50th Anniversary of the Expulsion of Asians from Uganda

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Thursday 27th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, I join the many congratulations to my noble friend Lord Popat on initiating this debate. He was a distinguished Minister when I joined this House and I have always admired the way in which he has conducted his ministerial and other jobs. I thank him very much.

I remember the beginning of 1972 as a very low point in British relations. The Labour Government had passed the 1968 immigration Act, which was a real stain on our community. In the very early 1970s, racism was almost becoming respectable. We tend to forget that. I join all noble Lords in my congratulations for and fond memories of Edward Heath. Had it not been for his determination and single-mindedness, we would probably not have done as well by the Ugandan Asians. Also, he started to turn things around; after this episode, racism was no longer respectable. That was a great tribute to Heath.

At that time, I was working in the Department of Health and Social Security. Our Minister was one Sir Keith Joseph, who later went mad but at the time was a very compassionate Secretary of State. The instructions that came down from him were to do everything we could to help carry the Prime Minister’s policy into action. I remember one aside in a meeting at which the Secretary of State was present—it was not a very large meeting, and I was very junior—where he remarked, “You know, you’re lucky we’re in government. I hate to think what we might have said if we hadn’t been.” I have always remembered that. I pay tribute to Edward Heath.

The other person who has done a lot for the Conservative Party and the country, who has not really been mentioned today, is David Cameron. When I started working for him as his trade union envoy, he was not only trying to broaden the base in trade unionism but was absolutely determined to get more representation of British society on to the Conservative Benches. I was the chairman of a Conservative association at that time, in a very safe seat. We had a by-election, caused by the retirement of a Member. We went to CCO, where I was working, but the sift committee in the Conservative Party which takes the names to it took up six white names. The noble Lord, Lord Pickles, who was then the chair, said, “I am sorry, but this is against party policy. You’ve got to have an ethnic-minority person—it doesn’t matter if they are a man or a woman—on your shortlist. Otherwise, we won’t approve it.” The determined actions of David Cameron and the way in which he basically gripped the Conservative Party by the throat and got it to modernise—getting more women and a more representative party into Parliament—have been a great contribution to this country. We would probably not have the present Prime Minister were it not for his activities.

I will finish on one more thing. After 1972, racism disappeared in the trade union movement. I noticed, because I have spent my life active in it, that it was suddenly no longer respectable to echo the words of the dockers who had supported Enoch Powell. Suddenly, the thing to do was to embrace all of society. It took some doing—there was some stuttering at the beginning—but overall it was successful, and the trade union movement has also made its contribution to a more equal and pleasant Britain.

Ukraine: Refugees

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Wednesday 6th April 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, for introducing this debate and for her thorough and moving speech. I have watched this from afar and one of the few rays of sunshine has been the appointment of the Minister to his present role. I am only sorry that his maiden speech is at the end of the debate rather than earlier on, because I am sure that we are going to be pleased to hear whatever he says. We welcome him knowing his record and how hard he is currently working and will be working.

The point we are at at the moment takes me back to almost the beginning of my political life, which was Hungary in 1956, when I recall that our community welcomed Hungarian refugees who had come to Britain and were settled. Unlike today, those refugees had no option to go back. They were in Britain and integrated and, of course, they were far fewer in number. When I look at the situation that we are in today, I reflect that we let down former Yugoslavia. What happened there was butchery at the same level as is happening today, a butchery that we thought we would never see in Europe again. I think that we have risen to the challenge this time.

I am astonished at the Russians and their sheer stupidity. The way in which they have acted shows a massive failure of intelligence, humanity and understanding of the international community. We used to have a saying that British military intelligence was a contradiction in terms, but Russian military intelligence does not appear to exist at all. They have got themselves into something that will last certainly for the rest of my life and probably the life of many people in this Room. We are never going to be able to go back.

At a time like this, I am constantly reminded—I will say it, although it is not popular—of the sheer stupidity of leaving the European Union. When we look at the gatherings of European statesmen—we saw one with Boris Johnson when he went to the European Council—we are well outside the room. Whatever we say about NATO—I notice that we are suddenly on about the G7—this is a problem that requires a European dimension to virtually every part. Our act of self-harm is coming home to roost now.

That is because not only do we have the problems with the refugees and getting the refugees in—I am not going to repeat them—but we have to look to the future. There will be a future when we have to rebuild Ukraine and when some of those 4 million people will want to go back home. They will be doing so to a land that has been devastated. In part—I am not saying that we should not have done it—it will have been devastated by British weaponry used by Ukrainian troops in the fighting. None the less, we will have paid a lot of money to give weapons to Ukraine to win. We have an equal obligation to look to rebuilding Ukraine and to a generous running budget for some years from this country towards doing just that. There will be a European effort that we must also contribute to. We must make it part of our job to make Ukraine worth living in again.

