European Union Opt-in Decisions

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2015 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

The UK has not opted in to the proposal to amend regulation (EC) No 1683/1995 on the uniform format for visas. The Government are committed to ensuring that people coming to the UK do so legally and are taking steps to improve document security. The UK has concerns about the current proposed design and is considering the implications that a new UFV may have on future visa strategy.

The UK has also not opted-in to the proposed Council decision authorising the opening of negotiations with the associated states (Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland) and Denmark concerning access to Eurodac for law enforcement purposes. This proposal concerns the opening of negotiations. If the negotiations are successful there will be a further Council decision, also subject to the United Kingdom’s Justice and Home Affairs opt-in. At this point we will be able to assess properly any potential benefits to the UK and others, and on that basis consider whether or not to opt-in.

[HCWS269]

Immigration Bill (Fourth sitting)

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

Q 245 On that point, Mr Greenhalgh used the phrase behavioural change. I think we all understand what the Government are trying to achieve, but you do not believe that the Bill does that. What should be in the Bill to get the behavioural change that the Government are trying to achieve?

Paul Greenhalgh: One of the difficulties with the Bill as currently framed is that there will be a number of what we would perceive as unintended consequences. They are twofold, mainly around our duties to provide support and care in certain circumstances arising from the Children Act 1989 and the Care Act 2014. Mainly, section 17 of the Children Act is something that would come into play in these sorts of cases.

At the moment, 80% of those cases are funded by no recourse to public funds arrangements as a result of a Children Act assessment. As a result of the current drafting of the Bill, a lot of families who would receive no further support as a result of their asylum status being confirmed would come to the local authority if they were about to become destitute. The local authority would be bound to make a human rights assessment and, if there are children involved, a children in need assessment. Those assessments take some time, so if a family are at immediate risk of destitution, we would have to put immediate measures in place.

So the first of our significant concerns is that this could result in a huge increase in demand on local authorities, which would in effect be a cost shunt from the Home Office to local authorities in an unfunded way. The other consequence is the danger that people will not come to local authorities but will go underground, and therefore be more at risk of exploitation and less able to be supported by the authorities.

If those are our concerns, we think some measures need to be put in place to provide appropriate safeguards. First, there should be a clarification of assessment processes, to reduce the burden falling on local authorities and the difficulty for families of having to go through what at the moment are two assessment processes. If the assessment process could be streamlined, that would be one improvement to the Bill.

The other significant issue is funding and the extent to which, however we frame the Bill, it will result in more cost to local authorities to support people on an interim basis. If there is recognition that those costs are a new burden, and if there is engagement between local authorities and the Home Office to work together on a practical level to support those families and help them to engage, we could see some of the intention of the Bill working more effectively.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

Q 246 Perhaps I could just pick up on that last point and ask the witnesses about that engagement. Are you engaging with the Home Office and working through some of those details that you suggest may be needed?

Paul Greenhalgh: We are. We had meetings with Home Office officials during the consultation period. We put in a joint response, and 48 local authorities sent in individual responses. The feedback from Home Office officials is that there was a consistent response from local authorities. We made it clear that we were very happy to continue to work with Home Office officials, and we have been doing that. We have had three technical meetings so far, and we are trying to work through how we can try to address together those issues that I have raised.

Councillor Simmonds: I thank the Minister for making himself available for those discussions. The one challenge that we have found at a political level is that there are sometimes differences of opinion between officials in different Government Departments. For example, on Children Act duties, traditionally we have had feedback from the Home Office that broadly says, “We are seeing people through our role in asylum and immigration, which we are here to manage.” Those in the Department for Education would say, “We’re not interested in that. We see them as vulnerable children, and therefore the duties are absolutely and unambiguously clear, and at the highest possible level.” The more consistency that we can get on some of those challenges, the better.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 247 No doubt we will come on to the detail of some of the cross-governmental work that is taking place.

In your responses to the 2005 pilot, you expressed your thoughts on what occurred 10 years ago. Obviously, the world has moved on; other provisions exist in respect of identifying people, and encouraging or supporting them to depart. Also, the proposals in the Bill are different on the balance of engagement, with the onus being put on the family to show that there is a genuine obstacle to their departure, rather than the family not co-operating and the Home Office evidencing that. So a different approach is being taken. Do you see some of those differences as being relevant in the context of the effect and workability of the new proposals?

Henry St Clair Miller: I guess that sometimes that is where the local authority position arises. We are not within the Home Office; we are not Home Office enforcement. So, sometimes it is difficult for us to comment on the barriers, in terms of leveraging return or indeed enforcing return.

I guess that local authorities working in this area have had a kind of old-fashioned approach to it—that we should end up with actual outcomes when we look at immigration enforcement. The outcome might be a grant of status, if that is appropriate, or it might be a removal.

It is often said that things such as a lack of documentation and a lack of engagement from the families are among the key reasons why removal rates are very low. Yet from the outside—from a local authority perspective—we have seen other reports about how things are organised for immigration processes in some of the caseworking teams, the barriers to processing cases, the delays in deciding applications and possible challenges to making sure that cases that have recently been refused are tasked to removal teams. I guess that we have always thought that there is scope to work with the existing framework, whether that is a family returns policy or an enforcement policy.

Notwithstanding all that, we can see why Home Office officials want to leverage compliance to some degree. We understand why it is thought that the tools proposed in the Immigration Bill will help to do that. From a local authority perspective, we are trying to work in that context, particularly if the Immigration Bill becomes law, while ensuring that the remaining safeguards—we provide a safety net for the most vulnerable—are retained where necessary. Of course, the unknown—the risk—is how many people do not go and what the burden is on the local authority. Indeed, that risk is not only about numbers and referrals but about cost, because we carry the cost burden of financial support, which goes on at the moment for more than two years on average.

Immigration, as you know, is a complex area of work. Lots of different approaches work, and we have been keen to work out with Home Office officials which are the best tools to do this in the work that we have done.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 248 Obviously, we have talked about the new burdens assessment. Do any of the other witnesses wish to come in?

Paul Greenhalgh: More broadly, we are keen to build partnerships with the Home Office and other relevant Government Departments. We see room for improvement in the way we engage together on identification and compliance in voluntary returns, and potentially on family engagement and supporting family returns. In the context of a new piece of legislation, it is important that we make that surrounding partnership work more effective.

Councillor Simmonds: I have little to add to that. The bottom line, from a local authority perspective, is that if people are not entitled to support and should not be in the country, they need to leave. The challenge is that, although a lot of the debate—understandably, in the context of the Bill—is about the rights or otherwise of individuals, the balance is that local authorities have a set of duties. For the most part, they are general duties. We are blind to a person’s immigration status. A child is a child, and we have a responsibility under the Children Act 1989 to intervene where appropriate. Any intention to remove entitlements or rights from certain individuals needs to be balanced by a recognition that that does not remove the local authority’s duty in those circumstances to provide support.

[The Chair]

A number of Members want to come in, but I interrupted Mr Starmer.

Immigration Bill (Third sitting)

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2015 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

The Minister has been very patient; he wants to ask a question.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

Q 203 Sir Keir highlighted the Court of Appeal case; I think I am right in saying that. Mr Gill, I believe that you were acting in respect of that case. Am I right in saying that some of the concerns that you have expressed to this Committee were considered as part of that hearing?

Manjit Gill: Some of the concerns were raised, but the way sin which the Court of Appeal dealt with things is this, and I certainly do not support any solution that puts people of this country at risk; nobody is suggesting that. If there was significant evidence of immediate risk to people, then it was accepted in the Court of Appeal—by me—that there might be some limited category of cases in which there would need to be an appeal from abroad, but that is a limited category.

Some of the concerns about the difficulties of the appeal process were raised, to get back to your point, but the way in which the Court of Appeal dealt with them—I do not particularly want to talk about individual cases, but since you asked—was to say, “Well, there may be those sorts of difficulties, but it will be up to the system to sort them out?” Now, what does that mean? Is the Home Office going to provide the money? Is the Minister of Justice going to provide the money? Who is going to sort it out?

[James Brokenshire]

Q 204 The reason I asked that question, Mr Gill, was that obviously a judgment was handed down in the Court of Appeal last week; I have certainly seen a note of that case. Does that judgment represent the current law in respect of the assessment of the principles of the Immigration Act 2014?

