilson doctrine. There needs to be no more prevaricating. There is considerable discontent across the House. The Government should be in no doubt that there will be growing support for the early-day motion tabled by a cross-party contingent over the coming weeks. They need to take this issue very seriously.
If we look at statements by previous Prime Ministers, we can see that they were unambiguous about the doctrine’s existence, nature and extent, despite the fact that there was sometimes pressure from those who argued against the absolute nature of the doctrine. I believe that such pressure was brought to bear on Tony Blair when he was Prime Minister, and he resisted it. The right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) has repeatedly reminded us that, in 2011, the present Prime Minister confirmed to the House that the Wilson doctrine was still in force. However, since the Home Secretary’s comments last July, hon. Members, including the right hon. Gentleman, have repeatedly sought clarification from the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary without success.
As the first Scottish MP to speak in this debate, I must address an important matter that emerged from the IPT hearing. It emerged that the most recent versions of the operational notes to the security services seem to exclude Members of the Scottish Parliament, the other devolved Assemblies and the European Parliament from any protection by the Wilson doctrine. That appears to be in contrast to versions of the same operational notes that appeared before 2014. SNP Members cannot imagine what event in 2014 could have provoked such a renewed interest in the activities of Members of the Scottish Parliament.
I hear the Home Secretary’s point about the discrepancy between what Jacqui Smith said when she was Home Secretary and the code of practice. However, we need to know why the code of practice and the official guidance seems, at least during some period before 2014, to have encompassed parliamentarians in the Scottish Parliament, the other devolved Assemblies and the European Parliament, but were subsequently changed. We need the Government to tell us what is going on. When the Wilson doctrine was first enunciated, there was no Scottish Parliament, other devolved Assemblies or European Parliament—[Interruption.] As my hon. Friend the Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin John Docherty) says, some people might like to return to that position, but that is highly unlikely.
We need to know why there has been a change in practice in relation to other parliamentarians in this country. The First Minister of Scotland wrote to the Prime Minister on 24 July seeking urgent clarification about this apparent change of policy, but two and a half months later she has still not received a reply. Liberty’s legal director James Welch has commented that removing the protection from the Scottish Parliament shows
“an arrogant lack of respect for democratic institutions”.
It might be said that such an arrogant lack of respect for the Scottish Parliament is often felt by SNP Members and Scottish parliamentarians.
I understand the Prime Minister to have said that there is supposed to be a respect agenda in relation to the Scottish Parliament. We need to know why the intelligence services and this Government think the Scottish Parliament is less of a Parliament or less deserving of such protection. Do they think Scots deserve less protection of their privacy when communicating with their MSPs than with their Westminster counterparts? As the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) asked, why should unelected peers of the realm enjoy greater protection than elected Members of the Scottish Parliament? Unlike Members of the House of Lords, Members of the Scottish Parliament and of the other devolved Assemblies have constituents’ interests to serve and protect. If there is a matter of principle about protecting communications between constituents and those who represent them, it should apply to all parliamentarians.
I want to stress that insisting on proper protection for the communications of parliamentarians with others is special pleading not on behalf of parliamentarians, but on behalf of the constituents, whistleblowers and campaigners who communicate with them. When people contact parliamentarians they are often in a vulnerable position—for example, somebody in a big Government body or a big corporate entity who wishes to blow the whistle on some official scandal. Yes, hon. Members of the House, the Scottish Parliament, the other devolved Assemblies and the European Parliament also have to be protected from intimidation or oversight by the Government so that they can help such sometimes vulnerable people and do their jobs without fear or favour.
What is to be done? The draft investigatory powers Bill to be brought forward in the autumn is an opportunity to refine the law to protect civil liberties and set minimum protections and safeguards across the board and, I suggest, for communications between parliamentarians and constituents. I very much welcome the Home Secretary’s statement that she will give further consideration to the position of parliamentarians in the Scottish Parliament and the other devolved Assemblies. I echo the call made by other hon. Members that there must be sufficient time to consider the Bill, but I am reasonably hopeful that we will be given sufficient time, because the Home Secretary has said that a draft Bill will be brought before the House.
Chris Bryant
I urge the hon. and learned Lady not to be too confident. Last time we had to pass such legislation, we had to pass the whole lot in a single day. We had to suspend all the normal processes in the House to take through the Bill in a single day.
