Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill

Gavin Robinson Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 12th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Michael Tomlinson]

I say directly to my hon. Friend that I will continue to work with him on this. I will come back to his specific points, and I hope I will address his very concern, perhaps in response to the right hon. Member for Clwyd West (Mr Jones).

My right hon. Friend the Member for Witham, my hon. Friends the Members for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) and for Torbay (Kevin Foster) and others spoke powerfully and directly. My right hon. Friend the Member for Witham rightly talked about the UNHCR and the EU. How galling it was to see that, the very day after the UNHCR advocated in the Supreme Court that Rwanda is not safe, the UNHCR itself sent 168 refugees to Rwanda as part of hundreds and thousands under a scheme that is already up and running, and supported and backed by the EU to the tune of millions of euros. We need to hear more of that, so I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend.

The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and the right hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) raised a specific point that I want to address head-on. This Bill will apply in full in Northern Ireland, in the same way that it applies in the rest of the United Kingdom. It is explicit, it is on the face of the Bill and will always be the case, reflecting that immigration policy is a UK-wide matter. I want to be particularly clear that nothing in the Windsor framework or the trade and co-operation agreement affects that. Where people have raised concern is on the rights chapter of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, which I want to be clear does not affect any clause in this Bill in any way.

I think I have time to address the specific concern that the hon. Member for Strangford raised. It is important to be clear that the 2005 procedural directive is not within the annexes of the Windsor framework.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

I am grateful to the Minister for addressing those points as clearly as he did. He will acknowledge that although he has addressed them in his closing remarks this evening, the Home Office published legal advice yesterday that did not touch on any of those points. May I ask him to take steps in the coming days to go further and update that legal advice in a way that encompasses the points he has just raised, in order to assuage the concerns of the House this evening?

[Michael Tomlinson]

May I give the hon. Gentleman this commitment: I will continue to work with him on the points that he has raised? I need to be careful about legal advice, as a former Law Officer. What has been published is a Government legal position statement, and that is different from legal advice. He will understand the differences in relation to that position. He has heard what I have said, and I was grateful to him for welcoming the points I made in response to the specific concerns raised.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) mentioned the House of Lords Constitution Committee, which gave me flashbacks to my grilling by that illustrious Committee, when I was sitting alongside my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General in my former role as Solicitor General. We followed that very report mentioned by my hon. Friend.

Turning to the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson), and the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, the hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Dame Meg Hillier), I make the simple point that I cannot address each and every one of the points made by the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North here. However, I know she is looking forward to asking me some specific questions tomorrow afternoon when I attend her Committee with my hon. Friend the Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery.

We then had from a former Law Officer-fest, as we had the pleasure of hearing from my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Sir Geoffrey Cox), my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill), who now chairs the Justice Committee, and from my illustrious predecessor, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon (Sir Robert Buckland). I am pleased to say that I am now a former Law Officer as well. We therefore have a joint endeavour and interest in making sure that this legislation works.

I have mentioned my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham and her important point about Rwanda and the rather patronising tone sometimes raised by Opposition Members when it comes to our international partners who have signed up to an internationally binding legal treaty with this country.