Manjit Gill: To the extent that the Court considered them. When one looks at the judgment, one sees that all the Court was saying is—first, it is very important to recognise this—that the test is not one of a real risk of serious, irreversible harm; definitely not the test. In fact, your own counsel conceded that at the hearing, but had not done so at any instance prior to that. The test remains one that asks, “Will there be a breach of human rights?”

Secondly, the Court said that the guidance that had been given to the Home Office staff was absolutely hopeless. That was sort of conceded by Lord Keen saying, on your behalf, that we will have to clarify the guidance. The Court said, “Well, it goes a good deal further than that”, and it was much more scathing in the hearing room itself. In other words, the Court was attacking the practice that is being operated at first-instance level within the Home Office. We await the guidance, so we do not know what guidance will emerge.

As to the practicalities of the appeal process and the difficulties of appealing from abroad, which I think is what you are asking me about, the Court said that in principle you could have an appeal from abroad. I have paraphrased those words; you will have to look at the judgment for more detail. But that does not mean that in practice the process necessarily works. On the practical problems, they said, “Well, there are practical problems, but that is something that will have to be dealt with.” That gets us back to those practical problems: who is going to sort out the delays in the system, who is going to ensure that the preparation is capable of being done, who is going to provide the funding for that and if a person has to be brought back for a hearing, which they contemplated but Home Office staff have not, who is going to pay for that? None of those problems is dealt with in the judgment because that is throwing them back on you.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 205 If I can take you back to my original question on the legal principles of the operation of the Immigration Act that you were challenging just then, the Court upheld the soundness of the principles in the context of human rights legislation.

Manjit Gill: I accepted, as did my co-counsel, Mr Richard Drabble QC, that you do not need an in-country right of appeal in every case. The Court of Appeal has noted that. There is no dispute about that, and I will tell you why it is accepted. The Strasbourg Court says that it is not imperative that in every case you need an in-country human rights appeal. You will certainly need it in article 2 and article 3 cases, which the Home Office accepts. There is no dispute about that; the issue is about article 8 cases. When the European Court uses the phrase “not imperative”, what it means is that you may well need it in a lot of cases but in some cases you may not.

That gets us back to which types of cases there are in which you can avoid giving people an in-country human rights appeal, and the question that was asked there. Supposing you have someone who is going to be a real danger to people on the streets—not just a low risk of reoffending but an Abu Qatada or someone who is going to immediately threaten to go around committing atrocities and so on. We cannot have that sort of person in the country pending appeal. I entirely accept that. Such a person should have to go abroad to appeal. It would depend on the individual case, of course, but I can see powerful arguments for saying such a person should.

We are not talking about such a person. We are talking about people such as the person Mr Yeo mentioned. To give a practical example, we mean someone who has been here since the age of six or seven, breaks up with his girlfriend, goes back to the flat and breaks the door down, frightens the girl but does not harm her, takes his belongings and goes. Quite properly, he gets locked up for a couple of years. That is a foreign criminal under the legislation. Should such a person, who may have been here for 25 years, and who may have a child from that relationship, then be forced to appeal from abroad? That is not an Abu Qatada-type character.

What is now being proposed is that the out-of-country appeal rights, which in principle can be had in a limited category of cases, should not be limited to that category but should be applied for everybody. That is contrary to a principle.

[Craig Whittaker]

Q 206 Just to clarify something you said, Mr Gill: this character broke down the door, scared his girlfriend a little bit but did not harm her, and got two years for that. Is that what you are saying?

Manjit Gill: I am giving you a practical example.

Immigration Bill (Second sitting)

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Tuesday 20th October 2015 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Q 7474 Neil, may I ask you to introduce yourself for the record?

Neil Carberry: Yes. I am Neil Carberry, the CBI’s director for employment skills and public services. For the record, I should say that I am a member of the Low Pay Commission and the council of ACAS, but all my comments today will be made purely in a CBI capacity.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

Q 75 Neil, thank you for coming to give evidence this afternoon. This is one of the rare occasions when I, as the Minister, get to ask some questions, so there is nothing unusual in this. On labour market enforcement, Sir David Metcalf, head of the Migration Advisory Committee, gave evidence to the Committee earlier today and commented that he hoped that the CBI would buy into the labour market enforcement director mechanism contained in the Bill. He was essentially extolling it and suggesting that the CBI should welcome it. In fairness to you, I want to put his perspective to you so that you can respond.

Neil Carberry: Ever since I was a student in the London School of Economics industrial relations department and Professor Metcalf was there, I have tried to keep him happy. The CBI’s attitude to the labour market section of this Bill is probably a good place to start. We are interested in driving out some of the appalling practices that exist in parts of our labour market. It has always been the view of CBI members that empowering enforcement officers to kick a few doors down and bring some bad guys to justice is the right thing to do. To do that effectively, you need a risk-based, intelligence-led approach. To the extent that any Government of any political colour take that up, the CBI will be supportive.

In a sense, our attitude to the labour market enforcement director is that if that is what is on the cards here, we will support that work. It is important that we ensure that people who are not able to raise their own concerns, because of the situation that they find themselves in, have some method of support from state enforcement. The labour market director will hopefully do that. Our concern is whether that work will topple too far into what we have perhaps seen in the past: tick-box approaches that actually fall more heavily on the compliant than on the non-compliant, who we would all agree need enforcement action.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 76 So your call is for smart enforcement, using intelligence and drawing together all the different strands of information to target more rigorously the non-compliant.

Neil Carberry: I think that is right. My understanding of the role of the director as we have seen it so far is that this individual will work across agencies. It is important that this change does not draw agencies’ attention away from their work. HMRC is still investigating every national minimum wage complaint that it hears and has also started to do some excellent intelligence-based, targeted work in key sectors. The introduction of the director will hopefully improve interaction with other authorities, but will not draw funding and work away from protecting people in areas such as payment of the national minimum wage.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 77 What is the CBI’s current assessment of labour market exploitation and non-payment of the minimum wage? How does your organisation seek to challenge that? In parallel with the Bill’s provisions, what role do you see the CBI playing?

Neil Carberry: Broadly, our view is that compliance with employment law in the United Kingdom is good. Largely, non-compliance is inadvertent and we have excellent systems to allow people to raise their concerns about that. There are parts of the labour market—where, I am glad to say, CBI members tend not to be found—which are more open to abuse, where there are more interlinks with people trafficking, for instance, and which are not easily policed by traditional labour market means because these companies are not traditional companies.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 78 And are you looking at particular sectors, or is that a more general comment about the labour market?

Neil Carberry: I would think that it clusters in three or four particular sectors, yes.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 79 Such as?

Neil Carberry: The obvious one would be parts of agriculture.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

Q 80 I look forward to serving under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. Mr Carberry, offences are already specified in the Immigration Act 1971 that are applicable to migrants who breach their immigration conditions. Do you believe that clause 8, which creates the new criminal offence of illegal working, is necessary, and do you think that it may have unintended consequences?

Neil Carberry: What we are particularly concerned about is that any criminal offence is genuinely used to go after criminal activity. Employment law offences are typically civil offences. As I have already said, breaches are largely inadvertent, or if they are not inadvertent they are due to lack of understanding on the part of an employer. The right place to police that is through education, the tribunal system, the advice that ACAS offers and so forth. I am not a criminal lawyer. To the extent that the offence that has been created is to be used to go after employers where there is repeated, multi-faceted and exploitative treatment of workers, we are very happy for that offence to exist, so long as the businesses that are brought to justice are engaged in those steps. What worries us particularly is not the existence of the offence but the risk that there may be a general drift of employment law in the United Kingdom from the civil to the criminal, because that would be quite destructive for employee relations in general.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Newlands]

Q 96 Do you think that it should be employers’ or the Government’s responsibility to prevent illegal working, especially given the move away from civil penalties to criminal charges?

Neil Carberry: I think employers should have a duty to ensure that their workforce have the right to work in the United Kingdom—that is probably accepted by our members—at the point of hiring. The issues that we have often faced are issues of establishing that fact in a timely fashion.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 97 Just to come back on that last question, what is your assessment of the level of knowledge among your members, recognising that part of the role of the labour market enforcement strategy, which the director will obviously have a key role in developing, is to focus on advice to the Secretary of State about education and training? What further steps, in practice, should be undertaken around that, and what about the role of the director in that piece?