Joanna Cherry
I was not in the House at that time, but I watched it on the television. I am aware of that, but I am giving the Home Secretary the benefit of the doubt, because she has indicated that it will be a draft investigatory powers Bill.
Mrs May
I am grateful to the hon. and learned Lady for giving me an opportunity to restate what I actually said earlier in response to a comment by the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). We are committed to and will shortly bring forward a draft investigatory powers Bill, which will be available for scrutiny by a Joint Committee of both Houses of Parliament. The expectation is that it will report sometime in the new year, with a view to our introducing the Bill for its passage through Parliament. The aim is to make it a carry-over Bill, with a deadline of December 2016.
Joanna Cherry
I am very grateful to the Home Secretary for confirming that. I fully understand the concerns of those who were Members of the previous Parliament. If things were to be done in such a manner again, there would clearly be an enormous public outcry.
Lady Hermon
The Home Secretary has given a very interesting response to the hon. and learned Lady. Indeed, all the responses have been very interesting. Speaking as a Member from Northern Ireland, it is a growing concern that representatives from the devolved regions, particularly from Northern Ireland, have not been welcomed on to Standing Committees. I urge the hon. and learned Lady to insist that the Joint Committee that considers the draft Bill includes representatives of the devolved regions from this House.
Joanna Cherry
As a novice parliamentarian, I am not sure of the propriety of such a proposal. If the House would find it acceptable, I would endorse the hon. Lady’s suggestion enthusiastically. If the draft investigatory powers Bill encompasses a clause that impacts on any sort of privilege for the Scottish Parliament or the devolved Assemblies, it is crucial that there is consultation with those Administrations.
Lady Hermon
Last week, we looked at the Immigration Bill, which rightly extends to the whole of Northern Ireland. Unfortunately, it appears that no Member from Northern Ireland will be on the Standing Committee. Given that the matter we are discussing today is of such importance, it would be very helpful to have an MP from Northern Ireland on the Joint Committee. I am not saying which party they should be from, but there should be a representative from the region.
Joanna Cherry
I feel the hon. Lady’s pain. At present, it appears that the Standing Committee that will consider the repeal of the Human Rights Act will not contain a representative from Scotland. My party has taken up that matter. I very much endorse the spirit of the hon. Lady’s comments. There must be full and proper consultation with the Scottish Parliament and the other devolved Assemblies in relation to any legislative proposal about privilege for parliamentarians’ communications.
I am coming to the end of my comments and am conscious of the time. In my respectful submission—I stress the word “respectful”—there should be a strong legislative presumption in the forthcoming Bill against interception and other forms of surveillance in respect of parliamentarians. That presumption may be rebutted, but only on the basis of a clear and specific suspicion that a particular parliamentarian’s communications contain evidence of serious criminality or in truly exceptional circumstances, such as where national security is involved. The protection should extend to all parliamentarians, as I have said. The legislation should require independent judicial approval for any surveillance of a parliamentarian or interception of their communications.
Given the constraints of time, I will leave it to others to deal with whether the Wilson doctrine applies to metadata, such as numbers, email addresses, times and locations, as opposed to the contents of communications. However, I will say that metadata may often be all that is needed to understand the nature of a communication, for example that it is from a whistleblower. At present, the interception of metadata does not require a warrant. In my respectful submission, it should do in the circumstances that we are discussing.
Finally, the suspicionless surveillance of parliamentarians and the wider public is contrary to a democracy governed by the rule of law. Intrusive surveillance must always be targeted and proportional.
Immigration Bill
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 4 months ago)
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Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
I declare an interest: like many other hon. Members, my mother is an immigrant, and one who, like many other immigrants in the UK, has given a lifetime’s service in the NHS.
It is as a lawyer I wish to speak in this debate, however, because I am concerned about the Bill’s attack on civil liberties, the removal of in-country appeals in human rights cases, the Bill’s lack of respect for the rule of law and due process and the shift from judicial to Executive control of the immigration bail system. The independent all-party law reform and human rights organisation Justice, of which I am a member, has prepared a detailed analysis of aspects of the Bill pertaining to the rule of law. I recommend that Members have a look at its full analysis of these matters. Justice has grave concerns about the legal aspects of the Bill, as does the SNP.
