Maccabi Tel Aviv FC: Away Fans Ban

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

Policing by consent is the bedrock of our policing, and I think everybody across the House would agree with that—those Peel principles drive everything we want our police to do. There are a number of areas where that model of policing by consent has been tested in recent years, and public order and protest are a case in point. It is hard for the police, and I praise them for virtually every decision they make when it comes to public order. Most protests go ahead well and are policed well. There are good relations between the protesters and the police, and the routes are discussed, debated and agreed. The vast majority of protests happen in a way that we do not even notice because the policing is done brilliantly—there are some absolutely excellent police who deal with this. But when we get something wrong, of course the public question what is happening and question that confidence. That is why it is so important that we in this place do not jump to conclusions and that we get the right answers in a careful way, so that can give the right response.

[Sir Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Nick Timothy) on securing an urgent question on this important matter. Does the Minister agree that it is not only the Jewish community who have been seriously let down by this sequence of events, but all of us in the royal town of Sutton Coldfield and across Birmingham? Does she accept that it is not right to blame the SAG, which will always go—on the whole—with the police evidence that is put before that committee? That might well be an argument for looking again at the structure of how these decisions are taken. Does she also agree that this looks like a maladroit political decision rather than a policy decision, and does she understand that many local people are very disappointed in the role of the police and crime commissioner, who is supposed to stand up for local communities and has not done so in this case?

[Sarah Jones]

I was in Birmingham last week to launch our winter of action: police working in our town centres and closely with retailers and other organisations to stamp down on and prevent crime. I was with the police and crime commissioner, who is doing a good job in the policing of the community. For the 4 million people who go through the Birmingham Christmas market, it will be a lovely experience. I will not condemn anybody in this place. There are questions to answer, and I know that the right hon. Gentleman’s community, like everybody here, wants answers. We want to get to a point where we can celebrate the fact that Villa won at the weekend. That should be the only story in town, but unfortunately it is not because of this situation. We need to get to the bottom of it, and the Government will do so and respond appropriately.

Maccabi Tel Aviv FC: Away Fans Ban

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Monday 24th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

I thank my hon. Friend for the work that he did supporting colleagues and his constituents after the Manchester attack. He is right to point to the 1980s, when we had a completely different era of huge violence in football. We are very glad that that has, in the main, subsided. He says that there should be no no-go areas for Jews. That is absolutely right; I completely agree with him.

[Sir Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

The Minister knows the Birmingham and Sutton Coldfield area well, so she will understand why so many of us locally are deeply troubled by this unpleasant episode. The initial decision to ban the Israeli fans was clearly wrong, and that is compounded by the information that has now come to light. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Nick Timothy) on securing this urgent question. Birmingham is a welcoming and tolerant city, and community relations in Britain’s second city are truly excellent. That is not because of the politicians, but because of the work that faith communities have done over many years.

[Sarah Jones]

The right hon. Member is right. I am very familiar with Sutton Coldfield—and my husband is a Villa season ticket holder, as are my twin boys. It is in some ways the bane of my life, because I never see them as they are always at Villa. It is worth saying that Villa fans are lovely and it is a lovely club. They are devastated that there would be any of this controversy. They just want to play football, watch football, support football, support their players and get on with it. Having talked to lots of them, I know that they have found the whole thing upsetting. They just want to watch the football.

As the right hon. Gentleman says, Birmingham is a great city. I pay tribute to the faith communities in his area and, I suspect, in many of our constituencies where the Faiths Together groups meet and bring different leaders together to ensure that we are all learning from each other and living side by side in peace.

Omar al-Bayoumi: Arrest and Extradition

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Monday 8th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, not least because he rightly raises the important point that we should always seek to remember and reflect on the sacrifice and the loss of the victims and survivors of terrorism. He is right: the victims and survivors of the horrific terrorist attacks that have scarred communities here and around the world must be remembered. This Government take that incredibly seriously, and in that spirit we have recently consulted on the creation of a national day for victims and survivors of terrorism. It is vital that the day reflects the voices and experience of those who have been directly impacted by terrorism offences.