Neil Carberry: There is an analogy here, slightly oddly, with the process of automatic enrolment in pension schemes. The Pensions Regulator for many years dealt with some very large companies, which had large defined-benefit pension schemes, kind of knew what they were doing and spent a lot of money on compliance. In many of our largest members, immigration compliance is a million pound a year commitment, because of the scale of it and the reputational risks that we have already discussed. We live in a world in which company size is gradually getting smaller, and has been for 20 or 25 years; the majority of firms are small businesses, and the majority of our members at the CBI are small businesses, often with limited HR capacity. The transition that, for instance, the Pensions Regulator had to make to talking to businesses that had never even heard of it and offering support—it is still struggling to get that right now, but progress is being made—is exactly the same transition that we need to make in this space. It really is helping smaller businesses to understand their duties and the support on offer to them that will be critical to making sure that illegal working action is effective.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 98 So I suppose in other words, to draw out another comment in Committee this afternoon, you are suggesting that the focus on that awareness should be at the smaller business end, the SME end, and on the some of the challenges that might reside there. Equally, I am assuming that you would not say that the larger firms themselves have no potential issues, given the supply chain elements touched on previously—who your sub-sub-contractor is, who is on a building site or has been contracted into a particular job—and the need for alertness around those sorts of elements, from a reputational as well as a legal perspective.

[The Chair]

Just before you answer that, we have a couple of minutes. Will any other Member wish to ask a question in that short time? No. Neil.

Neil Carberry: I agree with that. We talked earlier about the capacity of a firm to know whether it was dealing with partners who are compliant. What I would point to is that in this space we should not look for answers that look easy in Westminster but are actually ineffective on the ground. Experience with, for instance, licensing models—we are concerned about the potential for part of the Bill to create the space for the Secretary of State to dial up or dial down the extent of licensing models—is that licensing itself does not actually give a company any assurance that the licensee is compliant or not. The record of the GLA in taking away licences shows that firms behaving improperly were licensed. It is much, much better to have rigorous enforcement, intelligence-led, and then high-quality advice and support for companies that are taking action under the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sarah Champion]

In that case, I will let other people have a go.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 103 Lord Green, there has been some questioning during the course of this session about the introduction of offences relating to illegal working, in particular the creation of an illegal working offence against employees. Could you share any thoughts and comments on how we can have a firm response and crack down on illegal working in all its different forms, as well as some of the draws that entice people into migration? How would you respond to the challenge that this may somehow prevent people from coming forward who may be victims of exploitation or trafficking, for example?

Lord Green of Deddington: I will keep my answers shorter in future, Mr Chairman, but I wanted to set out some of the basic considerations.

[The Chair]

Sure. It was a good opening exchange.

Lord Green of Deddington: Our view is that it simply has to be an offence to work illegally in this country. I cannot see how it can be otherwise. For starters, these people are unquestionably undermining the wages of British workers or immigrant workers, for that matter—legal workers. There is no question that they are undermining the wages of legal workers.

Wages in London are lower than anywhere else in the country. Why? Because in low-paid work there is an enormous number of people who are ready to work for very little and, of course, employers know they can get illegals for even less. It has to be an offence, and it is high time that it was. As you say, there has to be a balance. As you know, the Modern Slavery Act helps in certain cases if people will come forward, but the answer probably is stronger enforcement—in other words, lean on the employers in order to squeeze out the ability to do this.

--- Later in debate ---

[Keir Starmer]

Q 120 May I ask the panel—but I think probably Mr Lambert and Mr Smith in the first instance—about the provisions in the Bill dealing with the duties on landlords to carry out checks before renting to, or allowing premises to be occupied by, a person without the right immigration status? Do you have concerns about those provisions, from the perspective of the landlords, and do you have any comment about the concern of others that there could be a default position leading to discrimination—in other words, landlords being so concerned, because it is a complicated exercise and they are not entirely sure what they are doing, that it is easier simply to default to a position where you rent to somebody who is pretty obviously British, or who has a British passport?

David Smith: We have four areas of concern, so yes to your first question and, actually, yes to your second as well, but in a different way. We are concerned about the speed with which the second Bill has been brought forward when the first Act, the Immigration Act 2014, is not fully in force. It was announced only two hours ago that the pilot that has been evaluated in the west midlands will be rolled out across the country from 1 February. That pilot was held by the Immigration Minister to be a success, so we are not clear why there needs to be a set of criminal provisions on top of civil fines, which are, apparently, already effective. We would urge Parliament to take its time as it goes through implementation of the changes.

We are concerned about document discrimination—so not so much discrimination on grounds of nationality as discrimination on the grounds of people not having passports. Having a passport is far and away the simplest way to check somebody, so we are concerned that landlords, rather than just discriminating against people, will simply take the path of least resistance, especially as more pressure, potentially, is applied to them, with the possibility of ultimately going to jail. Indeed, I note from the evaluation that was published a few hours ago that one example was given, by one of the interviewees, of a situation of somebody without a passport being refused accommodation. So we are concerned about that.

We are concerned about the way in which the offences come into effect. The way the Bill is drafted, as soon as the Secretary of State has served a notice informing a landlord that they have illegal immigrants in their property, they are immediately committing the offence of having illegal immigrants in their property. It takes 28 days before you can possibly evict those people, so there are 28 days during which they are committing an offence. It has been suggested to us that the Home Office will not seek to prosecute, but it would seem to me that the only person who could give such an assurance is the person who is now filling your old job, Mr Starmer, at the CPS, the prosecuting body.

It would also be normal with offence of this type to have a provision that says that a landlord can establish a reasonable excuse—for example, if they have been severely ill or something like that—and that provision is not there.

The last thing is the air of confusion about two aspects in particular. First, the helpline has been described as a helpline, and was stated as such the other day. However, it has also been described to us as only being there to check for asylum seekers and people who do not have documentation. We would like to know which it is, and whether it will be fully funded as a helpline, so as to be effective.

The other thing that is notable from today’s announcement is that the provision is to be rolled out from 1 February, but it is not clear whether it will only apply to new tenancies commencing on or after 1 February, because it has also been stated to us in other meetings that it may apply to tenancies that are already in place on 1 February. It would be very nice to have some clarity on that, because it would be an extremely serious problem. I see that the Immigration Minister is shaking his head, which may give me the answer to that question.

Richard Lambert: We have concerns about placing this kind of responsibility on landlords, who are not trained for it and are not familiar with it. However, we have taken the view that we have to try to make sure that if this system is going to be introduced, it is as straightforward and practical as possible for landlords to operate. That has been the level of our discussions with the Home Office and other agencies throughout the past year, since the previous Act was introduced.

On concern about discrimination, we were probably more concerned about discrimination when the original policy was announced, or at least I was more concerned at that time than I am now. That is partly as a result of my going round and talking to local landlord meetings, as I do regularly. Rank and file landlords in our organisation are very worried about this issue, and those outside the pilot area are more worried than those inside it. One of the things that really comes back to me is, “How will we be able to tell if somebody is British? You can’t just look at them and say they are British. You can’t see their name and say whether or not they are British. In this day and age, you can’t even listen to their accent and say whether or not they are British.” So what we find is that landlords are moving towards the assumption that, in the same way that employers now tend to check all identities regardless of nationality, landlords will check identification, to make they cover off this particular aspect.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 121 I thank our witnesses for giving evidence this afternoon, and I also thank the relevant landlord bodies for their participation in the round-table sessions that we have had and will continue to have throughout the detailed implementation of the Bill.

I want to come on to one of the parts of the Bill that relates to the termination of tenancies. When landlords discover someone who is in the country illegally, they will be able to resolve that issue in a speedier fashion through the landlord and tenant legislation. Would that be welcomed by the sector?

Richard Lambert: Most definitely. Our big concern about the initial Act was what would happen once a landlord found they had a tenant who no longer had the right to rent, or who they thought had the right to rent but turned out not to have it. How could the landlord end the tenancy as quickly and as cleanly as possible, without necessarily getting into the whole court process? One of the problems with a court process is that it can be very protracted, yet the landlord is in the position of having committed an offence.

