Immigration Bill

Baroness Anelay of St Johns Excerpts

Monday 10th March 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

In moving Amendment 48, I will speak to Amendments 55, 63 and 65 and support my noble friend Lord Patel’s Amendment 60. I apologise for not having been able to take part at Second Reading. Perhaps it would be helpful to the Committee if I paused for a moment.

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, is trying to introduce his amendment and I would ask that noble Lords leave quietly. That was quite a din. I also remind noble Lords that, when they leave, they should not walk in front of the speaker. It not only drowns him out, it means we cannot even see him.

[The Earl of Listowel]

I am most grateful for that intervention. Amendment 48 would exempt pregnant women from all charges and penalties associated with Part 3, particularly with regard to health charges and concerns for landlords about having tenants who might not be legal migrants. I want to take pregnant women out of this picture.

I recognise the difficulties that the Government face in terms of immigration. I grew up in Hampstead but I have lived and worked near Bermondsey, and I know that for the people of Bermondsey and other similar areas there can be more challenges due to immigration than in places such as Hampstead, around schooling and access to the health service but particularly around housing. There are real concerns and the shortage of housing can be a cause of social tension.

This, too, is a knotty political question, but if the Government and Opposition could come to some consensus about how to provide enough social housing and affordable housing for our people, many of these tensions might be far less acute than they are today. I know that is a great challenge but it relates to this issue and the concerns of our people about migration.

Perhaps it is helpful to think about how maternity has a certain sacred association. If one wanders around the Sainsbury Wing and looks at the earliest paintings there, one sees paintings from the 13th century of the Madonna and child, and nativity scenes. Respect for the mother and child during that very important period at the beginning of a family is at the heart of our Christian faith. It is not too surprising that France, Spain and Portugal—some of the Catholic countries—exempt pregnant women from any charges for accessing their health services. It points to the wisdom of the great faiths, as we increasingly realise how vital the very earliest months of a child’s life, from conception through the first two years of life, are to the successful later development of children.

Indeed, the right honourable Iain Duncan Smith did very important work concerning early intervention with families. Graham Allen MP, who worked with him in that endeavour, has set up the Early Intervention Foundation, which aims to raise awareness of the crucial period between conception and two years of age, and perhaps a little bit beyond that. Frank Field MP and Andrea Leadsom MP have set up the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Conception to Age Two—The First 1,001 Days, to really focus our minds on this crucial time in a child’s development. It takes several years for a child to grow into the physical stature of an adult but the brain is developing extremely rapidly in the first months of life and achieves its main development by age four. It is crucial to think carefully about how we treat mothers and their very young children.

I should have said something about newborns in my amendment. I talked only about pregnant women, but I hope that the Government will also think about mothers with newborn children within the first two years of life.

On several occasions I have had the privilege to speak to mothers in temporary accommodation through the Barnardo’s Families in Temporary Accommodation project. What came through particularly from their stories was the sense of isolation that they experienced and how difficult it was because of their temporary accommodation—they may be placed a long way from family or anybody of their ethnic group.