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Latest entry 10 Nov 2026
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Showing every spoken contribution, including 12,868 under 12 words. Hide short remarks
I thank the Minister for being generous with his time. Can he clarify a point? The Secretary of State was trying to stop some of the pull factors, and I welcomed the extension from five to 10 years in the qualification period for indefinite leave to remain, but it seems that the incoming Prime Minister will now water those new policies down. Is that the case?
T5. The Home Secretary is boasting about the fact that hotel asylum seekers’ numbers are being reduced, but of course, they are being moved into houses in multiple occupation and the Government will not produce the figures of how many are going into HMOs. This means that places such as Hinckley and Bosworth are getting more HMOs. Will the Government commit to producing the data to show exactly where people are being moved from and to, so that we can see what is happening specifically around HMOs? That has not been released in the quarterly data, and I would be grateful for an answer.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I thank Members for their contributions and the more than 700,000 people who signed the petition, including more than 1,000 in my constituency of Bexhill and Battle. This is a very real issue in my part of East Sussex. The Government forced on us the Crowborough asylum camp, just over the border in the constituency of Madam Deputy Speaker, my hon. Friend the Member for Sussex Weald (Ms Ghani), but very close to my own. We met the Minister just last week, alongside local residents and councillors, and heard at first hand about groups of young men gathering in this small rural town to drink on the streets, smuggling alcohol back into the detention centre and working illegally, and all the distress that that is causing. I am not surprised that the Government targeted Wealden for a camp, considering that it is run by Lib Dems and Greens, with their refugee asylum safe haven policy. At the heart of this debate is a question of control: whether the state and the people on whose behalf it operates have control of our borders or not. For the nation state to have meaning, a country must be able to remove people from within its borders who have no right to be there—whether to send them to offshore processing or detention, or to deport them entirely—and at scale. I welcome the opportunity to set out the overwhelming rational and moral argument for ending small boat crossings and the illegal people-smuggling trade, which is at the forefront of the petition. Whatever opponents of strong border controls say, and however much they attempt to demonise and caricature those of us who want to see control returned, I know not only that is this what the vast majority of the British public want, but that it is the right thing to do. We have to be clear-eyed about the status quo. Right now, not only is our asylum policy effectively determined by people’s ability to pay to get here, but the trade itself is putting money directly into the pockets of criminal gangs that are also involved in other crimes, such as drug dealing and violence. Whether someone makes the crossing is not a measure of their need, their comparative level of desperation or fear, or their vulnerability. In fact, it is quite the opposite. Small boat crossings favour the able-bodied, those with sufficient money to pay for the journey and those closest to Europe. They are not based on anything that Parliament or the Government have decided, nor are they a reflection of humanitarian crises. We know for a fact that every single person making the crossing from France—because they are coming from France—is not fleeing directly from a war-torn country where they are at risk of persecution. Decent, caring and compassionate constituents of mine say to me all the time, “They are safe; they’re in France.” People may have a preference—a desire—to be here instead of in France, but that is not what the asylum system was set up for. That is not what the laws and protections were intended to enshrine and make sacrosanct. However much defenders of those laws and regulations choose to ignore that, the British public can see through it. The first retort to those criticisms of the status quo is to say, “Well, that’s our fault. That’s our responsibility for forcing them to cross the channel”—as the spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats, the hon. Member for Woking (Mr Forster), said. But proponents of that argument entirely fail to play through the consequences of the safe and legal routes that they advocate for. I will do so now, in the hope that people might actually consider the matter. If we set up places whereby people can apply in third countries easily, what would happen? First, those places would themselves become a focal point for potentially large numbers of people seeking asylum, as there are quite literally millions of people living under conditions that would qualify them to seek asylum here in the UK. However much people pretend otherwise, we clearly would have to refuse some of those applications. Of course, the Green party advocates open borders and no restrictions, so maybe it would not refuse any, but let us assume we would not take everybody who applied by a safe and legal route. What would happen then? Would those people simply turn around and say, “Oh well, I tried to get in. I tried to use the safe and legal route; I’ll leave it there”? Of course they would not. Those people would then turn to exactly the same people-smuggling gangs and illegal crossings, and we would be right back to square one, only then they would be coming on top of the ones granted asylum through safe and legal routes. Even the most humanitarian-minded person would have to accept that there would be limits. If there are limits, we have to say no, and for “no” to mean anything, it has to be enforceable, or the whole thing collapses. Those opposed to deportation for those coming here illegally have no answer to that moral and logical question, so what must we do? We must make it absolutely clear that if someone comes here illegally, they do not get to stay—no ifs, ands or buts. Everything else, in terms of control and having a system that works, is underpinned by that. If we do not have meaningful control—because taking years to deport people will achieve nothing—then all the rest of the policies collapse. To stand any chance of actually delivering that, we have to come out of the European Court of Human Rights. Anyone who has studied the expansion of the powers of that Court cannot reasonably argue that it is fulfilling the same function intended for it. Some may argue that they are happy with that and welcome it, but it impossible to say that it is operating as envisioned by its creators. Let us take one example: article 3 of the European convention on human rights, which gives