What we wanted to see was a process that moved that forward as quickly and clearly as possible. The provision in the Bill whereby the Home Secretary issues a notice once the Home Office has been informed that a tenant no longer has the right to rent achieves that. We have some concern about a power that has always been with the courts moving over to the Executive, but that is a constitutional principle for Parliament, ultimately, to decide. For our purposes, and looking at the practicalities, the power should work effectively.

David Smith: There are a couple of different points to make. First, it is generous of you to put in a provision to allow eviction of Rent Act tenants, but it is possibly not entirely necessary, as Rent Act tenants will have lived in the UK for so long that they are almost certainly entitled to stay here anyway, irrespective of how they entered the country.

The other part of it that I am a little bit more concerned about is with relation to assured shorthold tenancies and the power you have put in to evict. As I read it, it would still require an amendment to the tenancy itself for that power to be exercised, in that ground 7A can only be used inside a fixed term if it is mentioned in the tenancy agreement. So that ground for possession would require a lot of landlords to change their tenancies, which it is obviously their responsibility to do, but there is obviously a substantial piece of education that will need to be done in the sector, which I accept is our responsibility—possibly more than it is yours.

The other point is the issue of transfer of tenancies, so where there is a group of tenants, some of whom are illegal immigrants and some of whom are not, there is a power for the court to transfer the tenancy. The first point is that it is easily got around by simply issuing proceedings for some other ground for possession as well, which is relatively easy to do. The other problem about it is: how will you deal with all the other side bits that go with it—for example, tenancy deposit protection?

If a deposit is registered in one group of tenants’ names and the tenancy is transferred by the court to a different group of tenants’ names, the deposit protection schemes will need to have the deposit re-registered, and something will need to be done to deal with that contractual positon. So I am a bit concerned as to how that will work. In practice, I am afraid the mechanics are a little bit more complex in terms of shifting tenancies around between tenants.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 122 The detailed input given thus far has been helpful in flushing some of those issues and, no doubt, those discussions will continue.

Given the time, I should ask Mr Leenders about the banking provisions. The new provisions in clause 18 are on existing bank accounts and the ability to take action. That may be linked to some of the other issues we have touched on in the session, such as proceeds of crime legislation, linked to the employee criminal sanction that was highlighted in a previous session. Will you comment on the practicality and operation of that?

Eric Leenders: Certainly. We have some experience through the Immigration Act 2014 of implementing the required database search for new accounts that customers might want to open. That has given us some experience and some learning. The three-stage process in the Immigration Bill is broadly similar in the sense that first there is the status check, currently through CIFAS. Then there will be notification of any matches back to the Home Office, which is the three-point match, and no fuzzy logic, which gives a clear indication of those particular clients that we might need to close accounts for. The differential is the action that is then taken.

Essentially, though, as we understand it, there are two ensuing actions. First would be an instruction to close the account. We are working closely with HM Treasury officials to understand how that might work in practice—if I may, I will come back to that point. Second would be some form of freezing order through the courts that might facilitate ongoing regular payments, potentially for rent and other things, if there are subsequent actions that the individual might need to take.

In the context of closing the accounts, some of the challenges I think we find are, first, which types of accounts? We know it is individual accounts, joint accounts, additional signatories, charities and some smaller accounts, but is it all those instant access accounts or is it simply current accounts? That has been a challenge that we faced that was clarified, I think on the Floor of the House, with the Act.

There is also the treatment of balances, particularly of course for overdrafts. That has a bearing on the amount of time we would consider appropriate for actually closing the account. Currently, the default would typically would be 28 days, but, if there is an overdrawn balance, we would probably like to see that paid and the account closed quicker to lessen the propensity for that overdraft to drift up again.

I think we have a bit of an issue where there might be knowledge of a disqualification but we might not hold the qualifying account. These days we tend to have financial services across a range of providers, and the extent to which our responsibility might be to disclose to those whom we feel might hold the account, or whether we do nothing, is a moot point just now.

The granularity of disclosure once we have given notice to close the account is something that we are working on with Treasury officials. Currently we are looking at whether that should include balances, additional parties to an account or details of regular payments, which potentially would include details of the originating account for that regular payment. That is not information that we would necessarily find easy to extract from systems, so that is an additional build for us.

In the Financial Conduct Authority we have obligations to treat customers fairly. We found with the Act that there are some cohorts of consumers where actually it is quite difficult, in the sense that those with no fixed address might not have suitable matching criteria to pass through the database, so then we should call them out. That of course creates a customer service issue. Elderly consumers are another area—perhaps they have not registered on the electoral roll and therefore, again, we might need to call them out. We need to get that referral process quite slick.

We will in parallel need to implement the payments accounts directive, which has a requirement that you are familiar with to do with account opening for citizens legally resident in the European Union, which is a different definition and criterion to work through.

In terms of the pragmatics, as we envisage what we call operationalising, we would see that first wave of checks across a database—it might be as many as 120 million-something accounts, so there will be a volume of activity. Thereafter, if we were to undertake checks quarterly, say, we would be very keen just to check any additions and amendments to a register, rather than to have to sheep-dip the whole database.

The final point of course is the timeline. We have had some useful clarifications, again, from Treasury officials that suggest that the first checks might not take place until the latter stages of 2017. Typically, banks need something of the order of 18 months to implement mandatory change processes and to go through testing and assurance internally. We might be able to foreshorten that—we are talking about a period of about, say, 12 months. Whatever we can do ahead of the detail in the secondary legislation would be very helpful to us.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 123 Thank you for that detailed and comprehensive answer on the provisions, which is quite helpful and instructive on the level of detail that is engaged here. Just briefly, perhaps you could reflect on the provisions of the Immigration Act 2014 and their implementation. What has been the practical experience? Clearly a lot of this quite detailed analysis was engaged there as well. What has been the situation to date?

Eric Leenders: On volumes, I think we have seen about 1.9 million searches go through the CIFAS database. From that we have identified some 14,000 matches against the database, and those have been referred back to the Home Office. That has in turn identified some of these issues such as people with no fixed address or those elderly consumers. So we can draw on that experience to inform our thinking around the Bill.

We consider that the CIFAS process is working quite well. The truncated timeline was difficult, frankly; there was an element of manual processing, and with manual processing there is, unfortunately, a higher propensity to or risk of error. So that is why we called for that slightly longer timeline—to ensure that as far as possible we can automate and therefore reduce the error rate within the process.

[Anne McLaughlin]

Q 124 I want to talk about potential discrimination under the right to rent aspects of the Bill. Not everyone is as enlightened as Mr Lambert, and so not everyone believes that you cannot tell by a face, a name or an accent whether someone is British. I was very struck by a statement sent out by the Residential Landlords Association, which I am going to read from:

“Whilst the Residential Landlords Association condemns all acts of racism the threat of sanctions will inevitably lead many landlords to err on the side of caution and not rent to anyone whose nationality cannot be easily proved.”

How concerned are you that the Bill will allow some people to use it as an excuse for their racism and that others will inadvertently end up acting in a racist manner, not because they want to but out of fear that they may end up breaking the law if they do not?

Richard Lambert: How concerned am I that some will use it? Very. How concerned am I that some will use it inadvertently? Fairly, but our experience is that most of the concern about the provisions is from people who have not gone into the detail, are worried about what they might have to take on, are concerned that they do not have the expertise or knowledge and are very focused on the penalties, because what has been pushed hardest is not the responsibility or the practicality but the level of penalty for getting it wrong.

Having had a quick look, like my colleague, at the evaluation report that was published this morning—we had a chance to look at it before we came in here—something like 22 of the 26 landlords who responded said that it was actually relatively easy to undertake the checks and that there did not seem to be an obvious level of overt discrimination, although there is still an undertone, and in a few cases that does happen.

It is a real risk, but when I said what I did about awareness of the fact that we live in a multicultural, multiracial, multifaceted society, that was not me speaking—obviously, I believe that—but me recounting what has been said to me by landlords at local meetings around the country. They are very concerned about the practicalities of how you make this work, and they realise that you cannot make assumptions, from looking at somebody, about whether they have the right to rent or whether they are a British national. The only way is to check and to check everyone. I recall anecdotally from my colleagues on the Home Office working group on the evaluation report that the largest level of resentment coming back from tenants was from the indigenous white British population, who did not understand why they were being asked to prove the right to rent. You actually get a counter-intuitive response.

