British Steel

Debate between Lord Henley and Earl Attlee

Wednesday 24th July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, we are committed to having a steel industry for the future, and the Government have left no stone unturned in their support for the entire industry. We are working with the sector, the unions and with the devolved Administrations to support the steel sector. I could list a whole range of projects that we are involved with. I mentioned the £300 million or so in support for energy under the industrial energy transformation fund; I could go on. We are committed to ensuring that we have a steel industry for the future.

[Earl Attlee (Con)]

My Lords, I too am grateful for the approach of the Government in this matter. However, does the Minister agree that one of the problems that we are experiencing is that high-volume steel is manufactured to well-understood, international engineering standards and therefore is a homogeneous product, and that makes the market exceptionally competitive?

[Lord Henley]

Again, my noble friend is right to point to the competitive nature of the market, and that is true for a great many industries. However, with the industry itself and government working together, we can ensure that we have a competitive part of that industry.

Abu Qatada

Debate between Lord Henley and Earl Attlee

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, again I repeat that we regret the decision of the SIAC court, just as we regret even more the earlier decision of the European Court of Human Rights. As I repeated towards the end of the Statement, those things need to be addressed in due course. The noble Lord then asked what we are doing to ensure that Qatada will in due course be deported. I assure him that we will do everything we can, in terms of the negotiations that have taken place and the negotiations that will take place, to make sure that we can deport him to Jordan, and that he will be entitled to a fair trial that is compliant under Article 6. We believe that the European Court of Human Rights got that wrong and that our own courts got it right in that what he was going to face was compliant under Article 6, but that is another matter which is for discussion on future occasions. We will continue to discuss it with the Jordanian Government and I hope that in due course my right honourable friend or myself or both of us will be able to let the House know how we are managing on that. But as regards a timescale, I cannot give the noble Lord one at this stage, and nor do I suspect he would expect to have one from me on this occasion.

The bail conditions are very severe; they are set out in the 1997 SIAC Act and the Immigration Act 1971. We are satisfied that they are appropriate for keeping him under control for the next three months, as is appropriate before we have to look at these matters again. The conditions are more severe than what is available under TPIMs. We discussed at length during the passage of the TPIMs Act the appropriate level of security that we and the security services need for keeping adequate control over dangerous people. I believe that we struck the right balance in reflecting not only the individual’s human rights but the security of this country. No doubt the noble Lord would like to use this one particular case to make a political football out of the matter. I think that that is regrettable and I hope that he will not follow that on this occasion. We believe that what we have in TPIMs is appropriate and adequate to deal with the threats that we are likely to face this year and in any subsequent year. We believe that what the previous Government set out was overly onerous and not appropriate to what is necessary to provide security for the individual.

I hope that I have given the noble Lord the appropriate assurances that he wanted on the more important questions. We will, as I said, exert every sinew to ensure that this very dangerous man, Abu Qatada, is deported from this country in due course, with proper respect for law and the support of the courts as is appropriate.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, may I remind the House of the benefit of short questions being put to the Minister so that he may answer as many as possible?

UK Border Agency

Debate between Lord Henley and Earl Attlee

Monday 7th November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, at least I can welcome the fact that the noble Lord welcomed the fact that we are making a Statement. He alleges that the Government are failing in their duty. I think that is a bit rich from the party opposite when one considers some of the failures that I outlined in the Statement made by the Home Secretary, which were failures of the party opposite when in government. We accept that there have been failings here, which is why my right honourable friend the Home Secretary set up those two internal inquiries and, as she quite rightly emphasised, the third and most important external inquiry that will be conducted by John Vine.

As I made clear in the Statement, the terms of reference for both inquiries will be set out and placed in the Library, and I will make sure that the noble Lord gets copies. The draft terms of reference are still being discussed with John Vine, but they will cover a number of aspects, particularly investigating and reporting the level of checks operated at ports between 1 January and 4 November—Friday of last week—and fully reporting any potential adverse outcomes to border security created by any unauthorised relaxation. The noble Lord will be well aware that at this stage I cannot say whether anyone posing a threat snuck through on those occasions. That is what we hope John Vine will discover as part of his inquiry.

As I made clear in the Statement, initial results from the pilots that we discussed were fairly good. The problem was that although the pilots were authorised by the Home Secretary, quite rightly, in June of last year after extensive consultation—I could take the noble Lord at considerable length through the whole decision-making process, but that will come out in the inquiry—what seems to have happened is that certain officials went beyond what was agreed. My right honourable friend made it quite clear that they were not go to beyond what was agreed, which is why we are asking John Vine and others to look into this.

Again, I stress that my right honourable friend gave the authorisation for those pilots. We will publish the decision-making process as it is unearthed by John Vine as part of his inquiry. Again, my right honourable friend made that clear in her Statement. I shall quote her words to remind the noble Lord. She stated:

“I am very happy for Mr Vine to look at what decisions were made and when by Ministers”.

I feel that that makes it as clear as can be to the noble Lord that we are not trying to cover up anything whatever. Nor are we asking officials, as he put it, to carry the can for ministerial decisions.

My right honourable friend made a decision about pilots, as I said. It is alleged that certain officials exceeded their authority. That is what we want to have examined and will have examined because the security of our borders is fundamental. I look forward to passing on copies of those inquiries to the noble Lord. As I said, John Vine hopes to report by January. We hope to have the initial report by Dave Wood in a somewhat shorter time. However, as the noble Lord said, the independent investigation by John Vine is far more important.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I remind the House of the benefits of short questions to the Minister in order that as many noble Lords as possible have the opportunity to ask a question.