Home Affairs and Justice

I shall not keep the House for too long, but I would like to comment on a number of aspects relating to this afternoon's theme and the Gracious Speech. I estimate that 55 to 60 per cent. of my casework relates to asylum, refugee and immigration issues. That is quite a heavy burden. My assistant, who has been with me since I was elected to this House nearly 17 years ago, has worked miracles with the Home Office on behalf of many constituents. I pay tribute to him, because it has been a big burden and our successes in breaking through red tape and so on are often rewarding. Like so many other hon. Members' assistants, my assistant Carl Morris does much of the nitty-gritty work, and I acknowledge that now in the House. It frustrates those of us with a high ratio of such work when we still see the bureaucracy, inertia and inefficiency of the Border and Immigration Agency on a number of issues. For balance, I want to say that things have improved. I welcome the fact that for some time now we have had a uniformed border and immigration service. That has had an enormous impact. I still think that we should beef it up into a proper border police force, but I am grateful for the current position, which is a marked improvement. However, there is still a long way to go. I urge the Justice Secretary to use his good offices to put pressure on Whitehall for better performance, because there is room for enormous improvement in several respects. Earlier today, my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) put in a bid, which I would like to endorse, in relation to one particular group—Zimbabwean refugees. It is plain common sense and in the interests of everyone that this group should be allowed to work—I would go on to say that other groups should be given that right—and I would have thought that that could be done with the stroke of a pen. No doubt somebody in Whitehall would find 1,000 reasons why it should not be done, but the Justice Secretary has been in office for long enough to say, ““Thank you very much, Sir Humphrey. I hear what you say—now this is what we're going to do.””