David Smith: People who will discriminate would discriminate anyway, so in a sense people who are going to actively discriminate as a result of the Bill would have been actively discriminating before. Our biggest concern is what we have chosen to call document discrimination. Of the UK indigenous populace—or however you want to describe those people—17% do not have passports. If a landlord has two people walk through his door who want to rent the same property, and one says, “I have a passport and can do the right to rent check right now,” and the other says, “I do not have a passport but will come back tomorrow with two forms of identification off the secondary list,” the landlord is technically not breaking the law by taking the first person, and in practice I am sure that he will take that first person.

Our concern is that there are groups of people who are not in possession of passports and driving licences. As a lawyer, I have many such people as clients, because I have a large client base of elderly people or people who are in care. There are substantial numbers of those people, and a lot of them are renting, increasingly in the private rental sector, as there is a change from social renting to private renting. There is a potential difficulty with providing those people with proper identification.

We have called for a much simpler document for people who are on benefits and would already have been checked to receive benefits. Local authorities could provide a single document—perhaps watermarked or stamped—that landlords could be clearly told was acceptable as a single document. At the moment those people are going to need to produce two separate documents. They may not have them to hand, or it may take time to acquire them. The benefits letter has to be signed by a named official, and named officials may be reluctant to put their names on these documents. Our concern is that groups of people who should have no reason to be concerned by this legislation at all may find themselves being put through checks that they cannot easily meet.

Immigration Bill (First sitting)

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Tuesday 20th October 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Keir Starmer]

Q 7 Am I right that people may be left destitute on the basis of a decision that is wrong or that needs to be retaken?

Mike Kaye: Exactly right.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

Q 8 Mr Kaye, do you agree, in principle, that there should be an ability to take sanctions against people who have no right to be in this country and are frustrating efforts to remove them or not co-operating with a voluntary returns mechanism? Do you accept that principle as a legitimate policy response?

Mike Kaye: Absolutely. We have a system whereby we try to discover whether people meet the criteria for refugee status. It is a very tough measure. You have to prove that you are being persecuted as an individual, that your Government are unwilling or unable to protect you, and that there is no other area of your country that you can go back to and be safe. It is a high measure to prove. I fully accept that if people do not meet that and if that assessment is accurate, they need to return to their home countries.

What I have highlighted is that the measures in the Bill will not help you to return individuals who have come to the end of the process. If you really want to return people at the end of the process, you need to stay in touch with them. Quite often an equation is made between refused asylum seekers and abusive asylum seekers. That is not the case for the vast majority. Last year, the Home Office refused 70% of Iraqis, 70% of Libyans, and 65% of Afghans. I am not necessarily saying that those decisions are wrong. I am saying that you need to understand that those people at the end of the process still have a fear about returning and that is why they do not always co-operate. I take the Minister’s point that sometimes people are not co-operating because they do not want to go home and they should rightfully go home, but for an effective policy, you need to stay in touch with people to encourage them to return voluntarily return or if forced removal is to take place.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 9 There is obviously a distinction that can be drawn. Clearly, you are not supportive of certain aspects of the policy, but I think you have taken the principle. Can I ask about the safeguards that would operate? Am I right in saying that the provisions under section 55 of the Children Act would apply and that provisions relating to destitution would be there in terms of support?

Mike Kaye: I think it is section 55 of the Immigration Act; but this is a question for you, Minister, about something that we do not understand. You said on Second Reading that the protections in the Children Act would be retained. You said in the consultation that safeguards would be introduced for children. I do not understand how you can safeguard children from destitution when it is the explicit aim of the policy that children should not get support from statutory services, local authorities or central Government. Will you explain that to Members, because I cannot square that circle.

[The Chair]

Can I just jump in? I should have explained to witnesses—I apologise for not doing it at the beginning—that Ministers love these sessions. It is a time that they get to ask questions, rather than getting grilled. I want to bring some more Members in, because I have about five queueing up to ask questions.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

I am grateful for that. I should warn you that this is the favourite session of the Minister because he gets to ask questions, rather than answer them. I have a horrible feeling he wants to start. Minister.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 31 Perhaps I could open things up for the Committee by asking an open question. Sir David, what are your thoughts on the establishment of a labour market enforcement directive, the need for greater co-ordination on enforcement, and the impact that might have on the employment market overall?

Professor Metcalf: By the way, the Minister and I are appearing this afternoon as well, so we are seeing a lot of each other today.

In a nutshell, I think the proposals are terrific but let me elaborate. My background includes, as part of the Low Pay Commission, 10 years setting the minimum wage, so I know something about the minimum wage, compliance and enforcement issues.

On the Migration Advisory Committee, particularly when we have looked at less skilled immigration, on which we published a major report in 2014, we do not stay in London; we go on visits. We have seen a lot of exploitation, in some cases bordering on slavery. That in a sense confirms the view that I had when I worked on the minimum wage that we do not have sufficient resources to do the compliance and enforcement as effectively as one would wish. For example, when we went to Wisbech in connection with the low skills report, we came across some excellent examples of joined-up government, with different agencies working together. That got us thinking that we have these very good bodies but are they working sufficiently harmoniously? In our report, we said in no uncertain terms that there were insufficient resources devoted to enforcement and that the fines and probability of prosecution were basically trivial—I do not think we used that word, but I will use it now.

In a sense, many of the employers where the gangmasters operate have no real incentives to abide by minimum standards or the minimum wage. We have a flexible labour market—I think this is a good thing because it helps our productivity and with jobs and so on, although that is a matter of debate—but we are not enforcing the minimum standards.

I think the three main proposals in the BIS-Home Office document will go a long way towards assuaging the concerns that we set out. I know that some of my other academic friends who have thought about this—possibly more than me—share that view. Just as an aside, the consultation document on labour market enforcement is excellent and I am sure that the Committee will recognise the co-operation between the Home Office and BIS. Sometimes there is tension between the Departments, but on this occasion they have produced an absolutely marvellous document.

First, you have a director of enforcement and he or she will, in a sense, set out strategy, report and be the pivotal person in an intelligence hub. They will mainly be dealing with the minimum wage with HMRC, the Gangmasters Licensing Authority and the employment agency standards inspectorate. They are the three bodies that he or she will have to engage with initially and set the strategy out for and think carefully about resource allocation.

The second proposal is a new offence of aggravated enforcement, which is in a sense between the rather minor infractions—I do not want to call them less serious—of the minimum wage rules and those that are very serious, almost slavery. Right now, we have not got anything that sits in the middle and the proposal is essentially to have one that sits in the middle. In the extreme, that might attract a two-year custodial sentence, so it is pretty serious.

The third proposal is that the Gangmasters Licensing Authority can spread out—not so much in its licensing role, but it does have considerable expertise in horticulture and agriculture and the proposal is that it could check in particular on aggravated enforcement in other sectors, such as construction, hospitality and so on. When I was an academic in this area, I wrote that there was a lack of enforcement. I have been involved with both the minimum wage and immigration in particular on the low-skilled end, and I think the proposals are really excellent.

[Craig Whittaker]

Q 32 For laymen like me, are you saying that the new role of the director of labour market enforcement is a good idea?

Professor Metcalf: A very good idea indeed, yes.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

I am aware that time is getting on, and I also have quite a few Members who still want to ask questions. Undoubtedly, we could talk for a long time about the trafficking issue, but we will move on.

Minister, would you like to ask a question?

[James Brokenshire]

Q 66 I want to ask Mr Miley, who has expertise and experience in licensing, how he thinks the powers contemplated in the Bill could strengthen existing enforcement around standards in the licensing process, and who should be holding licences. Also, I would like to know about his experience of using closure notices, and some of those short-term measures that are currently reflected in licensing legislation and are now being contemplated in a broader sphere.

John Miley: To answer the last question first, my authority has had no particular experience of using a closure notice. We have come close to it, but we tend to try to negotiate issues out before such things has happen. It is good that the proposals reflect the current practices under the Licensing Act 2003, which will make life a lot easier for licensing authorities to utilise the situation. There is the potential for reviews of a premise’s licence if a closure notice is actually turned into a closure order, which would be quite useful.