I wish to focus on three specific areas: the extension of the enforcement powers of immigration officers; the new immigration bail system; and the extension of the “deport first, appeal later” rules to all human rights appeals. As has already been said, the powers of immigration officers are significantly extended by the Bill. This concerns me for a number of reasons. Immigration officers and detainee custody officers, prison officers and prison custody officers are not part of the regular police force, and they are not trained to the same degree or supervised in the same way. The power granted to immigration officers to enter and search premises without a search warrant solely because they have reasonable grounds to believe that a person in a premises is in possession of a driving licence and is not lawfully resident in the UK is a significant and arguably disproportionate extension of their current powers. Given concerns about the ability of the Home Office accurately to identify who is and is not lawfully resident in the UK, there are obvious risks for both British citizens and legal migrants, as well as illegal migrants, that their rights to respect for their private and family life and indeed their home under article 8 of European convention on human rights will be breached.
Another matter that concerns me is the broadly defined category of documents that immigration officers and other officers are empowered to search. While the power of immigration officers to search and seize these documents has the safeguard that they must not seize documents that they have reason to believe are legally privileged, there is no such safeguard in connection with searches by detainee custody officers, prison officers and prison custody officers when they are looking for relevant nationality documents subject to seizure. That is a grave concern. I believe that before these powers are conferred en masse, the Government need to examine how existing powers are being used and should make the case before Parliament for each additional power that is being sought.
On the bail system, individuals previously granted temporary admission, release or release under restrictions will all be subject to immigration bail. The Secretary of State will be empowered to vary conditions. The Bill will bring many more people within the immigration bail regime, while simultaneously shifting control of bail and restrictions on liberty from the judiciary to the Executive. That will include a far-reaching power for the Home Secretary to place electronic monitoring and residence conditions on bail in all cases. A large number of asylum seekers previously granted temporary admission will now be seen exclusively through a prism of detention and bail, casting aspersions of illegitimacy and even criminality. Those affected are real people. I have constituents in Edinburgh South West who are asylum seekers. They are not criminals who should be subject to bail: they are refugees.
That brings me to the extension of the “deport first, appeal later” rule to all human rights appeals, not just those liable to deportation. It is important to be clear that this rule is being extended not just to illegal immigrants, but to all immigrants, including those who have been lawfully resident up until the Home Office rightly or wrongly refuses their applications. The appeals fact sheet issued by the Home Office makes it absolutely clear that this power will be used to separate families, including parents, from children. That cannot be right. Moreover, if people are “sent back to where they came from”—an emotive phrase—before they can raise their appeal, there will be very real practical and emotional difficulties for them in pursuing that appeal. Again, I urge hon. Members to look at Justice’s detailed analysis of the practical and emotional difficulties that immigrants sent back to where they came from will face in progressing their appeal.
I am conscious of the lack of time I have left. I was anxious to highlight the rule of law aspects of the Bill. For the reasons I have suggested and for other reasons to be advanced by my hon. Friends in the Scottish National party as the debate progresses, I urge Members to decline to give this Bill a Second Reading.
Oral Answers to Questions
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 4 months ago)
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Richard Harrington
The Government are well aware of the point that my hon. Friend has made. I am pleased to report that I went to Portsmouth last Friday to visit the naval base to which the cutters run by Border Force returned from the Mediterranean. During their time in the Mediterranean they apprehended many people smugglers. It is the Government’s policy to ensure, through the taskforce, that that will increase, because this is a serious problem.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
Today, The Times and The Guardian have published a statement signed by more than 300 leading lawyers, including 12 retired judges, a former President of the Supreme Court, former Law Lords, 103 Queen’s counsel and prominent academics, calling on the United Kingdom Government to take a
“fair and proportionate share of refugees, both those already within the EU and those still outside it.”
They say that the UK’s “present offer” to take 20,000 is “deeply inadequate”. Does the Minister and his Home Secretary think they are wrong?
Richard Harrington
I listened to that interview carefully; the person concerned was asked what they did think was adequate and was not able to answer. I hope that listeners to the programme and people who have read this correspondence will be aware that this Government are doing a lot in the countries around Syria and our expenditure has so far been more than £1 billion to help people in the areas around Syria. In addition, we have our programme to help 20,000 of the most vulnerable refugees, which I am very proud of and want to see delivered very efficiently.
Joanna Cherry
If the Minister wishes to see the advert—I have a copy here—he will see that it was signed not by a person, but by 342 lawyers. Let me follow up with a second question. The Home Secretary suggested in her conference speech that she wanted to work with other countries
“to review the international legal definitions of asylum and refugee status.”
Is she really wanting to dilute the international protection offered to those at real risk of serious harm or persecution?
