Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

I thank the noble Lord for the reminder and apologise for not dealing with that question. It will be covered with the second amendment. To return to the first, we are anxious not to exclude small organisations for which people may volunteer. Therefore, one of the suggestions from the paper that is in the Library is that it may mean larger organisations validating the work of smaller organisations if the smaller organisations do not have the resources to do it themselves. Again, local authorities are often candidates for providing that kind of validation, either by granting aid or by having a register of charities in the local authority area. We are anxious to avoid a situation where only large charities are beneficiaries and, indeed, where volunteers can offer their services only to larger charities. We require the agreement, understanding and support of larger voluntary organisations to take smaller organisations under their umbrella and look after them, either on a geographical basis or perhaps on the basis of one form of social or other activity. On the point raised by the noble Lord about the ability to extend or reduce the length of time, the simple and brutal point from the Government’s point of view is that, as the noble Lord said, the amendment would restrict the power to amend the qualifying periods. I resist the amendment, as it would represent an inappropriate restriction on the Secretary of State’s power to develop immigration policy. We live in a dynamic and fast-changing world and it is wholly appropriate that the Secretary of State should have sufficient flexibility within the legislation to react to changes as they happen. I can reassure the Committee that any regulations brought forward that sought to change the qualifying period would be subject to the affirmative procedure. That is the assurance that we offer and I hope that the noble Lord will feel that it is sufficient for him to withdraw his amendment. However, on the basis of what he said, I recognise that he might not simply withdraw it but may well return to it at a later stage. The reassurance that we put before the Committee is that we will follow the affirmative resolution procedure should the Government desire to extend or change in any way the pattern established in the clause.