the right to be protected from “torture or…inhuman or degrading treatment”. That right was constructed in the wake of world war two, in which, as well as being murdered, Jews, political prisoners, homosexuals and other minorities were subject to the most horrendous treatment imaginable: medical experimentation, starvation, death-inducing slave labour. How is that article 3 right now interpreted? It is now used by potential deportees to successfully oppose their deportation if the standard of healthcare in the country they would be returned to is not sufficient to meet their medical needs—the same standard of healthcare that is all that is available to millions of their fellow citizens in the countries that we would seek to deport them to. When did a right to be protected from torture or inhumane or degrading treatment become a right to access a particular standard of healthcare? We know that the convention has now gone as far as to be applied to questions of whether a particular Government is doing enough to tackle climate change. That is why even some of our most senior and respected jurists, such as former UK Supreme Court Justice Lord Sumption, are clear about the need to leave. I recommend anyone sincerely interested in this topic to listen to his 2019 BBC Reith lectures on it. He explains clearly how human rights laws are increasingly used in place of the practice of politics, democracy and elections. They have increasingly become questions of balancing. They always were, of course, but the balancing has become finer and more nuanced, and at their heart, those questions are societal and political, not legal. We should ask how it has come to this situation. It has come about because, at its core, in its willingness to expand its remit and take expansionist interpretations of the law, the European Court of Human Rights is fundamentally misconceived. The law does not exist in isolation. In the nation state, there is an interplay between the courts and judges, the parliaments, the executives, and the people. They balance each other out. Courts are, of course, operationally independent, but if they act intolerably, and if they consistently and gravely make rulings out of keeping with the views of the public they serve, Parliament can step in, as the body accountable to the public. However much in very many ways we want our courts to be independent, it is vital that in the end, ultimately, they are not independent of the people. This delicate interplay secures legitimacy for each actor in the system, and there is no such interplay in the European Court. That is how it has found itself so clearly removed from the expectations and views of the millions of people of the member states it seeks to advocate for. We can see, over many years, member states seeking to oppose the Court’s expansionist rulings; it has ignored them to its own detriment. We also see other countries—Canada, Australia and New Zealand—that are able to manage fair and balanced rules of law with rights for individuals without the need to be part of any supranational body. Anyone who argues against these ideas must be careful what they wish for, because the patience and generosity of the majority of the public is at its thinnest, if not exhausted entirely. If we do not respond to that, others with views that we are more widely unhappy with will take control, and the Government who have failed to secure it will be as much to blame as anybody else. As our current Prime Minister completes two years of his premiership, I hope that Members can reflect honestly. The promises of the Government to take control of our borders and to smash the gangs have undoubtedly been a failure. They gave the impression that tweaks could be made to significantly alter the number of crossings, but that has proven simply not to be the case, and they now have very little time left. The only country with a proven track record is Australia, and it implemented a policy of not allowing people to stay. Tweaking will not help. One in, one out with France will not help. The sooner the Government realise that, the better for the taxpayer, the better for those who want to be compassionate but do not want to be exploited, and the better for the crime agencies fighting the people-smuggling gangs. Virtue signalling will not achieve anything. Doing whatever it takes to actually regain control of our borders is the only thing that will, and the Government must get on and deliver it.
Let us say that in a year from now, all this stuff has not worked and the Home Secretary has committed to doing whatever it takes. Does “whatever it takes” include withdrawing from the ECHR?
Does the Minister really think that Canada or Australia do not get to deport people? Those countries are not in the ECHR, but they have deportation agreements with third countries, so in no way is it a necessity to be in the ECHR to have deportation agreements.
But we do not deport all rapists and paedophiles, because some of them make successful ECHR claims and get to stay in the country. Again, unless the Government are willing to tackle that, they will not get to do the things that the Minister has so much rhetoric about.
I do not know whether hon. Members know this, but just for the record, we took more people than we sent back under the Dublin agreement. It did not act as any deterrent, because a person was more likely to get to the UK on the basis of the Dublin agreement than they were to be sent away.
I want to begin by thanking Madam Deputy Speaker, my hon. Friend the Member for Sussex Weald (Ms Ghani), for securing a meeting with the Minister, local MPs, councillors and residents of Crowborough, where the Minister heard for himself reports of illegal working, groups of young men drinking on the street and the smuggling of alcohol on to the site. If the Government are to force this camp on people, the very least they can do is ensure that people there play by the rules. Can the Minister introduce breath testing and make it clear to anyone drinking on the site that if they are found to fail those tests, their asylum claim will be immediately thrown out?
As the House will know, the Home Office does not routinely publish figures on the number of small boat arrivals who abscond or whose whereabouts subsequently becomes unknown. Given that the Department holds case records that would allow that to be calculated, will the Home Secretary commit to publishing that information periodically so that the House can properly scrutinise the scale of the problem?
In Devon, local government reorganisation is taking up a great deal of bandwidth and detracting from what councils should be doing. My constituents want to know whether the announcement on Thursday will hold beyond the week. The Minister has avoided this question from multiple Members today: does the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham)—the future Prime Minister—agree with the proposed timelines and delivery for local government reorganisation in Devon?