Richard Harrington
My right hon. Friend made it clear in that speech that it was our intention to be able to deal with a lot of fraudulent applications for asylum, so that we can concentrate on those people who really need it. The hon. and learned Lady should be very proud of this Government taking 20,000 of the most vulnerable refugees over the course of this Parliament.
Migration
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Mrs May
My hon. Friend has long championed having debates on the Floor of the House on various matters put forward by the European Scrutiny Committee. The business of the House is of course a matter for the Leader of the House and the business managers. I simply point out to my hon. Friend that how the EU has responded on this matter has already been addressed by Members in our debates. Last week we had a number of discussions on this whole question, including three in the Chamber on various aspects of the refugee crisis and, indeed, migration.
In relation to aid, my hon. Friend is absolutely right that the United Kingdom has, as I said in my statement, given financial support to the aid programme adding up to virtually the same as that of the rest of the European Union put together, so I think we can be justifiably proud of what we have done. I think I am right in saying—I will correct this if I am wrong—that we are actually giving about double what Germany is giving in aid to refugees in the region.
I reiterate that the reason why that is important is that it helps people to stay in the region, where many of them want to be, so that they are there and able to return to Syria when the conflict is over and they can do so, and so that they are not encouraged to make the perilous journey that, as we have seen—sadly for some, including for some very young children—has led to a loss of life.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
I thank the Home Secretary for her statement, but the Scottish National party remains of the view that the United Kingdom Government are not doing enough in the face of the extraordinary humanitarian crisis sweeping across southern and now central Europe.
It is a matter of regret that at the emergency meeting on Monday, European Interior Ministers did not explicitly endorse Jean-Claude Juncker’s plan to have mandatory quotas for member states to facilitate the resettlement of the 120,000 refugees who are now in Italy, Greece and Hungary. The SNP welcomes reports that Ministers agreed in principle to share the refugees among different countries, but is disappointed that they could not decide how the refugees would be divided up. Meanwhile, the unravelling of frontier-free travel across Europe over the past few days is a symptom of the fact that certain states are bearing the brunt of the influx of refugees. It is therefore imperative that EU Interior Ministers agree on a new system of binding quotas for refugees to be shared across Europe.
It simply will not do for the United Kingdom Government to continue to insist on an opt-out from relocation proposals for the refugees already in Europe. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Moray (Angus Robertson) said in our Opposition day debate last week, the SNP recognises and welcomes the steps that the UK Government have taken, but we do not think that they are doing enough—nor do significant numbers of the British public and leading international charities. In her statement, the Home Secretary said: “The response of the British public has been one of overwhelming generosity”. Why are her Government unable to match that overwhelming generosity?
In the face of the biggest humanitarian crisis to hit Europe since world war two, it is just not right for the UK to refuse to take one single refugee from the European mainland. We should be taking steps to relieve the pressure on southern European countries, which, because of their geography, are the first port of call for the refugees. The refugees are seeking sanctuary with us—with Europeans—and countries such as Greece are ill-equipped to cope with them because of their own economic condition. Richer EU member states, such as the United Kingdom, should assist them to deal with the enormous challenge that they face. Will the Home Secretary please reconsider her refusal to take any refugees from the European mainland?
Finally, I want briefly to welcome the Home Secretary’s statement that the United Kingdom Government will take steps to co-ordinate the humanitarian and practical response at home by making contact with NGOs and setting up a gold command team. Some weeks ago, the Scottish Government set up a taskforce—it has now met twice—which brings together stakeholders from across Scotland in the areas of local government, housing, heath services, language support, transport and social services, as well as charities and faith communities. Will the Home Secretary confirm that what she is doing is something akin to that taskforce, and that it will perform the same function on a continuing, rather than a one-off, basis?
Refugee Crisis in Europe
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
I intend to strike a very different note from that struck by the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr Holloway).
Last week, our First Minister in Scotland convened a summit to consider the humanitarian crisis that is unfolding across Europe. She said we should be in no doubt that what we were witnessing was a humanitarian crisis on a scale not seen in Europe since the second world war. As the shadow Home Secretary said, the United Nations estimates that up to a third of a million people have tried to cross the Mediterranean in the last few months, and nearly 3,000 have died in the process. Desperate people are travelling through Turkey, Greece and the Balkans into Hungary as they try to get to Austria and Germany.