When—as it inevitably will—refugee fatigue starts setting in, we are going to have to resist it. It is already setting in around the Afghan refugees. We have a huge job on our hands, as does the Minister, not just in getting people here but in settling them in and then moving forward. I wish him the best of luck and godspeed from this side of the House, and the other side, because this is one area in which the whole House is totally united behind the Minister’s efforts. We wish him well.

School Trips: Passport and Visa Requirements

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

As I explained to the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, I think that collective, group passports are still in existence, although we expect them to be phased out at some point. The EU is now in the same situation as the rest of the world.

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, in an answer last June, the Minister suggested that collective passports under the 1961 Council of Europe treaty could be used. It turns out that these can be used only for nationals of the country sending the visit; in other words, a Spanish student in a French school could not benefit from this. Will the Minister undertake to talk to the group of tourism blue badge holders in London to try to devise a scheme—for the whole world, not just for Europe—that encourages young people to come to Britain? It is first impressions that often bring a lifelong admiration for a country.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

The noble Earl will know that we continue to accept collective passports from countries that have ratified the relevant Council of Europe treaty. Nineteen countries have done so but, in practice, only the UK, Malta and Slovenia actively issue them. As I said earlier, I think they will probably be phased out.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Lord Balfe Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 5th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Desai. I have been listening to him since 1967 and have never failed to be amused, entertained and even educated by what he has to say.

In common with probably all noble Lords, I have had a huge number of emails about this debate and Bill. Much has been made of the problems and there has been much analysis, but no solutions. That is because the Bill looks at a very small area, but it is a very big, worldwide problem. I have received very good briefings from the TUC and from UNISON. The UNISON briefing makes the very good point that many of its members are dealing with the refugees and migrants as they land in Britain, many of whom then go on to work in the basic industries in this country.

One of the things we have to come to terms with is that we have a long-term labour need. Part of the question we have to answer is, how are we going to deal with it? How are we going to get the people into the country we need to be here to do the jobs that are necessary in the economy? In short, there is a need for migrant labour.

We also have to get over this “trafficked” business. Most of the migrants who come not only to Britain but to all the countries of Europe are looking for a better life. If we stop them on the beach, put them in a nice little private area and say, “We are sorry you have been trafficked. There is a plane and we will fly you back home club class. Is that what you would like?”, most of them would say no, because they have spent a lot of their money to get here. We have to start with that very realistic thing.

I will not deal with the Bill in detail—that will come later. However, one of my worries about Clause 9 and the ability of the Home Secretary to revoke citizenship is that it becomes rather like the right of the Attorney-General to appeal against sentences. The papers will come up with campaigns against particular migrants who do particular things, and we will have a politicisation of the removal of citizenship. That would be totally wrong and it is one reason why we need to look very carefully at the proposals in the Bill which give the Home Secretary powers. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, who is not in his place, was an excellent Home Secretary, but I would not like to give any single individual the power or responsibility of being on the end of that sort of campaign.

This is the difficulty that Home Secretaries 70 years ago had with the death penalty. They were personally involved and were personally lobbied. I do not know of any Home Secretary who said on record that they really enjoyed their role as the arbiter of life and death. Please be careful of what power we give to any Home Secretary.

My noble friend Lord Wolfson made a very good point in asking, “What do we want to do?” As I said, there were few solutions in the emails I got. First, we should raise within the United Nations the fact that these conventions are dreadfully out of date. I have been in international European politics for 25 years, and it is almost impossible to get agreement on a particular set of proposals. I remember the law of the sea and how difficult that was. It is absolutely impossible to get them amended, but we have to try it.

Secondly, I suggest that we try to get together a conference of like-minded Governments in Europe who wish to look at how we can solve this problem and come up with some constructive solutions, instead of every single country looking around for different solutions and getting nowhere because they have no support. Those are my two suggestions.

Migration

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Thursday 28th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

My Lords, I find it interesting that migration is a “difficult subject” given that, it is true to say, we are nation of immigrants. On the funding of specific museums and organisations, I was lucky to be able to speak to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, yesterday. I will have to go back to my colleagues in DCMS and ask them about the noble Baroness’s question.