The Government’s proposed carve-up of Hampshire ignores their preset criteria, has no mandate and splits up East Hampshire. The benefits, if there are any, will come way off in the future, whereas the costs and the disruption happen now. Does the Minister think that the advent of a new Prime Minister is a good moment to stop in its tracks something that would otherwise make his fiscal task harder?
May I associate myself with your comments, Mr Speaker, and those of the Home Secretary about Ann Widdecombe? She was a formidable human being, and someone about whom we are all thinking very much at this time. This week, in the light of that news, the safety of politicians is something that we should all consider. The Home Secretary may be aware of the situation of a district councillor in Staffordshire Moorlands, Councillor Jill Salt, who has been the victim of sexualised artificial intelligence images. I do not agree with Councillor Salt on many matters, but on this I stand with her in total solidarity. Will the Home Secretary join me in condemning the comments of a Reform councillor, Dave Poole, who said that Councillor Salt needed to grow bigger balls in order to do the job?
In four days’ time, we will mark exactly two years since I first explained to Ministers how much the people of Staffordshire Moorlands do not want to be part of a greater Stoke local authority, do not want devolution forced on them, and want their say on who makes decisions about what happens there. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin), may I implore the Minister for a referendum? We do not want this imposed on us in north Staffordshire; we want to have our say.
Like many on this side of the House, I have very fond memories of Ann. She made the effort to travel to Staffordshire Moorlands—not many people do; we are quite isolated—[Interruption.] Yes, they come to Alton Towers—the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee) is quite right. But Ann came to Consall Hall Gardens, as it was then, to do a fundraising dinner for me, and she delivered a tour de force, which I suspect the then Prime Minister, now the noble Lord Cameron, might not have entirely approved of. My association was totally enraptured, however, and thought it was the most wonderful event. It is still fondly remembered in the association, not least because Ann told me I had to take off my heels because it would not be appropriate to stand too tall next to her in the photographs. May I also thank Staffordshire police for contacting me this weekend and making a visit to my home to review my security arrangements? I know that police forces across the country will be doing that and I am grateful to them for taking that time. May I ask the Home Secretary to comment on what might happen in the longer term around the Prevent duty? She will know that the Home Affairs Committee produced a report on new forms of radicalisation and extremism, with some recommendations that, we hope, might help law enforcement and others to find those who have a tendency towards violence. Will the Home Secretary consider that in the longer term?
It is an honour to follow the hon. Member for Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton (Jim McMahon). He was absolutely right about the tone we need to employ. I recognise the comments he made about his constituents. I suspect that his constituents have a very similar view to my constituents—we are not too far apart. I refer him to the Home Affairs Committee report on asylum accommodation, which talked about the point he made about the disproportionate numbers of asylum seekers in lower-cost accommodation areas. We did ask the Home Office to look at that. I also suggest that he avoids X and Facebook in the morning. It will probably make his life a lot better. I rise to speak briefly on the Bill, which I broadly welcome. These are matters on which our constituents expect action to be taken. It may not go as far as some would like in some areas and it may go too far for others, but on Second Reading we look at the principle of a Bill, and I agree that it should have a Second Reading and then be considered in Committee and on Report. There are a couple of points I want to make before I move on to my main comments. On article 8 of the ECHR, the Chişinău declaration was very encouraging. It is a good step forward to see agreement across the Council of Europe area on the way article 8 and other parts of the ECHR are being abused. I suggest that the Minister look at section 2 of the Human Rights Act 1998, which states that the UK courts “must” refer to decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. Perhaps the wording could be changed to “may” to make it easier for courts to disregard clearly ridiculous decisions that should not have any bearing on the decisions being taken in our courts. I also refer him to the work done in the coalition Government on the European arrest warrant, when we were still a member of it. We changed the rules in the UK so that only somebody who was guilty of a crime that would be a crime in the UK could have an arrest warrant applied to them. Previously, we had all sorts of spurious claims such as not paying tips to Greek waiters and so on. The Minister may want to look at that. On small boats, the Select Committee visited northern France. The hon. Members for Edinburgh East and Musselburgh (Chris Murray), for Sunderland Central (Lewis Atkinson) and for Bassetlaw (Jo White) were all there to see the work being done. It is very impressive to see the work being done jointly with the UK. We heard a lot from UK law enforcement and others who were working closely with their French counterparts. I encourage more of that. However, I cannot stress enough how important ministerial oversight is. I pay tribute to our former colleague James Brokenshire, who as Immigration Minister insisted that he receive an update every single day on the number of people entering the country, the number who were in claims and the number of visas being issued. He kept on having a daily update. Madam Deputy Speaker, it is a delight that you are in the Chair, but my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) was also an Immigration Minister and she employed a similar approach. It would be fair to say that the evidence we have heard on the Select Committee indicates that that level of ministerial oversight has not happened at all times, and perhaps that is why we saw some big spikes.
