Ben Goldsborough
Main Page: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)Department Debates - View all Ben Goldsborough's debates with the Home Office
(1 day, 9 hours ago)
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Alex Norris
On the deterrence point, as I have said, we are receiving applications at an unprecedented level, and at a time when our European Union counterparts are seeing fewer applications. There is an attractiveness to this country, which is why we are changing the protection package and carrying out record levels of enforcement against illegal working. Those are the changes we are making to break those pull factors to this country.
Turning to announcements, we would of course mean no discourtesy to the House, and the right hon. Gentleman will have heard the apology I made at the outset. However, we stated our policy in November, and what we are now doing is building it out.
Ben Goldsborough (South Norfolk) (Lab)
South Norfolk expects our immigration system to be fair, open and transparent. The one problem we have come across, unfortunately, is that there is a lot of confusion online, as has been expertly shown by the shadow Home Secretary today. Can the Minister clarify that the process we are looking at will save the taxpayer £20 million, instead of spending money to keep open asylum hotels?
Alex Norris
My hon. Friend is exactly right. With regard to family returns, I hear from Conservative Members that they would rather pay a family with no prospect of staying in the country an average of £158,000 to stay in a hotel, rather than pay that £40,000. There are 150 families in the pilot; if we were to be successful with all of them, that would save the British taxpayer £20 million. I think we would be doing right by them in doing so.