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, while I am pleased that this museum exists in the constituency that I used to represent, I point out that the Question is about knowledge and understanding of the contribution of migrants. I hope that the Department for Education and other areas of government that promote information will continue at all times to stress the positive contribution that migrants have made to this country, including both the Minister and me, who hail from outside the UK—or our families do, to be more exact.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for that question. As he was talking, I was just thinking how one of the awful moments for the Home Office was the Windrush scandal. One of the huge contributions that was made to this country after the war was by the Windrush generation. It has come to the forefront of people’s minds in the last few years, more than ever before, how people such as those in the Windrush generation helped this country, as did the Irish.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Lord Balfe Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 14th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, I begin by joining the welcome to my noble friend Lord Sandhurst. We are delighted to have him among our colleagues on these Benches.

I thank the various people who have briefed me for tonight, in particular the union UNISON, the Trades Union Congress and the Quakers—a trio of very socially responsible bodies. One of the things they have drawn to my attention is a recent Court of Appeal judgment, where it was held that:

“In a free society all must be able to hold and articulate views, especially views with which many disagree. Free speech is a hollow concept if one is only able to express ‘approved’ or majoritarian views. It is the intolerant, the instinctively authoritarian, who shout down or worse suppress views with which they disagree.”


I think that is a very useful start for where we are going.

To an extent, the Minister will have a huge amount of work clarifying matters in this legislation, because what is not clarified will of course end up in the Court of Appeal. If we do not make it clear, it will be clarified by judges, and fortunately—I hope—they will bear in mind such documents as the European Convention on Human Rights and others which have guided judicial findings to interpret this Bill.

One of the difficulties we have—which the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, alluded to—is that there are some people at the moment who deliberately exploit an anarchic way of conducting protest, not because they believe in the protest but because they believe in trying to get the consequences of the anarchy to panic society into taking decisions which could well turn out to not be very wise.

Having said that, the trade union movement welcomes the protection for emergency workers and looks forward to finalising and refining this legislation, so that it deals comprehensively with a body of workers who have had enormous amounts of problems.

I think the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, has left us, but he mentioned Orgreave. If we are actually interested in looking at the consequences of protest, there is a protest that could well do with some official looking at.

The definition of nuisance is a very movable feast, and we have to look very carefully at the borderline between what I would call peaceful protest and noisy and deliberate protest. As has been said, the whole nature of protest is often noisy. I have been on demonstrations in my time, and it is a very common thing—it is a sort of crowd coalescer—that you will have a slogan and you shout it out and it has a meaning for the people there. Most people who go on a demonstration in the classical sense are there because they have a reason for being there. They do not think, “What shall I do today? I know, I will go and demonstrate.” They are there because they are either in favour of something or against something, but they feel strongly about it.

If you bring in a penalty, as has been mentioned, of 10 years for disturbing flowers on a war memorial, it will never be imposed. It is as simple as that. It would be foolish legislation because no magistrate would ever impose that sort of punishment. I suspect we will spend considerable time looking at the Bill and dealing with its detail, but I hope, at the end, we will have a better Bill, because there are good parts of it, but there are also parts that need very careful examination.

EU Bilateral Agreements for Asylum Seekers

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Monday 6th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I say to the most reverend Primate that I thank the Church of England in particular for everything it has done to support asylum seekers; the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury has been the first person to take part in community sponsorship. The work of the Church has been incredibly important. Clearly, we will be trying to expedite asylum claims as quickly as possible. We have suspended returns to Afghanistan—understandably so—and I hope that the claims of all those who are waiting in the queue will be seen to as quickly as possible.

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, does the Minister accept that asylum seekers, who are not required to take any PCR test when they land in the United Kingdom—unlike double-vaccinated Members of this House—are put at a great disadvantage? Does she envisage that they will be required to take a PCR test before they can be sent back anywhere?

Daniel Morgan Independent Panel Report

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

The panel is clear that it did not find any evidence that freemasonry had any effect on the investigations. The Code of Ethics, published by the College of Policing, makes it clear that the police must remain impartial and that membership of groups or societies must not cause a conflict of interest or impact an officer’s duty to discharge their duties effectively.

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, at Chapter 10, Paragraph 470, there is a quote that

“‘the corruption of freemasonry influenced every attempt at seeking the truth in the initial Morgan criminal investigation and subsequent enquiries’.”

Later, there are some figures on the voluntary database, where 96% of judges, 88% of magistrates, but

“only 37% of police … declared whether or not they were Freemasons”.

The recommendation actually says:

“All police officers and police staff should be obliged to register in confidence”.