I thank the hon. Member—my friend from the Select Committee—for an enjoyable visit. We learned a lot, but it was a challenging visit, as there was an awful lot to take in. This is a problem that affects countries across the world; it is not an issue that can be solved by one country alone. We have to work together. We also came away agreeing that if everybody who arrived from France was immediately taken back to France, it would kill the trade of the people smugglers. That is something that we should start trying to negotiate with our friends in France. In the short amount of time that I have left, I will focus on part 5. I declare that, as co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on human trafficking and modern slavery, I have some concerns. Apart from anything else, human trafficking and modern slavery is not an immigration crime. Someone’s immigration status may make them more vulnerable, but it is a financial crime—it is the exploitation of one human being by another for financial gain. Although I understand the reasons and we are grateful that there are some good points in the Bill, it is concerning that it keeps being put into the migration bucket, rather than being seen as the financial crime that it is. I am in contact with a number of organisations, and the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, Eleanor Lyons, has been in touch with me. There is general agreement that there are some good things in the Bill—the strengthening of civil orders and the support for children are welcome. However, the abuse of the modern slavery protections needs to be looked at, because nobody can self-declare as a victim of modern slavery. A first responder has to say that this person is likely to be a victim of modern slavery, so what is going wrong with the first responders? Why is it that first responders are being dragged into, as the Government say, declaring people to be victims of modern slavery to avoid deportation? That is something that should be looked at without removing protections for victims. One has to have a victim-centred approach to this crime in order to solve it; it cannot be solved only by pursuing the bad guys. The victims have to be at the centre, because it is an extraordinary crime in which the commodity that money is being made from is the human being. It is not a drug, a firearm or any other product; it is a human being. That human being needs to be prepared and able to give evidence, to speak out and to recognise the crime that has been committed against them. Victim support is essential to solve this crime. If one wants to see the issue in a hard-nosed way, the only way we are going to kill the trade is by looking after the victims so that we can stop the bad guys. That is the basic point. I do not have time to go through the specifics, but I urge the Minister to engage with the many authorities—in particular, the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner—to see where the measures that the Government have introduced may have unintended consequences that make it harder to tackle this crime. With that, I will sit down and let other Members speak, as there are many others who wish to do so.
In recent weeks in West Worcestershire, I have met local police and the police and crime commissioner; the police and crime commissioner is being abolished, and the police are being reorganised. I have met the local health commissioners; they are being reorganised, and Healthwatch is being abolished. I have met district councillors; they are being abolished, and their ability to make determinations on planning applications has been taken away. Can the Minister explain how any of this throwing everything up in the air is actually going to help my constituents, particularly the most vulnerable?
Will the Leader of the House confirm that, given that the other place is sitting next week, there is nothing to stop him tabling a business statement to enable this House to sit next week? Given the enormity of the events happening in the Government next week, does he not think that would be a good idea?
Mr Speaker, I join you in paying tribute to Ann Widdecombe. She was a formidable campaigner who served with huge integrity. She will be missed. I know that the whole House supports the police in delivering justice for Ann. Reports today suggest that the Home Secretary and the new Prime Minister plan to capitulate to some of their open-border MPs on the Government’s own indefinite leave to remain plans. Previously, the Home Secretary was clear that the changes will apply to those in the country already. Will she now repeat that pledge, or is the new Prime Minister doing his first U-turn before he has even entered Downing Street?
The Home Secretary was not as quite as clear as she was previously. Vile rapist Shabir Ahmed must be deported back to Pakistan along with all eligible rape gang perpetrators. Separately, survivors like Fiona Goddard have said that they are terrified at the prospect of rape gang perpetrators being released early from prison in the coming weeks. First, will the Home Secretary bring forward emergency legislation to ensure that Ahmed can be deported? Secondly, will she urgently make the changes needed to ensure that no rapists will ever be eligible for the Government’s expanded early release scheme?