The hon. Gentleman asked a number of detailed questions, but I will not be able to respond in detail to all of them, for reasons that I have already outlined. I can say that we will look closely at the matters that have been raised. I hope he sees that there are reasons why we cannot get into the detail of this today, but I give him and the House and assurance that we will look closely at this.

[Sir Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend the Member for Goole and Pocklington (David Davis) did the House a service today in raising this important matter, but there are wider issues associated with the extradition treaty with America. The House will recall that the treaty was set up when Sir Tony Blair was Prime Minister to address terrorism, but in recent years, it has controversially been used for a much wider remit; from time to time, it has looked as though commercial and national advantage was sought from it. That suggests that the time may be right to review it. Will the Minister look at the matter carefully, and consider whether now is the time to do that?

[Dan Jarvis]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that this is an important matter with wider ramifications. I will not commit to the formal review that he describes, but I commit to him, and to the House, that we will look carefully at the issues that have been raised and the points he makes, and I will endeavour to come back to him and others on this issue as soon as possible.

Immigration System

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Monday 12th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. If the response to any labour or skills shortages is too often simply to turn to migration without addressing their causes—which might relate to pay and conditions, lack of training, lack of workforce planning and a whole series of different things—all that happens is that UK productivity falls. Alongside ensuring that we get the skills we need and that we benefit from international talent, we must invest to tackle domestic training and skills failures. That is what the increase in the immigration skills charge will help us to do.

[Sir Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

Surely the most immediate challenge is illegal migration across the channel, which is enraging our constituents, but the Home Secretary’s Government have kicked away the tough deterrent measures that they inherited from the previous Government. There are three critical measures that she should take: the first is to work incredibly closely with all our European partners; the second is to look hard at international conventions, particularly the 1951 Geneva convention; and the third—and in many ways the most important—is to work on the upstream problems at source. Increasingly, people are migrating in large numbers from the Sahel in north Africa, fleeing violence, starvation and extreme poverty. Does she accept that she and her European counterparts must lift their ambition and move towards a modern-day equivalent of a Marshall plan if we are to solve this long-term and increasingly serious issue?

[Yvette Cooper]

I agree with the right hon. Member that we must do more upstream to tackle some of the causes of dangerous journeys. We clearly need to act on the criminal smuggler gangs who are exploiting people and undermining our border security—that is why the legislation on counter-terrorism powers that we will debate tonight is so important—but we also need to do much more work with European partners. We have been working with France, for example, to get it to agree to change its rules so that, for the first time, it will start to intervene in French waters to prevent dangerous boat crossings. I agree with him about the importance of the Sahel and working upstream. We have established a new joint unit between the Home Office and the Foreign Office in order to do some of the work to which he refers.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dame Angela Eagle]

I certainly will. We should also remember the £60 million the Conservative party wasted on RAF Scampton and the £15 million on a derelict, asbestos-ridden former prison in Bexhill. We will not take any lessons from Conservative Members about value for money in Government expenditure.

[Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

In the royal town of Sutton Coldfield, we understand that we must do our bit to help house asylum seekers, but the Ramada hotel on Penns Lane has always been the wrong place because it is too far away from inner-city Birmingham-based services. Under the last Government, the facility was slated for closure, so will the Minister look urgently at winding it down and closing it as soon as possible?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

It is our intention to close all asylum hotels as soon as possible, once we deal with the backlog that we inherited from the Conservative party.

Points of Order

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Monday 27th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman, but I think he knows that was not a point of order for the Chair but a question he can ask of the business managers and the Leader of the House on Thursday mornings, when the Leader of the House takes questions. I see that the Minister is eager to answer the point. It is not a point of order, but given the sensitivity of the subject that we are discussing, I will allow the Minister to make his point.