They are not asked, but are obliged to do so. Later on, it says:

“The ‘rotten apple approach’ to dealing with corruption does not meet the needs of a police service seeking to minimise, and even prevent corruption”.


Is it not time at least to accept the recommendation that police officers should be obliged to register whether they are Freemasons?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I thank my noble friend. As I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, on the definition of freemasonry, the Code of Ethics published by the College of Policing makes it clear that the police must remain impartial and that membership of groups or societies must not cause a conflict of interest or impact an officer’s ability to discharge their duties effectively. As I said earlier, the panel is clear that it found no evidence that freemasonry had any effect on the investigations.

Passport and Visa Measures

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Wednesday 9th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I reiterate that we will not be reconsidering, but I do not agree with that assertion that thousands of children will not be visiting. What about the children from the rest of the world who visit this country? Are they in a different category? We are treating everybody in exactly the same way. Of course, there is always the option to get collective passports for groups of children issued under the 1961 Council of Europe treaty.

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, the United Kingdom is getting a bit of a reputation for doing everything to annoy Europe. The Minister speaks about other countries, but all the nearby countries are in the European Union. All we are doing is making people feel unwelcome. We are tearing up something which does not need to be torn up. The Minister says that she will not reconsider, so I will not ask her to, but I will ask her to reflect on the damage this is doing to Britain’s reputation outside this country.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I have much respect for my noble friend, but one could flip that the other way and say of the long-standing issue of children outside the EU: have we made them feel unwelcome for years? I do not think we have.

Immigration Rules: Statements of Changes

Lord Balfe Excerpts

Thursday 27th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords, it is not evident from my accent, unlike that of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, that I was only a few months out of Ireland when I was born. So, I was almost an immigrant, and my father most certainly was.

My first point goes back to that made by the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, and others: what is Parliament for when we are debating things that are so far past? I understood not only that we were taking back control but that the function of the British Parliament was to debate major changes in law and practice before they came into operation. That has most certainly not happened. I ask the Minister to take back to her department —and to her Government, because this is not just a Home Office matter—the way we feel we are being treated. We are being treated not as legislators but as rubber stamps, and that is not acceptable.

In my long career in politics I have never known debates on immigration to be either clear or popular. They are not clear because people get confused between asylum seekers, illegal immigrants and legal migrants, and they are seldom without emotion because people project their fears on to others, and the others are often those migrant communities. People feel threatened. I noticed, when I was in the Labour Party many years ago, how threatened many working-class Labour supporters felt by migration. We should not get away from that. One of the problems that the Labour Party has now—if the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, as its sole representative on earth, does not mind me saying so—is that many people at that level feel that there are some subjects they can no longer talk about within the political framework, and I am afraid that will have to change.

I draw attention to the huge number—I believe my noble friend Lord Horam referred to this—of doctors and nurses that we strip out of the third world. We let them be trained there and then we bring them into this country. Of course, they do valuable work but they do it away from the communities in which they grew up, which are often far less well-endowed than us. Any approach to immigration needs to be accompanied by an expansion of training places for those skilled migrants that we are pulling in, particularly from the third world.

I turn to the 2016 vote and what came out of it. People got completely confused. When I was canvassing for Remain in Cambridge, I was stopped by someone who was very angry with me and said: “Look, we don’t want these Nigerians here.” That was a total misunderstanding of what it was all about.

Now, without a second thought, we have signed up for something like 5 million citizens from Hong Kong to come and live here. There has been no debate about it. We have various prognostications as to what we want in the way of new housing, but no one mentions where 5 million new citizens are going to go. Will it be like Canada, where Vancouver has become a south-east Asian city? It could well, but we need a debate about it.

We also need a debate about illegal migrants and asylum seekers and the difference between the two. As the Minister will know, I have asked on numerous occasions how come we cannot stop boats crossing the Channel. How come it is apparently not an offence to illegally enter the country? People suddenly appear here and, frankly, it is worth taking the chance, but it should not be worth it. That is something we need to tighten up on because there is a world of difference between people-smuggling and immigrants and migrants coming into the country and leaving. On balance, I tend to be closer to the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, than to the noble Lord, Lord Green: the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, has outlined the advance and contribution made by migrant communities, and it is enormous.

The biggest attraction of the United Kingdom is the English language. Wherever you go in the world, if people know a handful of words outside their own language, they will be in English. We are seen as a magnet because we have a reputation for being a free, decent and incorrupt country. We should not sacrifice freedom, decency or our lack of corruption, so we have to make a policy and a framework that will work within that, and that will encourage genuine migrants but crack down on the illegal businesses that are flourishing.