The images of people suffocating in the backs of trucks, children drowning, and people on the very doorstep of the United Kingdom losing their lives as they try to cross from Calais to Britain haunt us on a daily basis. Those images will continue to haunt us, and our consciences and our reputation as a Union of nations, for many generations if we do not, together and collectively, act to help those who are in desperate need.
Mrs Madeleine Moon (Bridgend) (Lab)
We have just heard that one of the reasons we should have little sympathy for many of the refugees is the fact that many of them are fit young men. Is it at all possible that the hon. and learned Lady agrees with me that perhaps many of those men are also fleeing from conscription into military forces whose values they abhor and whose future they do not want to support, and that they want a democracy that they are unable to find in their own country?
Joanna Cherry
The hon. Lady has made a very good point, with which I agree.
I mentioned what the First Minister said last week. As has been made clear, the Scottish Government stand ready to do whatever they can to help to alleviate the crisis; but these are reserved matters, and the Scottish Government depend on the UK Government’s doing the right thing so that we can do the right thing in Scotland. To date, the UK Government’s response has been deeply disappointing. We recognise and support the funding that they have committed to the humanitarian initiatives to provide refuge and sanctuary in camps in the war zones of the middle east, but that significant effort must not be allowed to distract attention from the other significant efforts that are needed.
During our Opposition day debate tomorrow, the Scottish National party will elaborate on the action that we believe needs to be taken to deal with this humanitarian crisis. We will present three arguments. First, the United Kingdom should be part of the refugee solution, and we should accept our fair share of the refugees who are in and coming to Europe. We should recognise that these people have embarked on the often fatal journey towards southern Europe precisely because all other routes of refuge have been closed off, and we want the UK Government to assure the House that the UK will work with our EU neighbours in the European Commission resettlement programme to be announced tomorrow. Frankly, the UK Government’s refusal to work with the Commission’s current resettlement agreement to date has been an absolute disgrace.
The second point we will be making tomorrow when we elaborate our points in the Opposition day debate is that this humanitarian crisis should not be used as a cover for military intervention by the United Kingdom in Syria. The fact is that air strikes are already taking place on a daily basis by a US-led alliance, and since the advent of those air strikes the refugee crisis has not diminished; it has intensified. To bomb both Daesh and Assad-controlled areas, as the Chancellor has suggested, would not leave much of an already ravaged country unbombed, and that can only contribute further to the crisis before us.
Thirdly, the SNP will argue that the UK should sponsor a renewed UN initiative to secure and support safe corridors and camps throughout the middle east. If we base our response on humanitarian necessity as opposed to military intervention, we might help, rather than hinder, our fellow human beings. The UK must now play a proportionate role in conjunction with its European partners. It simply will not do for the Prime Minister to say that the UK will take only 20,000 refugees over the course of this Parliament, and those only from camps and elsewhere in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon. Germany has said that she will take up to 800,000 refugees, and in a matter of days will easily have outstripped the 20,000 the Prime Minister has said he wants to take over five years.
Who could forget the images on our television screens at the weekend of refugees walking towards the border with Germany carrying images of German Chancellor Angela Merkel torn from newspapers? How proud Germans must feel that their leader has taken such a moral lead; I wish that we, as members of this Union of nations, could have a similar pride in our United Kingdom Government.
Richard Arkless (Dumfries and Galloway) (SNP)
Does my hon. and learned Friend agree that the crystallisation of the embarrassment we on the SNP Benches feel about the UK Government approach is in the numbers? When the 20,000 over five years is stripped down, it is six per constituency per year across the United Kingdom. I have had hundreds of emails and crying phone calls from my constituents who are ready to take vastly more than this pitiful number of six per constituency. Does my hon. and learned Friend agree that it is the numbers that are embarrassing?
Joanna Cherry
I agree with my hon. Friend, and all Members in this House will probably have shared that experience of being absolutely inundated with emails and letters over the last few days.
I was talking about German generosity in the face of this humanitarian crisis, and I pose this question: on what basis do the UK Government think it is fair for Germany and our other EU neighbours to accept so many of these refugees who have arrived in Europe when the UK turns its back completely on the refugees who have arrived in Europe? There is a depressingly large contrast between Angela Merkel’s announcement yesterday of a €6 billion investment in shelters and language courses for refugees and the UK Government’s rather frosty approach.
There is also a danger that the UK Government policy of only taking those refugees who have stayed behind in the camps will label them as “good” refugees and those who have come to Europe as “bad” refugees. Such an approach is not helpful and does not begin to engage with the reality of the situation.
