Illegal Migration Bill

Baroness Helic Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 10th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Helic (Con)]

My Lords, I should perhaps declare an interest as someone who has experience of fleeing their home and country of origin.

I share my noble friend the Minister’s desire to see a fair, safe and controlled immigration and asylum system. I am grateful to him for speaking to me about the Bill. However, I do not believe, I am afraid, that the Bill is likely to be successful in its stated goals or is moral at its core.

I have three particular concerns: on modern slavery; on the rule of law; and on our international standing and commitments. First, modern slavery is an area where this party and this Government have led the way in the past. As other noble Lords have already warned, the provision to remove modern slavery protections for migrants is deeply worrying. Our former Prime Minister, Theresa May, who delivered much of our modern slavery legislation, noted that, as it stands, the Bill

“will consign victims to remaining in slavery”

and

“will give the slave drivers and traffickers another weapon to hold people in … slavery and exploitation”.—[Official Report, Commons, 26/4/23; col. 809.]

It will remove protections from the very people most at risk of being trafficked and force them underground, preventing them from coming forward to report. Rather than providing a deterrent, it would make it harder to identify and prosecute people traffickers who bring people into the United Kingdom illegally.

Secondly, on the rule of law, I am concerned by the limits that the Bill places on judicial oversight, both domestic and international. I am alarmed by any measure that gives the Government unchecked power to detain—including children, reversing a measure implemented by the coalition Government—and deems human rights claims inadmissible in courts. Restricting the oversight and appeal role of the British courts is a worrying precedent. Threatening to ignore judgments of the European Court of Human Rights breaches our international obligations and undermines an important institution that was created by British lawyers in the aftermath of the atrocities of the Second World War and which has been at the forefront of efforts to uphold the rule of law across Europe, including in relation to Russia.

The UN Refugee Agency has been clear that by, in effect, banning asylum claims in the United Kingdom and removing all safeguards on refoulement, the Bill breaches the UK’s international legal obligations under the refugee convention, the 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness and international human rights law, and would significantly undermine the international refugee protection system. It is also worth stressing that the Bill, building on the Nationality and Borders Act, does not only prevent people who arrive on small boats accessing the asylum system; it prevents people who arrive by perfectly safe methods—even those who come with a visa—from claiming asylum. In practice, it closes down the UK’s asylum system.

This feeds directly into my third point, which is about the effect of the Bill on our international commitments and international co-operation. Two months ago, the Integrated Review Refresh 2023 noted that the United Kingdom

“has a higher interest in an open and stable international order … based on respect for the UN Charter and international law”.

It recognised that this

“creates the optimum conditions in which the UK can secure its interests”

and

“helps us deal with challenges like migration”.

Undermining the jurisdiction of international courts and ignoring our international legal commitments does not serve our interests. The only way to tackle global, transnational challenges such as immigration is through international law, co-operation and shared responsibility. Leading a race to the bottom where we all try to offload our obligations on to others will not help, bearing in mind that 74% of all refugees worldwide are hosted by low- and middle-income countries with far fewer resources than our nation.

In March, the Home Secretary said that

“there are 100 million people around the world who could qualify for protection under our current laws. Let us be clear: they are coming here”.—[Official Report, Commons, 7/3/23; col. 152.]

She must be aware that more than half of that population are internally displaced people who have not left their country of origin. Of the 34 million refugees globally, three-quarters are hosted by neighbouring countries. When the alternative is torture, death or starvation, refugees will seek to cross whatever obstacles are placed in front of them. If we want to reduce the pressure on our borders, we need to put more energy into diplomacy, international partnership and co-operation to address the conflicts and other root causes that are forcing people to flee.

Just over a year ago, I led a debate calling for increased support for Ukrainian refugees. I said:

“No one wants to become a refugee or to leave their home; it is a journey of fear, uncertainty, peril and loss”.—[Official Report, 6/4/22; col. GC 295.]


I reflected on the extraordinary support that I received 30 years ago and which I saw being extended by people across the United Kingdom to Ukrainian refugees. I hoped that we could take the lessons learned from our compassionate response to Ukraine. Instead, we face an outright ban on asylum. For most refugees, safe and legal pathways to the United Kingdom do not exist.

We should seek to build an asylum and immigration system based on the rule of law and dignity, of sustainable systems which could be replicated globally. His Majesty’s Government should always defend international law, which makes us all safer, including the right to asylum. We should create the long-promised safe routes for refugees, address the asylum backlog so that decisions are made quickly and firmly but fairly and not arbitrarily, and strengthen international co-operation to reduce the push factors, from climate change to insecurity, which drive people to make perilous journeys in search of safety. That is how we will end the dangerous channel crossings.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I suggest that the debate be now adjourned until 7 pm.