I thank the Home Secretary for advance sight of her statement. I start by offering my deepest condolences to Ann’s family and friends. She will be terribly missed. Ann sat as the Conservative MP for Maidstone for nearly a quarter of a century, and in the European Parliament for the Brexit party. She served in government and in opposition, including as shadow Home Secretary. She always fearlessly spoke her mind. She did not worry about whether her opinion would be popular or fashionable; she always said exactly what she believed and exactly what she thought. Her integrity and her fortitude were unmatched. I first met Ann 29 years ago at a university debate, where we were speaking on opposite sides. I was a callow 21-year-old student; she had just left government and was at the height of her powers. I remember starting my speech by asking her to treat me more gently than she had recently treated Michael Howard. Needless to say, I was put very firmly in my place. Ann was also a much-loved celebrity, with memorable appearances on “Celebrity Big Brother” and “Strictly Come Dancing”, where she was whirled around by Anton Du Beke. We will all remember Ann fondly as a public figure who was always formidable, always charming and always entertaining. As we discuss this appalling murder, we should heed the words of Devon and Cornwall Assistant Chief Constable Matt Longman, who said over the weekend: “We are aware of online and public speculation, particularly with regards to motive… I urge people not to share or engage with that speculation. It’s unhelpful” and distressing to Ann’s friends and family, and is particularly harmful to the police’s investigation. Criminal barrister Dennis Kavanagh has also pointed out that speculation makes the police’s job harder and, in some cases, could even prejudice a trial. I urge everyone debating this issue to keep that in mind. It has just been confirmed by the Home Secretary that counter-terrorism police are now leading the murder investigation. In order to help to avoid that speculation, can the Home Secretary properly share any further information about this matter without prejudicing the investigation? I thank the police for releasing the information they have so far, including about the identity of the suspect. It is always important to release as much information as possible in the interests of transparency and to avoid misinformation filling the void, as Jonathan Hall KC, the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, has said previously. I will turn now to threats against those in public life. Any threats against MPs, who have been democratically elected to represent their constituents, or against others in public life, should be taken extremely seriously. In the past 10 years, two MPs—Jo Cox and Sir David Amess—have been murdered, and now a former MP has been murdered, too. The threat is clearly real. I remember when, in 2017, terrorist Khalid Masood drove a car into pedestrians along Westminster bridge, injuring more than 50 people, four of them fatally, and then ran into New Palace Yard—just yards from where we sit in this Chamber—where he fatally stabbed PC Keith Palmer. That was also an attack on democracy itself. Mr Speaker, I would like to thank you personally for all the work you are doing to protect MPs and those in public life. As the Speaker of the House of Commons, I know that you have made the safety and protection of those in public life your highest priority, and I would like to thank you for that. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] We must redouble our efforts to ensure that public political figures—both those who are MPs and those, like Ann, who are not—always receive the proportionate protection that they need. I would be grateful if the Home Secretary could confirm that she will review all the arrangements with that objective in mind. I believe that, in this country, we should be able to debate each other robustly on important issues, but that we should also speak to each other in a way that is civil and respectful. Of course, nothing excuses violent attacks on public figures, but we should all also set an example of civility and calm, and not inflame matters. We need people to step up and become MPs and to speak in the public square. Debate and disagreement are what make our country great. Ann Widdecombe exemplified that every minute of her life, and I pay tribute to her. I know that we will all remember Ann forever.
For the benefit of the House and for clarification, does the Home Secretary intend to implement her proposed ILR changes via amendments to the Bill, or via the immigration rules in the autumn?
I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add: “this House declines to give a Second Reading to the Immigration and Asylum Bill, while welcoming some of its provisions, because the Bill does not ensure all foreign criminals and illegal immigrants will be deported; does not end asylum for illegal immigrants; does not stop modern slavery claims suspending removal; does not stop illegal immigrants getting citizenship; does not make the changes the Government promised to reduce the numbers of people eligible for Indefinite Leave to Remain; because the Bill will allow sponsor human rights claims, which will enable people outside the UK to enter under human rights grounds; because measures in the Bill such as narrowing the ability to make Article 8 and modern slavery claims will not be effective while the UK remains in the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act 1998 remains in force; and because the provisions in the Bill are not capable of eliminating illegal immigration.” The reasoned amendment, which stands in the names of the Leader of the Opposition, myself and my right hon. and hon. Friends, is to decline to give a Second Reading to the Bill on the grounds that it does not go far enough to combat illegal immigration or to ensure that all foreign criminals are deported. First, I cannot help but notice the absence of the hon. Member for Dover and Deal (Mike Tapp), the immigration Minister, whom I was expecting to see in his place. Perhaps the Home Secretary has not yet forgiven him for openly defying her a few weeks ago, leading to her rather extraordinary public campaign to get him fired. No wonder she has so much trouble deporting illegal immigrants—she cannot even deport her own junior Minister from Marsham Street. [Interruption.] Does the Home Secretary deny that she tried to get him fired a couple of weeks ago, unsuccessfully? I notice that she makes no such denial. At the beginning of her speech, the Home Secretary made a number of claims about statistics, one or two of which I would like to gently take issue with. She referred to small boat crossings. Since the election, 76,000 people have dangerously and illegally crossed the channel by small boat. That is more than under any other Prime Minister. Let us keep in mind that those crossings were undertaken mainly by young men, all of whom were leaving a safe country, France. Nobody needs to flee danger in France. The Home Secretary also referred to removal numbers. Some 85% of those removals are voluntary, and only a tiny fraction are of people who arrived by small boat. In fact, since the election, removals of people illegally entering by small boat have amounted to only about 5% to 7% of small boat arrivals. Given that someone entering this country by small boat has a 95% chance of staying, and gets put up in taxpayer-funded accommodation, it is no wonder that crossings have occurred in record numbers. The only way of deterring these crossings is if almost everybody arriving gets deported when they arrive. I observe that of the 80,000 people whose asylum claims were rejected at first instance in 2025, only 12,000 left or were removed. It is true that FNO removals are somewhat up, which I welcome, but if we look at the breakdown by nationality, it tells a rather different story. The numbers of foreign criminals deported to countries such as Albania, Romania, Lithuania and Poland are high when we compare them against the offender population. When we look at countries outside of Europe, the numbers are much lower. For example, Jamaica, Iraq, Nigeria and Somalia together have 1,150 offenders in prison—and many more out in the community—yet last year, only 110, or less than 10%, were removed. Yes, the removal of FNOs to countries in eastern Europe is going well, and I commend the Government on that, but when it comes to removing foreign criminals to countries outside Europe, such as Jamaica, Iraq, Nigeria and Somalia, the figures are very low. The reasons for that are some of the ones that the Home Secretary touched on earlier.