[The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Mr Andrew Mitchell)]

Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I assure my right hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood) that we in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office are the servants of the House. We will do anything that the House requests in respect of fulfilling the role that he has identified, which we fulfilled in the early days of the Ukrainian war.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I have never known the Minister not to relish an opportunity to come to the Dispatch Box and I am sure that we will hear from him many times in forthcoming weeks. Let us hope that it will be with good news, to counteract the bad news that he has had to deal with today and on other days.

Bill Presented

Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill

Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)

Secretary Michael Gove, supported by the Prime Minister, Secretary Oliver Dowden, Secretary Lucy Frazer and Lee Rowley, presented a Bill to make provision to amend the rights of tenants under long residential leases to acquire the freeholds of their houses, to extend the leases of their houses or flats, and to collectively enfranchise or manage the buildings containing their flats, to give such tenants the right to reduce the rent payable under their leases to a peppercorn, to regulate charges and costs payable by residential tenants, to regulate residential estate management and to regulate rent charges.

Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time tomorrow, and to be printed (Bill 13) with explanatory notes (Bill 13-EN).

Metropolitan Police Service

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

One of the principal problems, bluntly, with the Metropolitan police is the quality of leadership at the very top, which determines the quality of leadership at street level. As the Minister seeks very diligently to find a new Metropolitan Police Commissioner, will he bear in mind the precedent from some time ago of finding a commissioner from outside the police forces, and bear in mind that within the military establishment there is a cohort of utterly brilliant generals and leaders who could bring those skills to bear on behalf of the Metropolitan police?

[Kit Malthouse]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to recognise the importance of leadership. I am sure he will be encouraged by the significant investment that we have made in the College of Policing leadership programme, which was designed to produce the future policing leaders. I say from a personal point of view that whether outside people with different professions could run a constabulary is open to question. In the reverse case, I am not sure whether, for example, a police officer could command a battalion in the Army. Also, modern policing is a much more complex environment than it used to be. However, we hope that through the work we are doing on leadership we will develop leaders who can drive policing forward into the 21st century.

Preventing Crime and Delivering Justice

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Wednesday 11th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

The right hon. Lady is absolutely right. I will come onto the forthcoming economic crime Bill, which speaks very specifically not just about how we do better and more, but how we target our resources to stamp out fraud and go after the permissive environment and the individuals who occupy that space and commit the most appalling economic crimes.

Since I became Home Secretary, an additional 13,500 police officers have been recruited. We are well on the way to our target of 20,000 more police officers by next March. Following the incredible response to our public consultation—

[Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

I am extremely grateful to the Home Secretary for giving way. May I reinforce the cross-party nature of what the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) has just said? She will know that the right hon. Lady and I have done quite a lot in the House to support the points that she has just made. I very much hope that, when the right moment comes in the economic crime Bill, she will listen carefully to the work that has already been done to try to reinforce the very point that she has just made.

[Priti Patel]

My right hon. Friend is correct on this. I know that, for many years, he has been a champion of many of the reforms, some of which have been put in place. We have had part 1—the Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act 2022 and sanctions—but the next Bill will also tackle Companies House and many of the wider issues that have been raised.

Nationality and Borders Bill

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Wednesday 20th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Tom Pursglove]

I can only reiterate the point that, at all times, the United Kingdom Government act in accordance with their international obligations, and that is of course something that we will continue to do. Nobody in this House or elsewhere should be encouraging people to put their lives in the hands of evil criminal gangs or to make these dangerous channel crossings. We saw in November the consequences when that happens.

[Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

Could my hon. Friend set out for the House what the safe and legal routes are, apart from the now closed route from Syria, the route under the scheme from Afghanistan and the current Ukraine scheme?

