Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Lawlor Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 13th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, for trying to get in before sponsors of amendments. I apologise to the Committee that my other public commitments have not allowed me to participate in this Bill to date.

I could not let this opportunity pass to pay tribute to my friend the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, who has been a tireless campaigner on the issue of family reunification and who, together with my friend the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, has authored a number of Private Members’ Bills with content similar to that in Amendment 165, which I support. In my opinion, this amendment that has been revised, refined and honed to perfection as a result of the extensive previous debates in this House.

I wish to make only two points. First, if there are issues with excessive immigration, asylum seekers are only a very small proportion of that problem. Secondly, the so-called push factors prompting people to seek asylum are far greater than any hypothetical pull factor—something that the Minister may say. I agree with the noble and learned Baroness in her comments about a lack of evidence to support this suggestion of pull factors.

The noble Lord, Lord Jackson, makes general comments about small boat crossings and foreign criminals trying to illegally enter the country. Amendment 165 is not about undocumented migrants; it is about children who have already been given refugee status, who should be allowed to be reunited with their family members. Perhaps in the absence of documentation, something the noble Lord mentions, family links could be established by DNA test, if necessary.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, has comprehensively and convincingly made the arguments in favour of this amendment, which I wholeheartedly support.

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 166 from the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, would not only oblige the Secretary of State to change the rules under Section 3(2) of the Immigration Act 1971 to accommodate her proposed new clause but would extend the type of relatives who could enter. As well as those allowed under Appendix F—dependent children under 18 and partners and civil partners—which was, as noble Lords will know, suspended in September 2024 pending review, it would mean that others would be added to the list of those who could enter and remain in the UK: parents, adoptive parents, unmarried partners and children as old as 25. This is in relation to persons, not the amendments on children. Because the people of this country have no appetite for increasing the scale of immigration but want the numbers cut—and have made this increasingly clear—I support my noble friend Lord Jackson’s amendments to Amendment 166, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. I have added my name to Amendments 167 to 171.

I would like to disassociate myself from comments which suggest that the majority of people in this country who want immigration cut and controlled are of some extreme disposition. Time and again I hear references to the “far right” or the “extreme right” or something else. Most of these people are ordinary people who have seen their communities torn apart very often, and they explain it on television perfectly clearly and lucidly. They are not put up to anything. They are worried about their children and what is going on in their local hotels. They are not extreme people. If any of your Lordships had young children going to school near an asylum hotel in which problems arose with people in that hotel, I do not think they would be considered extreme for raising the concern at Questions, as we can. We have a voice, but the people of our country will not have any voice until the next general election. I am sorry for slightly digressing.

I support these amendments not just because Amendment 168 would be a deterrent to foreign criminals coming in nor just because Amendment 171 would ensure that the aim of securing the border is inserted into the Bill, but because they would curb the numbers coming in rather than escalate them. In the year ending this June, 108,138 people claimed asylum. This is an 18% increase on the previous year and a fivefold increase on the numbers since 2022. Of this total, 84,231 were main applicants but 23,907 were dependants—the highest annual number of applications ever recorded, except for one other year.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

I did refer to the Conservatives as having carried on the very good practice.

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

I thank my noble friend and the noble and learned Baroness for their interventions. What I was saying is that the country has always been sympathetic and fair and accommodated people fleeing here when their lives or liberties have been in danger. However, mass global movement now poses a threat to stability in western democracies, not just Britain’s but that of other western European countries, particularly Italy, Germany and France—the founder countries of the European Union. If we are to continue to give a sympathetic hearing to those who have a real claim, we must avoid extending the potential numbers so that in addition to children under 18 and a spouse, a whole extended family plus anyone judged to matter to the person’s psychological or other well-being can come in.

We do not have a right to defy the clear wishes of the people of this country, who pay the bills for housing and for the Home Office, asylum and Border Force officials. My noble friend has referred to some of these costs, but the policing, the courts—which are clogged—the appeals system, the housing and subsistence of large family groups all cost money. Many individuals or families, when they leave Home Office accommodation, must be supported from the benefit system.

In the first quarter of 2025, more than 4,000 refugee households in England were recorded as homeless, meaning that either a single person or a family unit had applied for support after leaving Home Office accommodation—figures similar to the previous quarter. With the sort of expanding family as proposed in Amendment 166, what would the housing, accommodation and benefit bill then be?

I conclude by proposing that, even if the Government are tempted by Amendment 166 in the name of the noble Baroness, my noble friend’s Amendments 167 to 171 should be accepted in order that the Government can help bring the numbers down and stop them escalating.

[Lord Harper (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to agree and disagree with a variety of noble Lords. I am sad to say that I often do not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Kerr of Kinlochard, but on one particular thing he said, I strongly do, which is that since this Bill was introduced into Parliament, the Government’s policy on this area has evolved—with is probably the politest way of putting it—and it would be helpful to your Lordships’ House, if not today then certainly before we have the two and a half days of Report, if the Minister could set out clearly what the Government’s current position is and what we are amending or changing. That is a very sensible point, and it is difficult to have this debate with an ever-changing legal undercurrent, particularly since many of these laws are not in primary legislation but in secondary legislation, which is therefore more capable of changing. I always think it is useful, where there is agreement, to put that on the record.

