Electronic Travel Authorisation

Lord Coaker Excerpts

Monday 17th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I thank the noble Viscount for that question. He makes an important point. As I have said before in this House, we endeavour to operate our e-gates policy on the most welcoming basis we can, and this includes allowing EEA nationals to use our e-gates. It is perhaps unfortunate that the same privilege has not been extended reciprocally so far, but this is something officials continue to work on. I reassure the noble Viscount that my understanding is that the Schengen border area negotiations resulted in an agreement that there would be exemptions for residents and family members of EU citizens from ETIAS, although it is a little unclear what those are and how they will be affected at this stage.

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not the case that, whatever systems are used at the border, staff are needed to oversee the border and the e-gates? Can the Minister comment on the recent Daily Mail article, which said that the Defence Secretary

“has refused the Home Secretary's request for 750 troops to be deployed to plug gaps in the UK’s Border Force—claiming that Ms Braverman should have made contingency plans for the shortages, rather than expecting him to act as a last-minute stop-gap”?

The Home Secretary has said that, without those 750 members of the Armed Forces

“to help man immigration posts to cover for striking or absent Border Force officers, then British travellers could face long queues”.

What does the Minister say to that?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for that question. It is quite a long way from comparing ETIAS and ETAs, of course, but the short answer is that the figures that appeared in the Daily Mail article relate to the military aid to civilian authority application, which was made in order to make up for shortfalls in Border Force staff during strike action. I am glad to confirm for the House that there is no strike action planned during the peak of the summer season. I can also confirm that the Border Force strikes at Christmastime saw the effective deployment of soldiers; I am sure that Members of this House are grateful to them for their excellent work on that occasion.

I can assure the noble Lord that we have trained and are ready to deal with situations relating to a shortage of Border Force staff. We have recruited more staff, cancelled some leave and trained staff to address more front-line roles, so the noble Lord should be satisfied with that.