As for general enforcement, it is difficult to quantify the real issues relating to illegal working in licensed premises. As I said before, there is the possibility that that happens in late-night refreshment houses. In ordinary licensed premises, such as public houses and restaurants, that does not tend to be the case. It also seems that the national fraud initiative has not discovered much in the way of that in the past year. It has found more in the taxi trade, which I understand will be dealt with later in an amendment to the Bill.

The Bill will give the immigration agency the ability to undertake risk-based inspections and actions without needing to get the police involved, which happens currently. I am unsure whether it will improve standards. I suspect that if people can get away with it, they will continue until they are caught. An example then needs to be made and the employer needs to be properly castigated.

[James Brokenshire]

Q 67 Do you have any comments on intelligence sharing and joint working with other agencies to support the work of local authorities?

John Miley: It is to be commended. Generally speaking, licensing authorities do not work in silos. They work in the broader scheme of things, and work with the police and the Security Industry Authority and more generally with immigration. Good work is currently going on in quite a lot of cases. We do an awful lot of partnership working. In fact, it is one of the cornerstones of the licensing procedures that we consult and gather information among ourselves. In Nottinghamshire, all the responsible authorities meet every six weeks. That will include the immigration authority when the Bill is passed. It is a useful evidence and information gathering and sharing process.

[Kelly Tolhurst (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Q 68 I want to explore a little more around employers who are repeat offenders. I have witnessed examples of activity from smaller businesses that have caused concern. Does clause 9 go far enough to prevent such businesses, once caught, from doing it again? Is it enough to stop people who have already caused concern for agencies?

John Miley: In terms of licensing, if enforcement action is taken and it goes to its full conclusion, there is the possibility of closing the premises down. That is quite a strong penalty, so it would potentially have the effect of stopping it.

Kevin Green: Certainly, in terms of the recruitment industry, the conduct regulations and the enforcement in BIS are pretty clear. If people are found guilty, they can be struck off or prosecuted. We actually see few examples of repeat offences.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

I thank the hon. and learned Member for the point of order. I will certainly make inquiries where necessary—unless the Minister wants to say anything.

[James Brokenshire]

I can say that, as Members may have noticed, there is a written ministerial statement on the Order Paper in relation to the right to rent scheme roll-out more generally. Alongside that, the evaluation is being published. I suspect—and can certainly talk to hon. Members outside the Committee as well—that the evaluation will be available on gov.uk well in advance of our considerations this afternoon.

[The Chair]

That brings us to the end of the sitting. Thank you again to the witnesses; you have the message. The Committee will meet again at 2 pm.

Right to Rent Scheme

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Tuesday 20th October 2015 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

I am announcing today the roll out of the second phase of the measures relating to the private rented sector as prescribed by sections 20-37 of the Immigration Act 2014, otherwise known as the Right to Rent scheme. Where these provisions apply, landlords are prohibited from renting accommodation to people who are disqualified from a right to rent by virtue of their immigration status.

The provisions will come into force across the whole of England as of 1 February 2016.

The provisions were implemented on a phased basis starting on 1 December 2014 in Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Dudley, Walsall and Sandwell, in line with the commitments made by the then Government. The impacts of the first six months of the scheme have been subject to an evaluation exercise. I have considered the findings of the evaluation and the advice of a panel of experts in arriving at this decision. The evaluation can be found at: www.gov.uk

The Government have continued to engage with the private rented sector and the new Immigration Bill 2015, introduced to Parliament on 17 September 2015, provides new powers to evict illegal immigrants and offences where unscrupulous or rogue landlords choose to flout the law and are exploiting illegal immigrants for their own gain.

This demonstrates the Government’s determination to control immigration in the interests of the whole country and in ensuring that people here unlawfully are not able to enjoy a settled life here in defiance of our laws.

[HCWS253]

Immigration Bill

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Richard Fuller (Bedford) (Con)]

Some of the speeches from Opposition Members have done a bit of a disservice to our Home Secretary. I think that history will reveal her to have been an outstanding Home Secretary, given her capacity to cover the range of issues that the Home Office has to deal with, and the immediacy and potency of some of those issues. Those Members have also missed some of the breakthroughs that she has made in identifying issues of abuse, particularly in relation to people trafficking, and of discrimination in relation to stop and search that other Home Secretaries have not addressed. We must put that on the record to balance the argument.

As many people have said, it is undoubtedly true that immigration is the No. 1 issue. It is equally true to say that the vast majority of people who believe that to be the case are not anti-immigrant. However, they have specific things that they want to see in our immigration policies. They want to know that the system is under control. They want to know that the numbers of people coming to this country are reasonable and that our borders are secure. They want to know that the people who come here make not just an average contribution— a break-even contribution—but an above-average contribution to our country. As we have heard from people who are themselves the daughters of migrants, they also want to know that the people who come here will do their best to integrate into the country that they now call home. And of course, they want those people who they believe have no right to be here to leave or to be removed.

As I look through the Bill, I miss the provisions relating to many of those early points. The focus of much of it is on that last point. It says, “Please leave.” It asks, “What can we do to encourage you to leave?” I ask the Minister to listen to what hon. Members have said about the importance of evidence in pursuing the policies in the Bill. If we cannot supply evidence to support the measures we are taking, I fear that some of the negative consequences—some of which have perhaps been presented today with a bit of hyperbole—might indeed come to pass.

I am worried that the Bill focuses too strongly on symptoms rather than on the underlying causes of the concerns about immigration in this country. Our previous Bills have contained a number of measures that have precisely targeted the causes, dealing with bogus colleges, spousal visas and even the English test. I do not see much in this Bill to reinforce my belief that that is a continuing thread of the efforts of our Government’s policies.

Above all, we want measures that deal with immigration but avoid things that are costly, ineffective or unjust. Will the Minister therefore support efforts that would limit detention in certain circumstances? He is aware of a case involving a pregnant women. He wrote to me at the end of last year saying that her healthcare had been adequately provided—he was relying on second-hand advice—but as we found out last week in the High Court that was not the case. Continuing with the detention of pregnant women leaves us open to these sorts of abuses in the future. This Bill is an opportunity to correct that, address the position of victims of torture and rape, and introduce a limit on the period of detention for people who are subject to immigration regulations.

As has been said, this is not just about the extension of powers, but about how well we are using the powers we already have. I urge the Minister to provide more information in Committee about how the current powers are being used and why they are not sufficient. Many of us do not wish to see landlords and business people used as the front line of our Border Force; we are concerned about the potential for them to be criminalised. We are also concerned that as we put further pressure on people’s ability to stay in this country we will drive them to vagrancy and crime. I am sure that is not the intention, but I am also sure the Minister can see the potential for that in some of these measures. We have to get the balance right. The same applies on the issue I raised in my question to the Home Secretary about potential discrimination, which has been widely mentioned today.

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

My hon. Friend has been taking the issues of immigration and detention seriously, as he has Yarl’s Wood on his doorstep in his constituency, and we have discussed them on many occasions. On detention, welfare and vulnerability, may I say to him that the Stephen Shaw report, which has recently been finalised, is addressing all those factors, and that we will be considering and acting on its recommendations carefully? I hope that gives him some reassurance about the attention and focus we are giving to the issues that I know he holds dear.

[Richard Fuller]

That is very reassuring, particularly as it comes from such a capable Minister.

I am used to being a bit out of kilter with the norm of political views about immigration here—it used to be just me and perhaps the former Member for Brent Central and the hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn). Of course, Sarah Teather has gone on to better things and the hon. Gentleman has gone on to be leader of the Labour party, so I am left here talking from a bit of a different angle from everyone else. The focus of much of this is illegal immigrants, and there is one word that nobody has used about illegal immigrants—compassion. I wish to discuss that.

Whether we like it or not, we are talking today about a lot of the toxic legacy of the Labour party’s lack of control of immigration. When I became a Member of Parliament in 2010, there were people who had been in this country for five, six or seven years when they had no right to be here, and there were children who had grown up in our schools when their parents had no right to be here. People should not blame the Conservative party for trying to clear up the mess that was left, but my party and this Government need to see not only effectiveness, but compassion. What is compassionate about sending a child who turns 18 back to a country that they have never really understood? Where is the compassion in taking money away from someone while they are waiting for their case to be resolved? Where is the compassion for someone who is holding on to stay in this country when they have no right to remain here? Where is the compassion in leaving them for years and just making their life harder and harder in the hope that somehow they just leave?