It is also worth saying that, in this group, two different things are being talked about. I have more sympathy with the amendment put down by the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, and supported by the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, on unaccompanied children currently outside the United Kingdom looking to come to the United Kingdom to be reunited with family members. That is a completely different proposition from that in Amendments 165 and 166, which is about taking children already in the United Kingdom and widening the scope of those who can come here to join them.

This is an area of policy, as the Minister knows very well, which is incredibly litigious, and it therefore matters what words we agree, the scope and breadth of them and the clarity of them. I therefore wanted to draw your Lordships’ attention to a number of concerns that I have about the specific words in the amendments.

In Amendment 165, on the reference no recourse to public funds, it is worth pointing out to the House, because it is repeated on a number of occasions, that that does not include the National Health Service, which does not count as a public fund.

One of the areas that this amendment seeks to expand, according to the explanatory statement, is bringing in grandparents to accompany family members and a whole bunch of dependants. That is important because, generally, the consumption of health resources is not equal across somebody’s life. People consume more resources as they get older. When I was Immigration Minister, I saw a number of cases in which somebody was trying to bring an elderly relative to the United Kingdom, being willing to support them in the normal sense of that word, to accommodate them and put them up. What they would not accept is that we, the taxpayer, would be liable for their health costs, which in some cases are very significant indeed.

People do not mind paying for very significant health costs for elderly people who have spent their life in the United Kingdom and have made a lifetime’s contribution, but bringing someone elderly to the United Kingdom and the NHS and the taxpayer potentially having to pay for their health costs, when they have made no contribution over their lifetime, has to be borne into account. There is no recognition of that in this amendment. I did not want the Committee to miss the fact that although it says

“no recourse to public funds”,

which is of course an accurate characterisation, it is worth reminding people that

“no recourse to public funds”

does not exclude provision of healthcare, which does not count as a public fund in the legal definition, and the NHS generally does not deny health treatment to somebody because they cannot pay for it.

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

Does my noble friend consider that the fee of £700 that we now charge those on student visas for access to the NHS is too low, given that the average spending of the NHS per patient is around £3,000?

[Lord Harper (Con)]

On that point, briefly, it is good that we have the surcharge. It was brought in under one of the pieces of legislation I was responsible for in a former life. We can argue about the amount. For younger people in their late teens and early 20s, it is probably a reasonable amount of money. We looked at the costs at the time, and that cohort of people do not bear a huge weight on the health service—but they have some cost, and it is right that they meet some of it.

The second definitional point I want to touch on is in Amendment 166, about the use of the language “unmarried partner”, where I strongly agree with my noble friends Lord Jackson and Lady Lawlor. In my experience, that would be a massive red flag to anybody who wishes to come to the United Kingdom and make a definition. There is no way of proving or disproving somebody’s connection with such loose language. Spouse and civil partner are very clear. They can be evidenced, and documents can be produced to do that. As soon as you say “unmarried partner”, almost anybody can be said to fit into that category and there will be almost no chance of the Home Office making refusals on that basis—it will just be a large chasm.

I also support my noble friend Lord Jackson in Amendment 171, adding into the list

“the importance of maintaining a secure border”.

There is a very long list in Amendment 166, but they are all—in one way—things that the Secretary of State should consider, which would mean that the Secretary of State would have to let in more people. If the Secretary of State is making a judgment, it is very helpful to have a balanced list to weigh up.

I hesitate to say this in your Lordships’ Committee—there are so many lawyers here—but the problem with having the catch-all at the end, saying “any other matters the Secretary of State considers appropriate”, is that, certainly when we were drafting things, as soon as there is a list and things are not in it, weight is put on the fact that they are not in the list. If there is a very long list all in one direction, it is very helpful to put in that the Secretary of State also has duties to protect the border, because that enables the Secretary of State to put proper weight on that consideration in a way that is capable of withstanding legal challenge.

I will pick up another issue on language: the reference to adoptive parents and adoptive siblings in Amendment 166, which clarifies that it also includes “de facto adoption”. I have no objection to people bringing in adoptive members of their family, where that has gone through some legal process, but if it is de facto and there has been no legal process, it again becomes very difficult for decisions made by the Secretary of State to be upheld in the courts. If we do not have some kind of process, this becomes an open door.

Finally, reasonable-sounding language has been snuck into Amendment 165 with the reference to “any dependants”. If a child is in the UK, we define someone who can come and join them. That sounds very reasonable, but that person can then bring any number of dependants with them. Although it says that there would be no recourse to public funds, which we might discuss in relation to housing costs, there are a number of things that I think most people would consider were public funds, such as the NHS and universal credit, but that are not counted as public funds in that definition.