Nationality and Borders Bill

Debate between Anne McLaughlin and Rachel Maclean

Report stage & 3rd reading
Wednesday 8th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Anne McLaughlin]

I will take your advice on that, Madam Deputy Speaker, although I am little unsure whether we will get answers, because we have not any other time we have been asking for them.

Any disqualification from protection must be reserved for the most serious of offenders—those who pose a serious risk to the public or to national security. A public order disqualification for victims with prior convictions of 12 months or more is too wide, as others have said. There is a real danger that genuine victims who could give vital evidence against slavery networks, and who pose absolutely no risk to the public, will be excluded from that support.

The actual figures for referrals of offenders in immigration detention to the NRM are low, as was said earlier, and the Government have published no data to back up the sensationalist claims made in support of these measures. It is another theme running through every part of this Bill. There is nothing to back up their scaremongering claims. The hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller) was also asking for evidence. I very much doubt the Minister is going to give us any, but let us wait and see.

I will move on, finally, to say that I fail to see why all of this is part of an immigration Bill. We are not talking about immigrants; we are talking about victims of criminal offences. In 2016, I sat on the Immigration Bill Committee, and a Government Member, who is not present and whose name I will not reveal, told me, “If people do not want to be trafficked, they should simply say no.” That demonstrated a crass misunderstanding of what trafficking is. These are people who are not trying to migrate to this country; they are simply caught up in exploitation and they end up here.

I will end by saying that I would love to hear what the Minister has to say. I have zero faith that we will hear anything. I have never ever been so ashamed as I am today, because I know that Members will vote for this Bill that will damage, exploit and kill vulnerable people, who they claim to care about. It is absolutely a disgrace.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Rachel Maclean)]

We have had an excellent debate. Despite some of the comments I have just heard from the previous speaker, the hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin), there is more agreement across the House on the seriousness of these crimes and our determination to tackle them than there is disagreement.

The aims of the modern slavery elements of the Bill are twofold: to provide clarity on victims’ rights and entitlements, supporting effective recovery from this awful crime, and to increase prosecutions of perpetrators of the despicable crime of modern slavery. That is why we make clear for the first time in legislation that where a public authority, such as the police, is pursuing an investigation or criminal proceeding, confirmed victims who are co-operating and need to remain in the UK to do so will be granted temporary leave to remain. Our core principle is that the entitlements provided to victims are based on their needs, delivering a firm but fair approach. The Nationality and Borders Bill will go further than ever before in putting modern slavery victims’ rights into law. At the same time, we will put in place safeguards to ensure that these important protections are provided to those who most need them.

I will begin by addressing the Government amendments. I will attempt to come on to the Opposition amendments, but I do not have very much time. Government amendments 64, 71 and 73 to 75, which will make changes to clauses 60 to 63, are technical amendments that seek to provide greater clarity on the protections provided to possible victims through the recovery period and on when those rights can be withheld, and to ensure that we have flexibility in decision making. Specifically, they enable the conclusive grounds decision to be made in the recovery period, while still providing for a minimum recovery period of 30 days, which is effectively 45 days in guidance. The second part makes clear our position that, in specific circumstances, as set out in clauses 61 and 62, we can withhold the recovery period and the protection from removal that it provides. Those changes allow us to respond to modern slavery as an evolving crime.

On Government amendments 72 and 76 to 83, which all relate to modern slavery specific temporary leave to remain for confirmed victims of modern slavery, the aim is to clarify our international obligations with regard to the provision of temporary leave to remain for confirmed victims. Government amendments 78 and 81 to 83 are minor technical drafting amendments that provide consistency with similar provisions on the statute book. Similarly, Government amendment 79 updates the wording of the clause to reflect amendment 56, which we considered yesterday.

Government amendments 76 and 77 remove the wording “social well-being” from subsection (2)(a) of clause 64 on the temporary leave to remain. That phrase was an over-broad concept that lacked clarity and left the eligibility criteria for a grant of leave under the clause unclear for victims and decision makers, which undermined the aim of the clause.

I reassure hon. Members that we remain in line with our international obligations. We will continue to support, via a grant of temporary leave to remain, those who have a need to be in the UK to recover from physical and psychological harm caused by their exploitation. In the same vein, Government amendment 72 amends the wording in clause 63 from “social well-being” to “social harm”. I reassure hon. Members that the clause will be underpinned by the immigration rules, which will provide more guidance on the issue for decision makers.

Government amendment 80 extends the current policy in the Bill that temporary leave will be provided where needs cannot be met in another country of which the individual is a national or citizen, another Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings signatory country, or any country with which we have an appropriate bilateral agreement. Decision makers will assess potential returns on a case-by-case basis following an individualised assessment in line with guidance and available country information.