[Tom Pursglove]

In terms of various schemes, as I say, we have a rich and proud history in this country of providing sanctuary to people from around the world who require it. That has included 40,000 people being sorted out through the family reunion route, 20,000 Syrians and 100,000 Hong Kongers. Also, 20,000 Afghans are eligible to come and 60,000 Ukrainians so far have had visas granted. I think that is a record that we can be very proud of as a Government, and it is one we will continue to build on in the years ahead.

The first safe country principle is a fundamental feature of the common European asylum system. I have already set out the issue of inadmissibility. By enforcing this part of the Bill, we are taking the battle to the people smugglers and showing them that their horrible business will be made unviable. For that important reason, we cannot agree to this amendment. Hon. Members have already voted against the amendment, prompting the Lords to bring a further amendment adding a time limit of five years to get agreements in place. That does not address the issues we have with this—namely, it is right to allow for removals to be sought on a case-by-case basis where appropriate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stuart C. McDonald]

I agree with everything that my hon. Friend has just said.

I turn to Lords amendments 15 and 13B, which bring us back to the sweeping criminalisation of asylum seekers and others arriving in the UK. We are talking about Afghans, Syrians, persecuted Christians and Uyghurs. Those are causes that many in this House advocate and speak up for all the time, and yet when these people come to our shores, suddenly we are planning to let them down, offshore them, discriminate against them, treat them abysmally and criminalise them under this legislation.

The Minister has said today that the Lords have defined the criminal offence too tightly and he wants to go back to a sweepingly broad offence. He assures us that that does not really matter, because we will not use the provision against the Afghans and Syrians; it will be used only in egregious cases. We cannot pass criminal laws on the basis of wishes and assurances expressed at the Dispatch Box that we will be quite reasonable in how we use them. He has to come up with the tight wording for the criminal offence that he is aiming at. If he does not, I am afraid we cannot support it at all; in fact, we fundamentally oppose it.

We believe that the Bill represents completely the wrong approach, and we continue to support the House of Lords in all it is doing to try to rein in the worst aspects. I hugely regret that we have had such a pitiful amount of time to say what we have to say about the amendments. In deference to other Members, I will sit down now and do my voting later on.

[Mr Mitchell]

I draw the House’s attention to my registered interests.

I want to try to be constructive with the Minister this afternoon. I do not believe the Rwanda scheme will work, but I am full of good will towards the Home Secretary when it comes to trying to stop this ghastly, deathly channel trade. The Minister asks those who think that the scheme is impractical, ineffective and extraordinarily expensive what we would do. He is right to ask that, so let me try to answer.

There are four things we must do. The first, exactly as my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) said, is to employ more staff. We need to ensure that we process these asylum claims more rapidly. In Rwanda, it takes three months to process an asylum claim. We ought to have a much more streamlined system in this country, and ought to try to do away with all these lawyers, who extend and prolong the process unnecessarily. That is a point the Government should definitely address.

Secondly, we need to put right our dreadful relationship with France, our neighbour just 22 miles away. The relationship is not what it should be. There are plenty of senior officials and people of good will who have a much better relationship with France, and we need to address that point and repair the relationship. Nothing can be achieved in tackling this evil trade without our having a far better understanding with France. We need, if not its active support, then its passive acquiescence at the very least in the measures that need to be taken.

Thirdly, we need safe and legal routes. I asked the Minister to set out what those routes are, and of course he was not able to.

[David Simmonds]

Does my right hon. Friend share the concern that many of us have who wish to see the Government succeed in their endeavours, which is that the legal test for anyone opposing immigration control is not that there are safe and legal routes in general, but that a person specifically had access to a safe and legal route but chose not to use it, which may undermine some of the objectives we wish to see? Safe and legal routes need to be much broader if they are going to work as an effective tool as part of this policy.

[Mr Mitchell]

My hon. Friend absolutely puts his finger on the point, and he knows of what he speaks because he has dealt with these matters a senior councillor.