Our membership of the ECHR has less effect on deportations to Europe, because it is hard to make an ECHR-based claim if the receiving country is in Europe. However, when it comes to deporting foreign criminals to countries outside of Europe, such as those I listed, there are frequent ECHR-based claims, as the Home Secretary said earlier. I will expand on that point later, but there is no question in my mind that ECHR-based claims are one of the reasons why it is difficult to deport foreign criminals to those countries I just listed. Human rights claims, combined with asylum claims and modern slavery claims, mean that dangerous criminals remain in this country. I will give the hon. Gentleman a number. Under section 32 of the UK Borders Act 2007, the Home Secretary is under a legal duty to deport a foreign national sentenced to more than a year in prison, yet 20,000 people who meet that criterion are at large in the community, and many of them continue to offend. They are still at large in the community because they make claims under the ECHR, modern slavery and asylum routes. Those 20,000 people are a risk to my constituents and to his, and I take exception to some of the Home Secretary’s high-fiving at the beginning of her speech. Let me touch on the proposal for so-called safe and legal routes, or refugee sponsorship. The numbers that we are talking about would be in addition to the number of asylum claims that we are already processing. Last year saw the highest number of asylum claims in history. From memory, it was somewhere in the region of 109,000. This year, the number will only be a little lower. Adding to that when we already have record numbers of asylum claims strikes me as irresponsible. The Home Secretary said that there would be a cap, but she did not specify what it would be; I would be interested to hear that. She also asserted that the people coming in by these routes would not be a burden on the general taxpayer, because their sponsor would look after them. She neglected to mention that that support has to last only for the first year. Thereafter, the taxpayer could have to pick up the tab. I must say that I do not support the creation of these schemes until we have illegal immigration and asylum claims down essentially to zero. The argument that the creation of safe and legal routes will somehow stop small boats is absurd, because unless we give access to this country to everybody who wants to come—to everybody congregating in northern France, waiting to get on a dinghy—the ones who do not come in on that scheme will still try to cross on small boats. The idea that safe and legal routes will stop the boats on their own is absurd.
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. For many nationalities that cross the English channel by small boat—Afghan, Iranian, Iraqi, Eritrean and Sudanese, to name just six or seven—the asylum grant rate is well over 90%. In some cases, it is very close to 100%, which means that crossing by small boat is tantamount to an automatic right to stay here, even though those illegal immigrants—and they are illegal immigrants—are leaving a safe country. They are not fleeing danger; they were in France already. I agree that that creates a massive pull factor.
I agree that the situation in countries such as Afghanistan creates large movements of people—that is correct—and fixing problems at source is clearly the best thing to do. However, I do not think transferring potentially tens of millions of people—he gave the number just then of 60 million or 70 million—into the west is the right solution to this problem. Those people who are displaced are probably better helped close to their country of origin. Transporting people en masse into this country is not the solution. When we have illegal migration under control, by which I mean at zero, there is a case for a limited safe and legal route, but until such time as we do that, I do not think such a transfer is reasonable. By the way, the people who are crossing by small boat are not the most vulnerable. They are not typically women and children, or people who are sick and vulnerable. They are mostly young men who are paying people smugglers. If we were going to choose who to help, it would not be them.
I will give way again, but I want to make a bit of progress first. There will be plenty of other opportunities later. I will briefly touch on indefinite leave to remain, which is conspicuous by its absence from the Bill. We heard the policy proposal when it was announced last November, but we still do not have any of the details laid out. I agree with the thrust of the Home Secretary’s proposal to increase the period to 10 years, because otherwise a large number of people—about 2 million—who entered in the past four or five years will get a permanent right to stay, including a full right to benefits. That includes people who came in on skilled worker visas sponsored by, among others, kebab shops and fried chicken shops. I am keen to make sure that the Home Secretary sticks to her previous pledge that these rules would apply to people who are in the country already, and does not give in to pressure from her Back Benchers. I remind the House that the Home Secretary said to the Institute for Public Policy Research on 5 March this year that the change to a 10-year qualification period means “applying any rule changes to those who are in the UK today, but have not yet received settled status.” I hope she stands by her commitment. If she does, we Opposition Members will vote for it. She has our support on that. While we are speaking about legal migration, let me urge the Home Secretary to reconsider her plan to introduce remote language tests, which are open to enormous fraud and abuse. Australia and Canada rejected them for that reason, and some domestic professional bodies, including the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants, have stopped carrying them out because they are so open to fraud. I know that this testing is more efficient and I know that it will save money, but it is massively open to fraud.