Mrs Flick Drummond (Portsmouth South) (Con)
What does the hon. and learned Lady think about the leaders of other countries who have not given quite so much aid? We are giving 0.7% of our GDP in aid. Would she put those leaders in the same category as she is just about to put our Prime Minister in?
Joanna Cherry
We are here today to debate the response of the UK Government. I have already said that the SNP accepts that the UK Government have been generous in aid terms, but that is only part of the picture. What we are here today to discuss is the adequacy of the UK Government’s approach overall.
I found it very worrying that yesterday the Prime Minister seemed to conflate issues regarding what is a humanitarian crisis with economic migration and, even more worryingly, security and terrorist issues. This seems to me to be a cynical attempt to distract people from the moral imperative presented to us by recent events. Going on the evidence of our mailbags and emails over the last few days, I do not think that cynicism is going to succeed in the face of the fundamental decency of the people of the UK.
Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)
Will the hon. and learned Lady give way?
Joanna Cherry
I should like to make a little more progress; then I might give way.
I do not believe that people in the United Kingdom will tolerate a situation in which the Government simply wash their hands, Pontius Pilate-like, and walk by on the other side of the street in the face of the desperate plight of those people who are now in Europe. The point has already been made that the UK has a proud history of taking in refugees, from the Kindertransport of the 1930s through to the Ugandan refugees in the late ’70s. Even Mrs Thatcher’s Government took in 10,000 Vietnamese boat people after a bit of pressure was applied. The people of the United Kingdom will be ashamed if this Government do not relent and take a fair share of the refugees who have come to Europe.
We should not use the fact that we are not part of the EU’s borderless Schengen agreement, or that we are not at present part of the relocation initiative, to distract from what is a moral imperative to reach out to those who are suffering and in need, and who are coming to our relatively wealthy continent of Europe seeking sanctuary. They are, of course, coming to the poorest part of Europe, the south, and the people in the south, particularly in Greece, need the support of the richer nations in the north if they are to cope with the crisis that is unfolding on their doorstep.
Stewart McDonald (Glasgow South) (SNP)
Another thing that the UK Government could do—I think both sides of the House could unite around this—is put pressure on other states in the region such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia, which are supposed to be Britain’s allies, to take in some refugees. Some of those countries do not even recognise refugees in their constitutions. Does my hon. and learned Friend agree that the southern European states could be helped if the UK Government exerted their influence in that way?
Joanna Cherry
Yes I do, but it will be difficult to have any great influence when we are not seen to be making an appropriate response to the crisis ourselves.
We are an island Union of nations, and the point has been made that we are at the northern end of Europe and therefore rather removed from the apex of the crisis. We are also Europeans, and we will continue to be Europeans even if this Government take us out of Europe following their referendum. We have been good Europeans in the past, so let us not dishonour our forebears by turning our backs on those in need who are arriving on our doorstep in numbers bigger than at any time since the second world war.
Yesterday, the House debated the European Union Referendum Bill. In the context of that debate, we should be asking what sort of Europe we want to see. The Scottish National party is in no doubt that what Scotland wants—and, I believe, what the United Kingdom wants—is a humanitarian Europe that extends compassion to our fellow human beings in their hour of need.
Joanna Cherry
I should like to make a little more progress.
At last week’s emergency humanitarian summit in Edinburgh, the First Minister made it clear that Scotland was willing to take its fair share of refugees, as agreed by the UK Government, to help some of the most vulnerable people in need. We welcome the Prime Minister’s shift in attitude, and his late recognition that the UK has a role to play, as an important first step. However, the 20,000 refugees over five years should not be seen as a cap or an upper limit and, crucially, we must also play our part in responding to the crisis on the southern European coastline.
We believe that the UK should opt into the EU relocation scheme. The Prime Minister has made it clear that one-year resettlement will be funded from the UK’s international aid budget, but we are seeking urgent clarification on the impact that that will have on the work of existing aid projects. The refugee situation is now at crisis point, and stretching UK support and refugee intake over the next five years will mean that a number of people who could be helped immediately will be left without the vital help they need.
The Scottish Government want to work constructively with the UK Government, and the First Minister has written to the Prime Minister outlining the proceedings of Friday’s summit in Scotland, which focused on some of the practical issues involved in integrating those who come here seeking protection. Today, the first meeting took place of a taskforce that will bring together stakeholders from across Scotland in the areas of local government, housing, health services, language support and social services. The taskforce will try to co-ordinate Scotland’s humanitarian and practical response. These are reserved matters, however, and we cannot act until the UK Government act.