It was Lord Kirkhope who amended the Bill in the other place. He was Home Secretary Michael Howard’s Immigration Minister, and I think he holds the record as the Immigration Minister who has deported the most people needing to be deported from Britain. He also knows of what he speaks, and he made it clear that if we do not have safe and legal routes, we will not be able to make this system work. By definition, if we do not have such routes, anyone arriving on our shores will be arriving illegally, and that point needs to be addressed.

The fourth and final thing that needs to happen is that we need a new international convention. The 1951 convention, which Britain played a big part in setting up, is now completely out of date. That is because, since then, as colleagues will appreciate, there has been a revolution in travel. We also now have the tremendous push of climate change, which is pushing migration up very high. So we need a new international convention. I put this point to the Prime Minister on 25 July last year, and he described it as an “excellent point”, but I fear that since then nothing has been done. Britain needs to use its leverage and its experience at the United Nations as one of the five permanent members of the Security Council, and it also needs to use its brilliant diplomatic experience and knowledge to negotiate a new convention.

Those are the four key things that have to happen, and I hope the Minister will consider them before embarking on a scheme that, as I say, is impractical, ineffective and extraordinarily expensive. Rwanda is a safe country and a beacon of stability in Africa, but we should not export our problems in this way to a country that already tries to do its very best to help people who are caught up in humanitarian jeopardy.

[Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)]

I would like to use my three minutes, which have not come up on the clock yet, to focus on Lords amendment 6B. It is truly damning of the Government’s conduct that they oppose an amendment that merely seeks to guarantee refugees their rights under the 1951 UN refugee convention.

There is no such thing as an illegal asylum seeker under international law, yet under the Government’s plans, unlike refugees who have arrived on officially sanctioned routes, group 2 refugees—I will focus on them—who are deemed to have arrived in the UK in an illegitimate manner will only be offered temporary protection status and will have no recourse to public funds. As chair of the all-party group on no recourse to public funds, I am only too aware of its devastating human impacts. The Bill would further expand the number of people without access to public funds such as welfare benefits and housing assistance, and thereby ensure that thousands more refugees a year fleeing war and persecution are at increased risk of falling into destitution and homelessness once they have reached the UK.

If this Government were truly interested in the wellbeing of refugees, they would build a support network and safety net to enable those who have sought refuge in the UK to live comfortably and have fruitful lives, rather than chip away at existing support and create a tiered system. I urge all Members to support Lords amendment 6B to ensure that refugees living in the UK are not forced into poverty and destitution.

Global Migration Challenge

Andrew Mitchell Excerpts

Tuesday 19th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

First, I am surprised that the right hon. Lady is using Sir David’s name in vain, given that a former Labour Home Secretary infamously and discourteously described the Home Office leadership and management as “not fit for purpose” during Sir David’s tenure. Things have moved on in terms of the asylum system. Her party and other Opposition Members continuously vote against the new plan for immigration, but they have no plan to deal with these important and difficult issues. It will bring in the reform that our country needs, while making sure that we preserve the efficacy of safe and legal routes for people fleeing persecution to come to our country and get the support they need.

[Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend deserves great personal credit for seeking to tackle the dreadful crisis that exists in the channel, but does she accept that many of us have grave concerns that the policy she has announced simply will not work? On the cost, can she confirm that she will not be using expensive military aircraft to make the 9,000-mile round trip? Also on cost, will she ensure that before the House of Commons votes on this matter tomorrow we know the cost per asylum seeker of those she is sending to Rwanda?

[Priti Patel]

My right hon. Friend knows Rwanda incredibly well. We have had many discussions about it and I am very happy to meet him to have further discussions. We will not be using military planes for any removals. He will, like many Members of this House, be pretty familiar with the approach we take to removing failed asylum seekers and foreign national offenders to return them to their country of origin or to third countries. There is a whole process around this, which involves a lot of operational work and detail. I am happy to talk to him privately about that because the ways in which we can do this are complicated. He makes further points that I am happy to discuss with him as well.