Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Bill

moved Amendment No. 3:"Page 3, line 9, at end insert—" ““(3)   Within the period of three years beginning with the commencement (for any purpose) of subsection (1), the Secretary of State shall lay before Parliament a report about the effect of that subsection; and the report— (a)   must specify the number of applications for entry clearance made during that period; (b)   must specify the number of those applications refused; (c)   must specify the number of those applications granted, after an initial indication to the applicant of intention to refuse the application, as a result of further consideration in accordance with arrangements established by the Secretary of State; (d)   must describe those arrangements; (e)   must describe the effect of regulations made under section 88A(1)(a) or (b) as substituted by subsection (1) above; (f)   may include other information about the process and criteria used to determine applications for entry clearance; and (g)   may record opinions.”” The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I tabled a similar amendment on Report, when the Minister said that the Government were minded to accept the principle behind the amendment but that it was technically incorrect in its drafting. I am grateful to the Minister for giving me the opportunity to use the resources of the Home Office Bill team to have it redrafted in a more appropriate form. I put my thanks to the team on record. The drafting that the Home Office Bill team came up with fully meets the objectives of the amendment that I tabled last time. It is important for Parliament to have the guarantee that it will have the chance to hold the Government to account for the whole system of administrative review of applications for leave to enter the UK to study or work—in other words, a chance to review the operation of the Government’s new points system to which we referred in the previous group of amendments. There is also the chance to review the abolition of appeals against refusal of a visa for work and study. The amendment requires the Secretary of State to lay a report before Parliament within a period of three years that kicks off as soon as the Government bring Clause 4 into operation. I chose a period of three years as being what I hope is an appropriate target time, as I want Parliament to be able to review the following matters: first, how the phasing in of the points system is working; secondly, how the training of the entry clearance officers is improved; and, thirdly, how they are coping with what should be a more objective way of allocating visas. The Government have said previously that they expect a roll-out to tier 1 in the next 18 months and then they may go on to tier 2. The Minister gave us further information about the roll-out time today. The Government will have to put in place training and guidance of allocation on points very early, otherwise it will not work. I expect that a debate after three years of the scheme should give a fair reflection of concerns and, one hopes, the successes of the new system. If we had to wait until the scheme has been fully rolled out, we might have to wait for so long that it would be too late to make suggestions about improvements to it, and the rot might have set in, so it is important to get early intervention. As I say, we hope that it will be successful, but experience means that a lot of tweaking always has to be done. I hope that my amendment will give the chance for that tweaking to take place at the right time. The amendment would require the Secretary of State to set out an extensive range of information in the report, including the number of applications made in the period under review, the number refused, and the number granted after initial refusal was reversed as a result of further consideration by the administrative review procedure that the Government had put in place. I hope that proposed new paragraphs (e), (f) and (g) will give Parliament the opportunity to debate more generally how the system itself is working, and the reactions to it of both the users and the staff operating the system, including the views of the entry clearance monitor. I beg to move.