The UK is increasingly isolated in the international community over these issues, and the international community is stepping up to the job of sheltering refugees. Over the past 24 hours we have heard that the following places will increase their share of refugees: France to 24,000, Germany to more than 31,000, Quebec to 3,650, Venezuela to 2,000 and New Zealand to 600. His Holiness Pope Francis said at the weekend that every Catholic parish in Europe should take a family of refugees, as should every religious community in Europe.
Mark Field
Does the hon. and learned Lady not recognise that deeply seared in the collective German psyche is the memory of the 9 million or so displaced German civilians as the second world war came to a close, and so to make a comparison between this country and Germany is wrong? I do not say that in an unkind way, because when my own late mother was a five-year-old girl she was one of that number. She was forced to leave a village outside Breslau, as it was at the time—it is now called Wroclaw—where my forefathers had lived since the 1720s. To make that comparison between the German psyche on these sorts of issues and the UK is very unfair.
Joanna Cherry
I do not think it is unfair to draw an unfavourable comparison with the generous response of the Germans. I accept that they have a rather different history from us—there are many reasons for that. We have benefited in the past—
Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con)
Will the hon. and learned Lady give way?
Joanna Cherry
Let me answer this point. We have benefited in the past from being an island that is separate from the rest of Europe and perhaps we have not experienced a refugee crisis, although many people were forced to leave my country of Scotland as a result of the clearances, people had to leave Ireland as a result of the potato famine, and people have had to leave England and Wales as a result of extreme poverty. We have therefore experienced some of these pressures—
Joanna Cherry
I would like to make some progress, because I am nearly finished and I am conscious that a lot of other people wish to speak.
The Prime Minister came to the Dispatch Box yesterday and presented a wholly inadequate response to a truly horrific humanitarian crisis. The point I wish to make is that the international community has not thought twice about stepping up to the table and helping share the burden of refugees. That is why I have listed so many countries other than Germany that have been stepping up to the plate in the past few hours. It is a striking fact that halfway around the world from Syria, Brazil has taken in 2,000 Syrian refugees since the start of the conflict in 2011.
Joanna Cherry
I am sorry but I will not, as I do want to finish now.
Just yesterday, speaking on Brazil’s Independence day, President Dilma Rousseff said Brazil will welcome Syrian refugees with “open arms”. She said that she wanted to reiterate the Brazilian Government’s
“willingness to welcome those who, driven from their homeland, want to come live, work and contribute to the prosperity and peace of Brazil.”
That is the sort of humanity we need, it is the international initiative that refugees need and it is the moral compass that I hope will make the UK Government wake up to their now shameful position on the international stage.
Water Cannon
Joanna Cherry Excerpts(10 years, 7 months ago)
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Mrs May
It is of course open to the police at any time to apply for the use of a less lethal weapon that has not been authorised. A proper process is undertaken, and that is the process that has pertained in this case. A business case is put forward, the proper medical and technical evidence is taken and the decision is then made by the Home Secretary.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
I thank the Home Secretary for an advance copy of her statement. I will probably not say this very often during the life of this Parliament, but I wish to commend her for her decision and for the careful reasons she has given. This was a decision for England and Wales only. I have been in touch with the Scottish Government this morning and can confirm that Scottish Ministers do not support the use of water cannon in Scotland. Water cannon do not offer a proportionate response, and they cut across the traditional approach of policing in Great Britain. They are indiscriminate and target peaceful protesters with a significant risk of injury. The Home Secretary was not convinced of the case for water cannon back in 2010 when she said:
“A range of measures is available to the police…and we do not believe water cannon are needed.”
We are delighted that nothing has happened to make her change her mind. Will the Home Secretary confirm that there will be no change in her announced approach over the next five years?
Mrs May
The hon. and learned Lady was probably entirely correct in her initial surmise that this is possibly going to be an unusual occasion when she and I agree on matters related to home affairs. I am grateful to her for outlining the Scottish Government’s position. As it happens, I will meet the Scottish Justice Minister later this afternoon to discuss a number of issues. As for the next five years, I have taken the decision on the basis of the evidence that has been put before me. As I have indicated in response to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), it is open to the police at any time to apply for the use of a less than lethal weapon. At that time, the evidence available would be considered and a decision taken on that basis.