We can talk about effectiveness, but it is our values, too, as a country that we are talking about. I, for one, want to make sure that the Bills we pass in this country stand up for the best principles of our country as well.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

This has been a very wide-ranging and passionate debate. Clearly, there are some issues that deserve further scrutiny.

Let me welcome the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) to his new role; this is the first opportunity I have had to do so. I look forward to further debates with him on the issues that have been highlighted during this debate.

The hon. and learned Gentleman raised a specific point on the statutory defences under the Modern Slavery Act 2015. Perhaps in the sense of wanting to respond to him positively so that we can end the debate in that manner, I can say that that Act does include provisions relating to defences. There will be a defence to the new criminal offence of illegal working in the Bill. The Director of Public Prosecutions also issues guidance to protect victims from unfair prosecution. Certainly, I can give that reassurance to him and to other Members who raised the point during today’s debate.

May I say to all hon. Members that this Government are firmly on the side of the vast majority of law-abiding migrants who play by the rules and contribute so much to our society? The UK has a long and proud history of immigration and this Government will continue to welcome the brightest and the best, the skilled and the talented to our country and to recognise the contribution that they make.

I thank all my hon. and right hon. Friends for their support of the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson) rightly highlighted the concern in his community and the need to deal with illegal immigration. My hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins) made the important point about exploitation by organised crime. He made the very clear statement that exploiters have the most to fear from this Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris) talked about strengthening criminal sanctions for illegal working.

My hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Mr Bellingham) raised an issue in relation to nurses and talked about some of the things that he has seen in his constituency. I can say to him that we take the advice on who should go on our shortage occupation list from the Migration Advisory Committee. That Committee said at the start of this year that nurses should not go on that list. It is considering the evidence further, and we will continue to take account of what it has to say on these important matters.

My hon. Friend the Member for Pendle (Andrew Stephenson) highlighted the new closure power and the scope of the director of labour market enforcement. We have launched a consultation today and I welcome contributions to that. My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies) highlighted his experiences on his visit to Calais, a point that was also raised by other hon. Members who have been out to northern France. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Kelly Tolhurst) also highlighted this point, and we are continuing to work with Kent County Council on the pressures it has experienced, particularly those concerning unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

My hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) made a powerful point about having good migration, not mass migration, and my hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Byron Davies) talked about how we need to stop the abuse carried out by rogue landlords. I hope that we will reach a point in our discussions on the Bill at which we will highlight how these measures contribute to taking action against rogue landlords more generally, working with local authorities to clamp down on the appalling conditions in many of the properties those landlords own. This is about supporting the proper regulated sector and joining up to take action against those who are exploiting the vulnerable.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

The Minister said earlier that the Modern Slavery Act 2015 would protect victims who might be prosecuted for working illegally. He says that the Bill will enable us to deal with rogue landlords. Will he put in the Bill protection for landlords who let a property accidentally, who are not rogues, and protection for victims of trafficking?

[James Brokenshire]

We will no doubt discuss that point in Committee, but the Bill builds on measures in the Immigration Act 2014, including the right-to-rent provisions, the mechanisms that operate and the clear guidance we provided in the pilot scheme, and we will continue to do that. We are clear that there should not be any discrimination and that will be set out firmly in the guidance we will provide. That point about how the Government are approaching the measure must be stressed to the House.

My hon. Friend the Member for Gower mentioned the impact on children, a point that was raised by other hon. Members as well. Section 55 of the Children Act will continue to apply as regards safeguarding duties towards children.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller) talked about immigration detention and I repeat that we have commissioned the Stephen Shaw review into immigration detention. Stephen Shaw has recently submitted his report and his findings are being considered carefully. The report will be published by laying it before Parliament alongside the Government’s report on its recommendations.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael]

rose—

[James Brokenshire]

I am sorry, but I have only two minutes left and I need to raise a few more points.

My hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Mims Davies) rightly highlighted the exploitation of legal workers and my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) pointed out the inconsistencies in the reasoned amendment, which time does not allow me to highlight in greater detail.

It is also important to highlight the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Fareham (Suella Fernandes) about the “deport first, appeal later” provisions and I would like to update the House. The original measures in the 2014 Act were considered by the Court of Appeal and were upheld as lawful. It is important to highlight that evidence, as evidence was a point emphasised by the shadow Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham). This matter has been considered carefully by the Court of Appeal and found to be lawful, and it has been upheld.

It is also important to highlight the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) about diversity and how often the most diverse communities see the effects of migration. There is a need to tackle illegal immigration in those communities as much as anywhere else, and they have provided support. My hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet (Craig Mackinlay) stressed that we should uphold the law for those who seek to abide by it. That is the central tenet of the Bill; it is about upholding the law for those who abide by it. We should uphold those principles and deal with illegal immigration.

I look forward to the continuing debates on the issues that have been highlighted. The Bill will ensure the public’s expectation of a system that is fair to British citizens and legitimate immigrants while being tough on those who abuse the system and flout the law. We believe that the measures in the Bill are right, proportionate and necessary and I commend it to the House.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

Oral Answers to Questions

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

The Government regularly monitor the effectiveness of the visa application process in sub-Saharan Africa as part of their monitoring of the global visa service. We are committed to the UK benefiting from a safe and secure visa service while providing a first-class operation to genuine visitors.

[Patrick Grady]

Next month marks 10 years of formal co-operation between the Governments of Scotland and Malawi, but I have heard from the Scotland Malawi Partnership that Malawian nationals are finding it increasingly difficult to apply for visas, making strengthening community links more difficult. Given that the partnership has told me that every part of the system seems to be becoming about charging more and delivering less, will the Minister meet me and representatives from the partnership to discuss those concerns in more detail?

[James Brokenshire]

I am always pleased to meet hon. Members to discuss the work of the Scotland Malawi Partnership, and I fully recognise the close bonds and ties that have existed for many years. Our focus is on delivering a high-quality service, and I am pleased to note that about 86% of applications from Malawi are successful. We are considering closely how we can improve the service further, however, and I am certainly happy to meet the hon. Gentleman to discuss the issues on his and the partnership’s mind.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

The Mayor of Calais has a point, does he not, about there being a unique pull factor—[Hon. Members: “She!”] I do apologise. I am sure she is a most impressive lady and a friend of our nation. Anyway, she has a point about there being a unique pull factor in the benefits we pay, how we deal with discretionary leave to remain and the fact that people can vanish into the black economy. Rather than just concentrating on visa applications, therefore, will the Minister undertake to remove all these pull factors into this country?

[James Brokenshire]

I think my hon. Friend, in his own distinct way, has highlighted the important distinction between legal and illegal migration and the challenges we have faced in terms of migratory flows and those putting their lives at risk on the Mediterranean sea and in the hands of people traffickers. We are examining all options, as part of the Government’s comprehensive stance, and focusing in particular on those people traffickers and smugglers selling people false hope and putting their lives at risk.

[Mr Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Con)]

4. What guidance she has issued to police forces on high-profile policing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)]

T3. My right hon. Friend will be aware that most goods vehicles coming into the United Kingdom are operated by overseas companies. How can Her Majesty’s Government encourage those firms to operate appropriate levels of security to prevent people using those vehicles to gain illegal entry to our country?

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

We have strengthened our partnership with the haulage sector and food industry to reduce the challenge of clandestine stowing away. My hon. Friend highlights an important point about the international aspect. We hosted a conference in Brussels setting out and sharing good practice because we need to ensure that there are high standards not only among UK hauliers but among EU hauliers.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

T2. Does the recently updated Home Office country information and guidance on Eritrea take into account the recent findings of the UN commission of inquiry into human rights in Eritrea?

[James Brokenshire]

We keep our country guidance up to date. The hon. Gentleman highlights a particular piece of evidence. Our guidance is constantly reviewed and we look at all forms of evidence in setting out the approaches that our entry clearance officers should take.

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

T5. The Modern Slavery Act 2015 was a great achievement for my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and her colleagues. What progress is she making in working with other European countries to tackle modern slavery, especially in the light of the report from the Centre for Social Justice on organised crime groups that move men, women and children across EU borders into slavery?

[Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow North East) (SNP)]

T4. A month ago a very impressive young woman came to my surgery asking for my help. She is in her mid-20s and is a high-flying accountant—or she would have been had her wings not been clipped by the shock news that she has no status in this country through no fault of her own, but because her parents have overstayed their welcome. She is now estranged from them. Does the Home Secretary have any sympathy with children in those circumstances who have done nothing wrong? Could I write to her and ask her to use some discretion in looking at this case?

[James Brokenshire]

It is very difficult to comment on an individual case without knowing all the facts and circumstances, but if the hon. Lady would like to write to me with that information, I will consider it carefully.

[James Berry (Kingston and Surbiton) (Con)]

T8. I am proud that in Kingston offers have come in thick and fast to host Syrian refugees since we offered to do so not after the terrible image of Alan, but more than 12 months ago. This has not always been easy because some of the refugees come from incredibly traumatised backgrounds. Is the Home Secretary assessing which Syrian refugees have been victims of torture and ensuring that they are housed close to areas where they can access rehabilitative services?

Immigration Detention

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield), and my hon. Friends the Members for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) and for Bedford (Richard Fuller) on securing today’s debate on the report of the joint inquiry by the all-party group on refugees and the all-party group on migration into the use of immigration detention in the UK. I am aware that all three of them, as well as others who have contributed to this debate, were part of the panel that produced this report, and I thank them and their fellow panel members for their work. The report raises interesting points on an extremely important issue, which we have examined and continue to examine carefully. Like other right hon. and hon. Members, I also want to place on the record my thanks to Sarah Teather, who chaired the panel and did some extremely important work. This was certainly a topic on which she was very impassioned, and remains so to this day.

This debate has highlighted the fact that immigration detention remains an important and emotive subject. Depriving an individual of their liberty is one of the most serious acts a state can take. The decision to detain should never be taken lightly and, once the decision has been taken, it is incumbent on the state to take proper steps to safeguard the health and welfare of those in detention. I always stress that those detained should be shown respect and dignity. This has certainly been an area of particular focus for me since I became the Minister for Immigration last year. I have visited a number of immigration removal centres; indeed my first visit this Parliament was to Yarl’s Wood, and last week I was over at Heathrow seeing the two immigration centres there. The issue will command a continuing focus, on the part of not only the House, but Home Office Ministers.

The Home Office uses immigration powers of detention to prevent unauthorised entry to the UK or to effect the removal from the UK of people who have no right to be here. A lot of the debate has highlighted asylum, but IRCs deal with many broader matters, including foreign national offenders and cases where people have overstayed and are abusing their right to be in this country. It is therefore a complex picture, but it is important that we discuss these points in the way we all have during today’s debate.

[Seema Malhotra]

rose—

[James Brokenshire]

I have a limited time to cover quite a lot of points. My normal approach would be to take lots of interventions, but I would like to make a number of points in response to those raised, if hon. Members would allow me.

It is very important that we are able to remove people who have no right to remain in the UK and those who have abused our hospitality by committing crimes. We would always prefer those with no right to be here to leave of their own volition, and a number of mechanisms in the Immigration Acts and the forthcoming immigration Bill are designed to promote that, but unfortunately it does not always happen. When individuals refuse to leave voluntarily, we must be able to enforce their removal. That may well require a period of detention, which we aim to keep as short as possible.

We need to be clear about the fact that detention is not only a necessary tool to support the removal from the United Kingdom of foreign criminals, which I am sure Members in all parts of the House would endorse, but equally important in managing non-compliance by people who are here without lawful basis of stay.

As a number of Members have mentioned, the report’s principal recommendation is that immigration detention should be subject to a statutory time limit of 28 days. I should explain that it is not possible to detain under immigration powers indefinitely, although some have sought to suggest otherwise. Indefinite detention is unlawful. To be lawful, detention must be based on one of the statutory powers in the Immigration Acts, and must accord with the limits set out in case law from both the domestic courts and the European Court of Human Rights. There must be a reasonable prospect of removal within a reasonable time frame, and the Home Office must continue to show how a case is being progressed to removal if detention is to be maintained.

Our published policy makes clear that there is a presumption in favour of liberty and that detention should be used only as a last resort, but there will be some cases in which longer periods of detention may be appropriate. The hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) asked me about that. “A reasonable prospect of removal within a reasonable time frame” is a highly case-specific consideration. A reasonable time frame may be longer, for example, for a person with a history of non-compliance with immigration conditions than for a more compliant individual. Criminality and public protection concerns will also play heavily into the consideration of the length of the reasonable time frame. There are some very difficult cases involving foreign-national offenders who may be seeking to frustrate their removal. No doubt we will return to the issue of how that can be managed, in the context of, for instance, the use of electronic tagging, and I look forward to those future debates.

I am sure Members agree that it would be totally unacceptable to reward foreign criminals and illegitimate migrants who refuse to comply with immigration law by requiring their release, even when removal was imminent, simply because a blanket time limit had been reached. Members may recall that an amendment to introduce a statutory limit of 60 days was proposed in another place during the Report stage of the Immigration Bill last year, and was rejected by a majority of over 300. The rejected time limit was significantly more than the 28-day limit proposed in this report. In the light of that earlier clear vote, the Government do not currently propose to return to legislate on the issue, but we will keep it under review.

The report recommends that more use should be made of alternatives to detention in the UK, and I entirely agree with that recommendation. Our published policy already reflects the view that detention should be used only as a last resort, and that alternatives should be considered whenever possible. I am considering carefully what further steps may be taken in that regard.

Concerns have been raised that we do not deport or remove people quickly enough, and that they may therefore spend longer in detention. Concerns have also been raised about the number of people who are released from detention rather than being removed from the UK. We are keen to ensure that deportation or removal takes place promptly. We streamlined immigration and appeal processes in the Immigration Act 2014 to support that, and we are considering what further steps can be taken.

People may be released from detention for a wide variety of reasons. For example, their circumstances may have changed in a way that makes detention inappropriate, they may have been granted bail, or their removal may have been prevented or delayed by unexpected obstacles such as the securing of travel documents or the lodging of late legal challenges. It does not follow automatically from a release that the original decision to detain was wrong.

However, there is more that we can do in this area. Work is in hand to examine the purpose, operation and size of the detention estate. As part of that work, we will be looking at the issues of gatekeeping for entry to detention and the review of detention, once authorised, to see how those important functions might be enhanced. We will certainly reflect on the points that have been made about caseworking. I take this very seriously, because I want to ensure that the use of detention is appropriate and is applied in the right manner.

Part 2 of the report focuses on the physical conditions of detention, including the standard of accommodation provided in immigration removal centres and healthcare representation. It is common ground that when we do detain, it is vitally important for individuals to be held in humane but secure accommodation, and for us to ensure that their welfare is safeguarded at all times. Obviously, we have an overview from Her Majesty’s chief inspector of prisons, and I meet representatives of the independent monitoring boards that operate in immigration removal centres, whose reports I take extremely seriously.

Following the publication of the report, we asked Stephen Shaw, who was conducting an independent analysis of welfare in IRCs, to look specifically at part 2 as part of his review. We have not yet received Mr Shaw’s report and had an opportunity to consider it fully, and it would not be appropriate for me to speculate on its findings, but I assure the House that we will be considering it very carefully indeed. It is a serious piece of work, and we will give its response serious consideration.

I am conscious that I am nearing the end of the 10 minutes that Front Benchers are customarily allowed. I apologise again to Members for that fact that I may not have been able to respond to every single point. I thank the members of the all-party parliamentary groups for their work in putting the report together, and I thank the Members who secured today’s debate. I take this issue extraordinarily seriously, and the Home Secretary does as well. That is why we commissioned Stephen Shaw’s report, and, once it has been concluded, we will update the House accordingly.

EU REFIT Regulation

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2015 Written Statements

[The Minister for Immigration (James Brokenshire)]

The UK has opted in to the regulation (COM (2014) 715 final) repealing certain acts in the field of police co-operation and judicial co-operation in criminal matters to the extent that it applies to the European evidence warrant (EEW).

This regulation originally repealed several acts in which the UK does not participate. However, the proposal was revised to include the EEW, a measure in which the UK also does not participate, but which remains partially in force between some member states. The Government therefore decided to opt-in to the part of the regulation that repeals the EEW under protocol 21 to the EU treaties.

This gives greater legal certainty around the UK’s non-participation in the EEW given the revised terms of the proposal.

[HCWS163]