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman knows nothing about Facebook clips, but let me be honest: mistakes were made in the past, and the policies that we have now developed, under new leadership, will fix those issues. In fact, this indefinite leave to remain policy was first proposed by us about a year ago, and then, very wisely, the Home Secretary adopted it. Let me come to the commitment that the Home Secretary made on Shabir Ahmed, the vile gang rapist who should be deported back to Pakistan. We support the amendment to section 7 of the Immigration Act 1971, although section 33 of the UK Borders Act 2007—I think it is subsection (1)(b)—might need some attention as well. I would only ask the Home Secretary not to do that by amending this Bill, which will probably take a year or so to reach the statute book. I hope that she will consider doing it instead through emergency legislation in September, which could be completed in a couple of weeks; we took the Terrorist Offenders (Restriction of Early Release) Act 2020 through Parliament in, I believe, 15 days in February of that year. There is not a moment to lose, and this can be fixed quite quickly. As for the substance of the Bill, I agree with some of the Home Secretary’s analyses of where the problems lie. She is right to say that the immigration appeal system, modern slavery laws and human rights laws are being abused on an industrial scale by foreign criminals, and also by people with no legal right to be here, including people who came here illegally in small boats. These illegal immigrants and foreign criminals do make repeated claims, time after time. The Home Secretary gave the example of a foreign criminal whom it took four years to deport. I was aware of the case of a Somali man who entered the country illegally and participated in the violent gang rape of a 16-year-old girl. On his release from prison, it took eight years to deport that man back to Somalia, because he made two or three different claims on sometimes contradictory grounds. I think that he made two modern slavery claims, and a number of human rights claims as well. There have been other cases in which foreign criminals have avoided being deported. For example, an armed robber avoided being deported back to Nigeria on the grounds that his mental health needs would not be taken care of perfectly there. Another man, a drug dealer, was not sent back to Iraq on ECHR grounds because, apparently, he had become too westernised. There was not a single thought for the safety of British children and the need for them to be protected from paedophiles. A Zimbabwean paedophile was not deported to Zimbabwe because he might get treated with hostility there. The judge gave no thought to protecting British children, and no thought to protecting our citizens from criminals. In another case, a man was taken off a charter flight to Jamaica, again on human rights grounds—I think it was article 8—and about six months after being removed from that flight, he murdered someone on the streets of south London. That happened because of the supposed human rights of a criminal who went on to commit murder. I agree with the analysis that our immigration legal system, our modern slavery system and the human rights system are being abused on an industrial scale, and that has to end.
I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend. When it comes to foreign criminals, and people who enter this country illegally, having exited a safe place, namely France, I do not think that they should be given all the protections that we have been discussing this afternoon. Let me turn to some of the specifics that the Home Secretary has put in the Bill. The changes to the immigration tribunal system, and the measures dealing with modern slavery and trying to better define article 8 constitute small steps in the right direction, but on their own, they are not going to work. Past Governments have attempted to make such measures work, but they have essentially failed, and I think that they will fail again. For example, better defining article 8 in domestic law was attempted in—I think, from memory—section 19 of the Immigration Act 2014, which I believe created section 117 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002. That was an attempt to do, broadly speaking, what the Home Secretary is trying to do now, and it did not work, because judges—not just those in Strasbourg, but our domestic judges, empowered by the Human Rights Act—simply continued interpreting family rights very expansively and allowing foreign criminals to stay. I admire the Home Secretary’s effort to do this, but it has been tried before and it did not work. Excluding modern slavery claims by foreign criminals has also been attempted before. The Bill essentially seeks to amend section 63 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, which was an attempt by a previous Government to fix this problem four or five years ago, and it has been repeatedly struck down by the courts. Because of the ECHR and the way in which it is incorporated by the Human Rights Act, it does not matter how we legislate. As with section 63 a few years ago, following the Home Secretary’s most recent attempt today judges will use the European convention on human rights, empowered by the HRA, to circumvent laws passed by this Parliament. The Home Secretary experienced that herself just last week, when her “one in, one out” scheme was upset by vexatious modern slavery claims. She tried valiantly to fix the loophole in guidance, and last week a court struck it down. The conclusion that I have reached—having suffered in the Home Office in the past as she is suffering now, trying to fix these issues within the construct of the ECHR and modern slavery legislation, and the examples that the Home Secretary gave only support this—is that the only way to fix this issue is to come out of these institutions entirely. We cannot do it by tinkering, which is what the Bill seeks to do. The previous Government tried it, I have tried it personally, the Home Secretary’s predecessor tried it, and she is now trying it again. The truth is—
Let me finish the point. The truth is that tinkering like this does not work when we have very expansive rights-based conventions. The only way of fixing this properly is to exit the ECHR entirely, repeal the Human Rights Act entirely, exit the Council of Europe convention on action against trafficking in human beings—the modern slavery treaty—and say that people entering the country illegally, particularly from a safe place such as France, simply cannot claim asylum. That would enable us to legislate in this House without courts’ effectively circumventing our legislation, as they do on a near-daily basis. It would enable us to deport not just some foreign criminals but all foreign criminals, and it would enable us to deport, within a week of arrival, anyone entering the country illegally by small boat, either to their country of origin or to a safe third country if we could not deport them to their country of origin. That would be a genuine deterrent to prevent these unnecessary crossings, and would give us back control of our borders. While I share many of the diagnoses in the Home Secretary’s speech, I honestly do not think that these measures, which are incremental and an attempt to work within the existing framework, will work. Only radical solutions will actually work. I see that the hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) is twitching with excitement, so I think I had better give way.
