Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Bill

On the substantive elements in new clause 1, I shall disappoint the House in that the most compelling point made in Committee was about the issue of the twilight zone and criminality. New clause 1 addresses that matter, although it may be clumsy. The hon. Member for North Southwark and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes) clearly said that the provision affects only a limited number of people. On the appeal right process—non-suspensive appeals versus in-country appeals issue—it is an even more limited group. The points made about criminality in the new clause are limited to those who would exercise on a notice of removal and through the one-tier appeal their right to pursue an asylum or human rights claim. That is the very narrow pool of people who are affected in that regard. Let me be clear—those people will not get extensions to leave or the rights and benefits that leave accrues because, as a result of the position that they are in, they have no leave. There can be no leave to pursue. I do not want to reach the stage—there has been evidence of it over the past three, four or five years—of putting a perverse incentive in the core of a Bill under which those people, albeit small in number, queue up to make erroneous and capricious human rights and/or asylum claims simply because they know that it will elongate the right to work and the benefits that they may have had prior to the refusal. The debate about that has been interesting and I shall take some of the points into account—I do not accept the substance of points about students—but much of the argument was erroneous because of the small, narrow focus of people who are involved.