When the ECHR was first conceived and entered into as a treaty in 1950, it was developed for very good reasons. It was designed to avoid a repetition of the horrors of the second world war, which the hon. Gentleman refers to, but over the years judges in Strasbourg and domestically, using the living instrument doctrine, have expanded and expanded and expanded the definitions of the articles, which are necessarily very vaguely worded. For example, article 3 of the ECHR is on “freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment.” When it was written, that meant “Don’t send people to concentration camps.” On the face of it, the words are very reasonable; if we were to sit down today and come up with a convention, it would have those words in it. But the way it is applied by judges today means that we cannot send foreign criminals back to other countries, like Zimbabwe, in case they face hostility there as foreign criminals. We cannot run our border system because of the way the articles are interpreted. The balance has now shifted so far that it is preventing border control and a number of other things as well, and that is why we have to leave the ECHR. I do not accept the proposition that the only thing standing between us and barbarism is the ECHR or the Human Rights Act. This country has led the world in human rights, not just for decades but for centuries. If there are any gaps in our protection of rights that this Parliament feels are exposed by leaving the ECHR, the proper remedy is for this sovereign, democratically elected Parliament to legislate to fill them. If there is a gap in our domestic statute or our common law, and this House feels that the gap needs to be filled, the right way to do so is not by having judges make up expansive case law; it is by having this democratically elected parliament debate the issue, as we are doing now, and take a vote on it. That is the way in which democracy should function. I think that one of the reasons mainstream politics is coming under pressure, if I can put it euphemistically, is that pledges made at elections, by successive Governments, on issues like immigration do not get delivered. One of the reasons why is that the human rights legal framework prevents them from being delivered. The Home Secretary gave examples of that, and it is essentially a democratic deficit; this Parliament, not judges, should decide how our borders are run. While I welcome these measures as small steps in the right direction, I do not think that they will work. I do not think that the measures in this Bill go far enough, because they do not address the fundamental problem.
I will take one last intervention before finishing.
First of all, I do not think that Winston Churchill would ever have envisaged that the ECHR, which he helped create, would lead us to being unable to control our borders. Secondly, on the Good Friday agreement, I urge the hon. Lady to read the 175-page report by Lord David Wolfson KC, which explains how our Good Friday agreement obligations could be upheld after leaving the ECHR. Thirdly, on her point about protecting rights, the ultimate guarantor and protector of the rights of people in this country should be this democratically elected Parliament, not judges handing down expansive definitions of vaguely-worded clauses that have acted as a charter for illegal immigrants and foreign criminals. I ask the House to support our reasoned amendment. While these are small steps in the right direction—
I need to finish. While I agree with the diagnoses that the Home Secretary eloquently set out in her speech, the measures that she proposes simply will not work. I know that because I have tried to introduce such measures in the past, including by amending section 63, and the courts do not let them stand. Until we come out of the ECHR and the ECAT treaty, stop illegal immigrants claiming asylum and end judicial review of most immigration cases, we will not get control of our borders and the public will continue to lose trust in mainstream politics. That is why I moved the Opposition’s reasoned amendment.
I call the shadow Minister.
I call the Chair of the Environmental Audit Committee.
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.
Order. The hon. Lady really does need to get to a question. There is a really important piece of legislation still to come and this statement will finish at 6.40 pm, so many Members are going to be disappointed unless questions are very brief.
Ann Widdecombe was a force of nature, and my heart goes out to all her friends and loved ones. The BNO route has provided sanctuary for Hongkongers fleeing the autocracy of the Chinese Communist party. However, its effectiveness should not be measured in visas granted, but in whether people are actually safe here. BNOers live under CCP bounties, doxxing and surveillance. A year after the foreign influence registration scheme went live, not one person or company has registered as working or taking money from the Chinese state, and the Government still refuse to put the Chinese Communist party in the enhanced tier. Do the Government really believe that not a single organisation in the UK is engaged in political influence on behalf of the Chinese Communist party, and if not, how many investigations have there been into those failing to disclose? The annual report on FIRS was due to published by the end of June. Are the Government planning on sneaking it out during the summer recess to hide their failure to protect us and Hongkongers from the Chinese Communist party?
Nobody asked for this, and the lack of a mandate has been compounded by councils like Rutland county council refusing to engage with any opposition councillors. I want to make it clear that the responses of the Lib Dem-run Rutland county council do not represent the views of Rutlanders or indeed the entire council; that in Leicestershire, we do not want the Leicester city land grab; and that rural Lincolnshire and Stamford do not want to be run by urban Lincoln. Will the Minister consider delaying the process to make sure that all councils have engaged with all councillors? They might be telling her that they are doing so, but they are certainly not.